by Ali Standish
The library is empty besides two kids sitting at the computers. I take a table in the back and pull out the journal, followed by my lunch. I try to nibble quietly at my carrot sticks (which, it turns out, is pretty much impossible) as my fingers trace the shape of the words, each spike and dip of the pen forming its own question.
Who wrote them? Who knows about the Spinney? Hadn’t Gram told me never to tell anyone else about it? And how could anyone know about the journal inside the sycamore hollow, and how Gram and I took turns writing our stories there?
For a wild minute yesterday, I thought Gram must have found some way to write to me from beyond the grave.
But then I flipped back and saw that the handwriting didn’t match hers at all. It looks kind of familiar, but it’s not Mom’s or Dad’s or Lily’s, either, unless one of them was trying to disguise their handwriting so I wouldn’t be able to recognize it.
I can’t really see any of them writing this chapter, though. Mom hates the woods. No offense to Dad, but he could never write this. He doesn’t even like to read. Gram told me that as a little boy, he was never interested in hearing fairy tales or reading books together like she and I did. Not even The World at the End of the Tunnel. And Lily . . . well, Lily just doesn’t care enough about me to do something like this.
But there is something about the chapter that feels so familiar. Probably because it’s exactly the kind of thing Gram would have written. And maybe that’s the reason that I’m not creeped out by it.
Because it feels like, for the first time since she died, I’ve gotten a tiny piece of her back.
It feels a little bit like magic.
“Hey,” says a voice.
My head snaps up as I slam the journal closed.
Fina is standing beside my table, fidgeting with her backpack straps.
“Oh, hi,” I say, voice lifting with surprise.
“Can I sit with you?” she asks.
I glance behind her. “I thought you went to sit with Edie.”
Fina takes this as an invitation to sit and slides into the chair beside me, dropping her backpack on the floor. “No,” she says. Then she leans in closer. “I don’t think I like her very much, actually.”
“Even though her dad is a famous journalist?” I ask.
“She was so mean to you yesterday about your bag. I don’t like hanging out with people like that, even if their dads are famous.”
I am starting to think Fina and I are going to get along just fine.
“Actually,” she goes on, “I was looking for you in the cafeteria yesterday, but you weren’t there. And when I didn’t see you again today, I thought you might have come here.”
“How’d you know?” I ask, scooching my lunch over as she pulls out her own brown bag.
“Emm-A,” she says. “A for ‘always reading,’ right? I like reading, too. That’s why I wanted to sit with you. Plus, us new kids gotta stick together.”
“And you’re Fin-A,” I say. “A for ‘adaptable.’”
She smiles. “It’s short for Josefina,” she says. “Josefina Ramirez.”
“Emma Talbot,” I say. “I like your name.”
“Thanks! It’s my grandmother’s name, too.”
“Does she live back in California? Or did she move with you?”
“She’s in San Diego,” Fina says. “We lived outside of LA, but we used to go see her a lot. I really miss her. What about your grandmother? You said yesterday that your bag is hers, right?”
“My grandmother—Gram—she died,” I blurt out. The words still feel wrong—silly, almost—coming out of my mouth. I wonder if they’ll ever feel real. “Just a few weeks ago.”
“Oh, no!” Fina says, eyebrows furrowing behind her glasses. “I’m sorry, Emma. That majorly sucks. My grandfather—Abuelito—died a few years ago, and it was awful. I still miss him. Sorry, that probably doesn’t make you feel any better.”
“No, it’s okay,” I say. “I don’t think I’ll ever stop missing Gram.”
Fina nods. My eyes start to well, and I decide we need a change of subject. “It must be really different here from California.”
“It is,” Fina says. “It’s much greener. And the air is so, like, thick! The air in California isn’t like that at all.”
“I bet it’s really boring here compared to there.”
“I think the place where you grow up is always really boring,” she replies. “It’s not like I went to red-carpet premieres or fancy clubs or anything. Mostly I just went into LA for field trips and stuff.”
