Fortune Falls

by Jenny Goebel

  I’d forgotten all about her. I glanced back toward the entrance to the tunnel, but she was nowhere in sight. The last time I’d seen her, she’d been perched on one of the side track rails. She had to have moved when the train came. She had to be all right. Didn’t she?

  “She led us to Wink!” Petey persisted.

  I nodded my head. “Wait here. I’ll go look for her.” Just as I was about to suck in my breath once more and charge back into the tunnel, the black cat came promenading out. Not only that, she was carrying something small and furry in her mouth—a rabbit’s foot.

  We saw two crows perched on a tree limb on the way home.

  Two crows, joy—the rabbit’s foot was working already. Still, even joy didn’t seem adequate to describe what I was feeling. I felt giddy and bubbly and impossibly light. I squeezed Petey’s hand, and we both chortled with laughter. Nothing was funny; it was just beyond understanding that our luck had done such a one-eighty. Wink was back, and the charm changed everything. I didn’t want to get too far ahead of myself, but it had to mean the curse was somehow broken.

  It meant I could pass the Luck Test. It meant I could go to Flourish and stay with my family. It meant I could still be friends with Cooper. It meant I was having the best birthday imaginable, even if it was Friday the thirteenth!

  When the four of us—Petey, me, Wink, and the cat—arrived back at the house, Mom was waiting at the front door with a huge smile on her face.

  “I passed!” she squealed, her curls bouncing as she ran to greet us on the lawn. She grabbed my left hand and Petey’s right hand and we spun circles together beneath the fake crows. “No more Mr. Keen! No more double shifts! I’m a certified nurse, and I’m transferring to pediatrics!”

  Remarkable.

  It was all too wonderful to believe. I hadn’t merely skirted past Fate’s skeletal fingers. Somehow, I’d glided far beyond its reach and brought my family with me.

  “Mom!” I said, tugging the rabbit’s foot from my pocket. Back at the tunnel, the black cat had set it down on the ground before me, almost ceremoniously, with the loudest purr I’d ever heard humming inside her.

  The foot was more than a little grisly—a slender white bone protruded from one end and seemed to have been picked clean. But the fur on the other end was soft and fresh and overflowing with fortune. I didn’t want to think about what horrible death the poor rabbit had met. What a sad twist of fate that rabbits’ own feet never bring them any luck.

  Mom clapped her hand over her mouth in surprise. She was ecstatic to the brink of tears. “How?”

  “I’m not sure. I …” I glanced around searching for the cat and caught a glimpse of her yellow eyes staring back at me from deep within a bush. Eerie, I thought, then, No. Yellow—the color of sunshine, bright enough to penetrate darkness.

  Since she was safely hidden, an explanation could wait. I shrugged.

  My feelings for the cat were too jumbled. I knew it would take time to sort them all out. I’d have to figure out what to do about her soon but, for the time being, tucked away in the bushes seemed like an okay thing. And there was something else I’d been thinking about on the walk home. “Can I go to the dance tonight, Mom?” I blurted out. “Now that I have the rabbit’s foot, I’ll be safe. I know it’s my birthday, but we already had cake. And … there’s someone I need to apologize to.”

  Mom gave me a scrutinizing look, but it didn’t last long. Soon she was bobbing her head happily. “Why not?” Then she reached up and, in one fell swoop, snatched all the remaining fake crows from a nearby branch and tugged until their strings snapped.

  * * *

  I felt mysterious, and beautiful, and lucky.

  The rabbit’s foot hung from a black leather pouch around my neck, and I wore black tights and a long black T-shirt, and my coils of hair looked wildly exotic behind my feathered mask. My mom had unstitched all the black feathers from the fake crows and then molded and fastened them together until they formed butterfly wings around my eyes.

  As soon as I stepped into the school gym, I gasped. It had gone through an even greater transformation than I had. Small white lights were wrapped around four ladders that stood like Eiffel Towers in the four corners of the gym. The twinkling lights provided the only illumination.

  Black gossamer cloth draped the tables and hung from the walls. Boys and girls flitted across the room in elegant masks and dark clothing. It felt like a dream or a nightmare or some blurry place in between.