I giggle. “Edie would be really disappointed to hear that.”
“I bet she would,” Fina replies, grinning. “Anyway, what were you reading?” She peers down at my lap, where I’m still gripping the journal.
“Oh, that’s not, um, what I’m reading,” I say, stuffing the journal into Gram’s satchel and pulling out The World at the End of the Tunnel. “This is.”
Fina almost jumps out of her chair. “Oh, my gosh, I love that book!” she says. “It’s one of my favorites!”
“Really?” I say, but it’s more like a squeal. Because like I said, even though most people have heard of the book, not that many people have actually read it. “I’ve read it like a thousand times.”
“Same here.” She reaches into her backpack and pulls out a notebook. All across the cover, there are quotes written in silver Sharpie. She points to one that I recognize immediately.
It’s from a scene in the book after Jack and Sarah reach the Dimwood. They have the feeling that something is following them, but it’s not until they rescue a gnome from becoming an ogre’s midnight snack that a snowy-white owl swoops down and reveals himself to be an old wizard called Maradel. He rewards them for their kindness with a basket full of fresh bread and butter that magically replenishes itself and a hollow stone with a flame inside that never burns out. When Jack and Sarah thank him for his magic, he says they have themselves to thank. Then he says the thing that’s written on Fina’s notebook.
“Kindness is its own kind of magic.”
“I check the bookstore for a sequel every time I go,” I say.
“I used to have a refrigerator box that I pretended was Fernlace. I made a flag and cut a door and everything.”
“Cool.” Fernlace is the fairy palace in the book, in case you don’t know. On the outside, its walls are made of the strongest river stones, but inside, they are woven from threads of soft cloud.
Fina grins, but then she pulls out a ziplock bag full of vegetable chips and pulls a face. “Ugh. My mom knows I don’t like these.”
“In that case,” I say, digging into my satchel once again until I root out two of the double chocolate chip cookies Mom got me yesterday, “want a cookie?”
She giggles. “I really do. My mom never lets me take cookies to school. She’s way into healthy food.”
I hold up my carrot sticks. “Same,” I say. “I don’t usually get cookies, either.”
I hope Fina doesn’t ask me why I have them today. Ever since I found the journal, I’ve had something else to think about besides my white spots. And I’m not ready to tell anyone else about those.
Fortunately, she breaks a big bite off and sticks it straight in her mouth. “Mmmm,” she groans. “This is amazing.”
Ms. Singh walks down the hall and catches sight of us in the library window. She waves and gives a thumbs-up.
“She thinks we’re reading,” I say. “Doing something educational.”
“This is educational!” Fina insists. “We’re having book club. You know what I love about that book? Every time I read it, it feels like the first time.”
“I know what you mean,” I reply. “It feels like it all happened a really long time ago, but also like it’s happening right as you read it.”
“Exactly.”
“Uh-oh.” Mr. Yardley, the librarian, has spotted us and is headed our way, looking disapproving. “We aren’t supposed to have food in the library.”
Fina glances at the cookie, then stuffs the rest of it in her mouth. She holds up her hands innocently. “What ’ood?” she asks through her mouthful of chocolate.
I laugh so hard I almost spit out the rest of my own cookie.
“The library is a place for reading, not eating,” Mr. Yardley says in a disapproving voice, just as the bell rings.
“Sorry, Mr. Yardley,” I say. I try to sound serious about it. The last thing I need is to be banned from the library. We gather our things to go.
“What do you have now?” I ask.
“Math,” she says. “What about you?”
“Science,” I say.
She makes a gagging motion. “Blurg!”
“Anyway, that was really fun.”
“Same time tomorrow?” says Fina hopefully. “Except maybe we can go to the cafeteria and eat first?”
“Definitely.”
Fina waves goodbye and sets off. I start walking in the opposite direction, feeling lighter than I have since before Gram died.
12
It’s funny how much different school is when you have a friend. Wednesday goes by really fast. And I don’t mind it that much when I hear Edie and the Graces (both of her minions are named Grace, if you can believe it) whispering my name and laughing as I pass them in the hall.
Fina and I eat lunch together before heading back to the library, just like we planned. We talk about our families. I tell her about how Mom always wants everything to be perfect, like one of her architectural drawings, and about how I’ve been really lonely since Gram died. I learn that Fina’s mom got a job teaching history at Hampstead College, which is why they moved. Her dad is a professor, too, but he’s on something called sabbatical.
“It just means he has a lot of free time on his hands,” Fina says with a roll of her eyes. “So he’s been the one doing all the cooking and cleaning. He’s really bad at cleaning, but Mom and I don’t want to hurt his feelings. Yesterday, he put bleach in the laundry instead of detergent. He turned all of Mom’s shirts white!”
Part of me is dying to tell her about the journal. I need someone to talk to about the new entry and who wrote it. Also, is the woman in white that Ivy sees in the forest a witch? Or is she someone else, or just a dream like Gran said? And how do I decide what to write next?
But the other part of me knows I can’t tell anyone. If I did, I would have to tell about the Spinney.
So instead, I tell her about the poem I wrote about Edie. Fina’s eyes go wide.
“So that’s what she was looking at when you leaned down to get your pencil! No wonder—her face went all red and pruney.”
She lets out a little giggle.
“It’s not funny!” I insist. “She’s probably plotting to murder me or something.”
Okay, maybe I was joking about the murder, but Edie does bump into me extra hard during a basketball game in gym later that day. Coincidentally, she manages to do it right when the coach is glancing down at her phone.
I don’t tell on her. I’ve been waiting for her to do something to get back at me, so it’s almost a relief when it finally happens.
On Thursday, Fina and I have just sat down in the cafeteria when I see her waving someone over.
“I hope it’s okay,” she says. “I told her she could sit with us. She’s in my math class, and she’s new here, too.”
I turn around to see a short redheaded girl with masses of freckles bobbing toward us with her tray. She sits down and introduces herself as Ruby.
“Hey!” I say. “I remember you. You were on my bus the first day of school!”
She’s the one who looked really nervous, who I smiled at.
“Oh, yeah,” she agrees after studying me for a moment. “I remember you, too! I made my mom drive me the last couple of days. I hate the school bus.”
“Well, I officially call the first meeting of the New Kids Brigade to order!” Fina says, banging her fist on the table like a gavel. Ruby and I glance at each other and laugh.
“Are we a secret society?” I ask.
“Like with nicknames?” Ruby says eagerly.
Before Fina can answer, I look up to see Edie scowling at us as she passes by. Ruby sinks into her seat, but her eyes follow Edie all the way to a table across the room, where she sits with the two Graces and a pair of boys, Sean and Austin.
“You know Edie?” I ask.
“Not really,” Ruby says. “Only that when I had to say my name on the first day of school, she laughed.”
“Why?” Fina asks blankly.
Ruby points to her freckled face with one hand and holds up a lock of hair with the other. “Red hair, red freckles, red name,” she says. “The kids at my old school thought it was funny, too. I wasn’t exactly, um, popular there. But I thought maybe now we’re older . . .”
She stares wistfully at her PB&J.
Secretly, I don’t think it was very nice of her mom and dad to name her Ruby. But maybe the freckles came later.
“Don’t mind Edie,” I say. “Having a famous dad has given her a big head.”
Ruby’s eyebrows shoot up. “Her dad is famous?”
“Famous-ish,” Fina corrects.
“Point of order,” I say. “I would like to vote for a change in discussion topic.”
“I second that motion,” Fina says, grinning. “Ruby, where’d you move here from?”
Ruby hesitates, like she actually wasn’t done talking about Edie yet, then says she moved from Virginia. By the time she’s done telling us about all the pets she brought with her—three dogs, five cats, two chickens, and a hamster—lunch is over.