  Someone handed me a glass of bloodred punch. I took a sip. It fizzed and sizzled all the way down my throat as I scanned the room for one masked boy in particular.

  When a bone-chilling scream sliced the air, my body went rigid—a response so deeply ingrained, I’d probably never rid myself of it. Around me, everyone else was laughing. It took me a moment to register what was happening. It’d just been a prank. A scare. Someone had spooked a friend with a fake, dangling spider. Fear for fun—a new concept for me.

  It seemed that danger held a sweet appeal for those whose lives had never truly been marred by it.

  Terror forced you to feel alive—made your heart pound and your blood pulse, brought a surge of energy and heightened awareness. Maybe, deep down, the Luckies felt like they were missing out on something. Why else would they throw a party on the most dangerous night of the year, set up ladders in the gym, and dress like omen-bringing birds?

  Huh. All these years I’d cowered at home on Friday the thirteenth, wishing I were here. And now that I was here, it all seemed rather silly. A giggle bubbled in my throat at the exact same time a finger tapped playfully on my shoulder.

  Cooper.

  One of his eyes was covered with a pirate patch made from black feathers; the other sparkled brightly in the Eiffel Tower lights. “You came!” Cooper shouted over the music wafting through the air.

  I nodded my head and yelled, “She’s back!”

  I didn’t have to explain who I meant. Cooper’s face spread into a grin worthy of the most devious, seafaring rascal that ever lived. “How?”

  With the loud music playing in the background, it was impossible to explain everything that had happened, so I simply lifted the pouch around my neck and let him have a peek at the rabbit’s foot.

  “Does this mean?”

  I nodded my head. “The curse is broken.”

  Cooper picked me up by the waist and spun me through the air, which was not an easy thing to do considering we were nearly the exact same height. I hadn’t even needed to say I was sorry. I could tell by the way his eyes were alight with relief and the way he squeezed me to him that all had been forgiven. “You have to tell me everything!”

  Cooper set me back down, laced his fingers through mine, then led me through a door that had been cracked open for fresh air.

  Outside, the stars were far more brilliant than the twinkling lights inside the gym. With the door still ajar, the now softer, velvety sound of music provided a soundtrack as I told my story. Cooper’s forehead creased with concern as I purged every last detail: my mom being called into work, the window having shattered in the storm, and Petey getting angry at me and disappearing in the night. Cooper held my hand, squeezing harder than he probably meant to as I told him about searching for my brother in the cemetery and later finding him asleep in the alcove. Then about my botched birthday wish and rescuing Wink from the tunnel. He didn’t relax until I got to the part about the cat and the lucky rabbit’s foot.

  When I’d finished, he hugged me to him again. “I can’t believe you’re here.”

  I melted against him, resting my head on his shoulder. “I can’t, either,” I whispered.

  Just then, sharp voices rang out from near the entrance of the school. We slowly broke apart and then quietly crept up behind the bushes to get a peek of what was going on.

  A trembling Nathan Small stood on the sidewalk. He wore all black—the only shock of color coming from a four-leaf clover pinned to his shirt. Felicia stood in front of him,
blocking the way inside.

  “Tell me,” Felicia said forcefully, “what do you think you’re doing here?”

  “I … came for the dance,” Nathan said.

  Felicia shot him a scornful look before dropping her gaze to the clover. Quick as lightning, she ripped it from his shirt. “Where did you get this?” she said, holding it out in front of him. “You’re luckless. You couldn’t have possibly found it on your own.”

  Nathan squared his shoulders. “A friend gave it to me,” he said and then added, “He has plenty.”

  Felicia narrowed her eyes and without any hesitation, she dropped the four-leaf clover on the sidewalk. Before Nathan could snatch it back up, she pulverized the clover beneath her shoe. “We don’t have room for hapless upstarts in this town,” she said. “If the Unlucky think that just because someone shows pity on them, they can attend the same schools, even show up at our dances, they’re wrong. It’s just going to go badly once the charm wears off.”