“Wait, wait!” Fina says as we start to get up. “I now officially declare this meeting adjourned!”
She bangs her fist against the table again. “Our next meeting shall commence tomorrow, lunchtime. The topic: Mr. Owens giving detention out just for talking in math class. It’s a total infringement on our First Amendment rights!”
“You guys will have to tackle that on your own,” I say, thinking about my doctor’s appointment tomorrow afternoon. “I have to leave school early. . . . I have a thing.”
Fina shoots me a quizzical look, but I don’t really want to tell anyone about the appointment. Or my spots, either. At least not until I know what the doctor is going to say. My stomach turns a somersault.
Friday can’t come soon enough.
13
Dad picks me up on Friday afternoon to take me to my appointment. Mom had an important client call, so she’s meeting us there.
On the way, we listen to the radio for a few minutes before Dad punches it off.
Then, “Your spots could be lots of things, you know,” he says. “A fungus or something.”
“Ew, Dad.”
“It’s not a big deal. People get them all the time. When I met your mom, she had this terrible fungus on her toenails. Didn’t let me see her feet for months until it was all cleared up.”
A nervous giggle escapes my lips as I imagine Mom’s face when the doctor told her she had a fungus. She probably went berserk. In case you haven’t noticed, Mom is not really the fungus type. “She’s never told me that.”
“She’s never told anyone that,” Dad says. “So you can’t either.”
As we pull into the parking lot of the doctor’s office, my heart jumps into my throat. Dad turns off the engine but doesn’t move from his seat.
“Whatever happens, Butterfly,” he says, “you know we love you, right?”
“Right,” I say.
“Okay. Let’s go.”
Mom is already in the waiting room when we walk in. She gives me a hug and kisses my head and tells us she’s already checked me in. Then she crosses one leg over the other and swings her ankle back and forth, back and forth, which makes me feel even more nervous than I already was.
We wait for approximately a year before the nurse calls us back to the consultation room, and for about a lifetime before a short woman in a big sweater dress appears through th
e door.
“Hi there,” she says. “I’m Dr. Howard.”
She shakes Mom’s and Dad’s hands, then looks at me and smiles. “You must be Emma,” she says. “How are you today?”
“Okay,” I say, because according to Mom that’s what you say when someone asks how you are, even though (also according to Mom) you are also not supposed to lie.
Sometimes you just can’t win.
Dr. Howard gestures to the table, covered in crinkly white paper, and I sit down on it. Dad and Mom both stand beside me, ignoring the chair in the corner. “So,” the doctor says, “what seems to be the problem?”
“Well, um, I started to notice these spots,” I say. “Like, white spots.”
“On her toes first,” Mom says. “Right, Emma? And then on your arms.”
“And I think there are some really tiny ones above my eyebrows,” I add, not looking at Mom. I haven’t mentioned those to her.
Dr. Howard blinks. “And when did you start noticing them?”
I think back to Gram’s funeral. “A couple weeks ago. But there was only one then. On my left toe. And then a week or so later, there were a lot more. Or at least that’s when I noticed them.”
I see her studying the skin around my eyebrows. Her face is impossible to read.
“Right,” she says. “Well, how about we give you a bit of space to change into a robe, and then I’ll look at those spots, okay?”
She hands me a robe and tugs the curtain around the bed. As quickly as I can, I take off my jeans and shirt, then shrug into the robe.
“Ready,” I call.
Dr. Howard pulls the curtain back. She examines the right leg first, then the left. She even looks at the bottoms of my feet before doing my arms and stomach. As she runs her fingers along my shoulders, I wonder if she can feel how hard my heart is beating. Every now and then, she hesitates over an area and looks at it through a magnifying glass. She runs her fingers through my scalp and finishes by studying my face again.
While she examines me, she asks me questions in a bright voice, about school and stuff. It’s almost enough to distract me from the tiny frown I see creep up her face.
“So, what’s wrong with me?” I ask when I feel like I can’t stand not knowing for even one more second.