  Felicia paused and then sweetened her voice. “I’m sorry. But you understand, don’t you?” She wrapped her arm around Nathan and turned him so that he was facing away from the school. “It’s time for you to go home.”

  Nathan didn’t put up a struggle. He merely trudged back down the sidewalk. His acceptance of it all—like he’d been expecting something like this to happen—broke my heart more than anything. Felicia watched him go with a smug smile on her face. When he had disappeared from view, she marched back inside.

  I lunged forward, but Cooper held me back. “There’s nothing we can do now. The clover can’t be repaired, and Nathan is already gone. Don’t let Felicia ruin your night, too.”

  I dropped my gaze to the minced pieces of green on the sidewalk and nodded my head.

  “Besides, it’s your birthday, and you haven’t even danced yet.”

  I allowed Cooper to lead me back to our original spot just outside the gym. Music still seeped like honey through the crack in the door, filling the starlit sky. I shed my anger with Felicia, as well as the injustice I felt for Nathan, and let the music fill me, too. The night was warm with just enough breeze to cause a gentle rustle in the budding leaves of a nearby tree. The air was sweet with the scent of blossoming flowers.

  Cooper took my hand again, and I realized that I hadn’t danced since my last ballet recital—since the night before my dad died.

  “Okay?” he asked.

  I nodded my head. Then I let myself go. The swirling and swaying made me feel giddy again. My skin tingled where Cooper’s left hand rested on my shoulder, and mine on his side. It felt almost electric where the fingers of our other hands joined together, forming their own little tower between us.

  This is why I came, I thought. Not to dress like a crow. Not just because I had a lucky charm and now I could. I came because Cooper was here.

  We danced beneath the starlight until I felt dizzy and light-headed. But, for once, it wasn’t the light-headedness of having held my breath too long. If anything, it was from breathing deeply, from finally having the world lifted off my chest.

  Even though I’d barely slept a wink the night before, I had trouble falling asleep after the dance. Part of me kept wanting to float up and out of bed with the weightlessness and freedom I’d felt while dancing with Cooper. The other part was being chained down by the seared-in-my-brain image of Felicia crushing Nathan’s clover.

  No matter how much luck I had, Felicia would always have more. And for whatever reason, she would always use her luck to push down those with less luck. I shuddered to think just how far she and her parents might go.

  Would they take charms from everyone they felt undeserving, so that only the uber-lucky had any luck at all? If they could convince others the way they’d convinced Cooper’s parents, all the Luckies might turn on those with less luck. What if the town decided Bane’s wasn’t enough protection? Perhaps the Luckies would find a way to also have the luckless adults, maybe even the very young, separated, too. Or worse. Would they do to the Unluckies what had been done to all the cats?

  I swallowed a lump in my throat and glanced at the window well. At some point, the black cat had hopped down in it again. The second I slid the window open, the cat began purring and rubbing her boney stub-tailed backside against my hand. Her fur was so soft. As much as I didn’t want to make the comparison, I couldn’t help but think of all the people who’d never given Wink a chance, never given me a chance, for that matter.

  But that was different.

  Wink was Wink, I was me, but something about the cat was evil. Or maybe not. I wasn’t so sure anymore.

  One thing I did know was that she trusted me. It would be easy to trap her now and make a trade. That was if I still needed a rabbit’s foot—which I didn’t. Unless …

  Perhaps I should still make a trade with Zeta, I thought. If I did, I might be able to do something to thwart Felicia’s actions. Otherwise, I knew she wouldn’t stop campaigning until all the luckless had been eradicated from Fortune Falls.

  * * *

  The next morning, the cat followed me all the way to Lucky CharmZ, brushing against my legs as I opened the door to the luck emporium. I figured it didn’t matter if she was seen with me. People in this part of town were frightened of their own shadows. The last thing they’d want to do is mess with a black cat, no matter how much they wanted it to disappear.

  Zeta raised his bushy eyebrows at the sight of the black cat weaving between my legs.

  “I want to make a trade,” I blurted out the moment his eyes met mine.

  “Ha! I see you found Jinx,” Zeta replied. “This is the cat you want to trade in? I should’ve known.”

  “I—no … Jinx?” I said, thoroughly confused.

  “That’s the cat’s name. Jinx. It means something that brings bad luck. She’s a lucky black cat, so, you know, I thought it would be cute.” I swear Zeta started to blush as he went on with his explanation. “Like calling a big man Tiny, or a timid dog Bear—that sort of thing.”

  “I know what Jinx means,” I said, “but did you say—”

  Just then, Chance came barreling out from behind the counter. The cat hissed when she saw the pudgy, little pig. Chance squealed, spun around, and dove back behind the counter for cover. Zeta placed a big hand on his big, bald head. “Ack, the two of them really don’t get along.”

  “I’m sorry,” I tried again, “did you say she’s lucky?”

  “Yep, that cat right there is a Japanese bobtail. A black one like her is rare, and one of the luckiest charms you could ever hope to encounter. I had her imported straight from Japan as a kitten. But she’s worthless for selling. Everyone around here has it in their heads that all black cats are unlucky. Try telling that to the Japanese Yamato dynasty—longest continually ruling family in the world. And why do you think that is? Black cats. Still, no one will buy her for her luck, and she couldn’t hex something to save her life.”

  Zeta leaned in close to me and whispered, “I’ll let you in on a little secret, though, if you promise not to tell anyone.”

  I nodded my head.

  “Even in Fortune Falls, luck often has very little to do with the charm and everything to do with perception.”

  I glanced down at Jinx. She was intently staring at the spot where Chance had disappeared behind the counter. She was poised to pounce just as soon as the pig poked its little pink snout out again. A lucky black cat? I shook my head in disbelief. My judgment of her had certainly been clouded ever since the moment she showed up on my driveway. All thanks to my perception of what I thought she should be, not what she was.

  What about all the students who’d perform poorly on the Luck Test? How many of them would wind up luckless simply because they were sorted that way? Betsy seemed to have average luck. Apparently, her brother’s luck had been average, too. But at Bane’s, they’d both be branded Unlucky, so certainly they’d end up as such.

  The levels of grayness in luck never failed to mystify me. I knew I’d never get
it all figured out, so I moved on to something I could comprehend. “A bobtail,” I said, “so her tail is supposed to be that way?”

  The shop owner chuckled. “I bet you thought something took it from her. Another animal? A trap? Nah, that’s the tail she was born with. And I highly doubt Jinx would let anything or anyone put their hands or teeth on her unless she wanted them to. Fate knows I couldn’t put my hands on her. Shame, because petting her makes you lucky, too—for a spell anyway.”

  “Oh,” I said. It all made sense now. I’d petted her before I’d gone into the tunnel with Wink. Jinx was the reason we’d made it out safely, and of course a lucky cat would find a rabbit’s foot. “How long does it last?”

  “I thought so. She let you pet her, didn’t she?” He nodded his head. “Seems like the two of you might just be kindred spirits—both used to being misjudged, perhaps? Well, the extra luck lasts only for a few hours, maybe half a day, but it works every time you pet her. Here, Jinx, come here, girl. Let Zeta stroke your fur for a second?” The shop owner droned on, “Here, kitty, kitty.”

  Jinx licked her paw, ignoring Zeta until he finally gave up.

  “Ah, well, if you want me to take her off your hands, I’m more than willing. But I know better than to demand that you give her back. Finders keepers, losers weepers and all that. Even if I can’t sell her, she’s worth at least two horseshoes. Jinx will come around to me eventually … as long as I can keep her and Chance from going at it all the time. That is if you still want to make a trade?”

  “Oh,” I said. “Thank you. But I wasn’t planning on trading the cat. I want to trade this in.” I opened the leather pouch Mom had given me for the dance and pulled out the lucky rabbit’s foot. “The cat I was hoping to keep,” I said quietly.

  Zeta’s eyes darted back and forth between Jinx and me. He whistled and placed one hand in the other, rippling his tattooed muscles. “She must really like you. Let you soak up quite a bit of luck, I’d say. As far as I’m concerned, she’s yours. And you can probably do as well as anyone who aspires to owning a cat. Seems to me, though, they’re only interested in owning themselves.”