Lucky Me

by Cindy Callaghan

  To both of the Genes I’ve been lucky to have known and loved.

  Acknowledgments

  I am one lucky girl to have so many wonderful people in my life to thank.

  As always, I need to thank my ever faithful critique partners, the WIPs: Gale, Carolee, Josette, Jane, Chris, and Shannon, and the Northern Delaware Sisters in Crime group: John, KB, Jane, June, Chris, Janis, Susan, and Kathleen. I could write without them, but nothing would be very good.

  Special thanks as always to my family: Ellie, Evan, Happy, Kevin, my parents, my nieces and nephews, my sister, my sisters-in-law, my brothers-in-law, and my mother-in-law.

  Thanks to inspiring friends near and far, old and new.

  I am the luckiest of lucksters to work with a literary dream team: Mandy Hubbard, literary agent, and Alyson Heller, editor. Without their help and support, none of this works.

  To teachers and librarians. Most of all, to my readers—I love getting your e-mails, letters, pictures, selfies, posts, and Tweets . . . keep ’em coming! I hope you love Lucky Me as much as Lost in London and Just Add Magic.

  To all of you above, and those I’ve somehow forgotten, I wish you luck in both your dreams and your realities.

  One

  If I had to pick one thing that I believe in more than anything else, it would be this: LUCK. I’m Meghan McGlinchey, the most superstitious thirteen-year-old girl in Delaware, and possibly the world.

  For example, I never got out of bed when my digital clock read an odd number. Odd number = bad luck.

  7:02. Perfect.

  I dressed in a snap because every day it was the same school uniform—boring plaid skirt, plain white shirt, itchy button-up navy-blue sweater, matching headband, horrendous blue leather shoes, and kneesocks. The outfit was—how should I say this?—ugly!

  I dashed down the stairs, especially careful to skip the thirteenth step today because it was a very important day, one I’d been looking forward to for weeks. I was running for eighth-grade class president. And today was the election. I had done a stellar job campaigning FOREVER. If I didn’t totally mess up my speech, I was pretty sure I was gonna win. With all the practicing I’d been doing, it would take a major freak of nature for me to mess it up.

  I passed my four sisters and parents scrambling around in the kitchen. I opened a can of food for my cat, Lucky. He ran over when he heard it pop. I scratched his ears as he lapped up the food.

  I loved Lucky, but he and I had a problem. He was a black cat. And people like me, we didn’t mix well with black cats. But we had an understanding: He didn’t cross my path, and I took good care of him. It worked for us.

  The kitchen was louder than usual this morning. My younger sister Piper (the fifth grader) yelled at one of my older sisters, Eryn (the eleventh grader), “Why did you touch my playlist? Why? WHY?”

  Dad yelled across the kitchen to my mom, “Can you put a bagel in the toaster for me?”

  The baby, Hope, cried while my oldest sister sang her an Irish lullaby to calm her. It wasn’t working, so she tried some applesauce, which the baby threw across the room. It nearly hit my white shirt, but I ducked out of the way just in time. SPLAT! The applesauce hit the wall behind me.

  Phew, that was lucky!

  I stood at the front door, under the horseshoe mounted on the wall and next to my snow globe collection, watching the insanity.

  The living room was a mess with suitcases and duffel bags. We were leaving the next morning for Ireland, where we would spend spring break. The purpose of the trip was for my father to meet his newly discovered sister. You see, he’d been born in Ireland. Sadly, something happened to his parents when he was just a kid, and he’d been raised at a home for boys.

  Until a few months ago he hadn’t thought he had any family. But thanks to some online research, he’d found a long-lost sister. I imagined that when he met her, he’d introduce me as his middle daughter and president of Wilmington Prep’s eighth-grade class. It was gonna be totally impressive.

  I crunched the granola bar I’d packed in my backpack the night before—instant breakfast. With a little planning, my morning was the way I liked it: mayhem-free.

  In fact, I liked most things organized. I might have been the most organized eighth grader at Wilmington Prep, an all-girls private school that went from kindergarten through twelfth grade. This meant that Piper and Eryn were in my school. If you knew either Piper or Eryn, you’d know this wasn’t a good thing. (Piper was known as the bigmouth, while Eryn was quiet and filled with a bad attitude. I’d heard a lot of nicknames for her, most made up by my bestie, Carissa. None of them were nice.)

  While I waited for someone to realize it was time to leave, I flipped through a Forever 21 catalog.

  “Meghan,” Mom called through the chaos. “You have a letter on the table.”

  “A letter?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “You know, the regular old-fashioned paper kind that’s delivered by a mailman.”

  I stepped around the chaos. Sure enough, on the hall table was a letter addressed to moi.

  Who writes letters anymore when you can just text or e-mail? The postmark on the envelope said Limerick, Ireland. Hmmm.

  Dear Friend,

  I am starting this chain letter and mailing it to three people to whom I would like to send good luck. In turn they must send it to three people. If you are receiving this, someone has sent the luck to you—as long as you, in turn, send it to three more people within six days.

  Chain letters have existed for centuries, and many have traveled around the world. A United States police officer received $25,000 within one day of sending his letters. However, another woman ignored it and lost her life’s fortune because she broke the chain. A Norwegian fisherman thought for sure he would never find true love, but just two days after sending his letters, he met the woman of his dreams.

  To get your luck and avoid the unlucky consequences, you must:

  • Copy this letter

  • Add your name below and remove the name above yours

  • Mail it to three people within six days

  from,

  4. Clare Gallagher, Ireland

  5. ___________________

  Clare Gallagher?

  I didn’t know anyone by that name. How does she know me? That wasn’t important now. What was important was that I send this letter to three people ASAP. No, double-ASAP. Maybe I could get the good luck as soon as today—for the election—and avoid those “unlucky consequences.”

  I went into my mom and dad’s home office and rummaged around.

  “What are you doing in there?” Mom called over the havoc.

  “Looking for envelopes!”

  “I don’t have any,” Mom said. “Sorry. I’ll bring a few home from work tonight.”

  That would be too late. Maybe I could get a couple from the school office. I only needed three. “How about stamps?”

  “Sorry. The baby used them as stickers. I can buy more after vacation.”

  After vacation wasn’t today, and I needed the luck today.

  Eryn bumped me out of her way, causing me to drop the letter. “Move it, buttmunch,” she said. She stepped on the letter as she left the house. (This is what I meant about her attitude—bad.)

  Piper did pretty much the same thing on her way out, not because she had attitude issues but because she wasn’t paying attention.

  Shannon picked the letter up for me. She was twenty-two years old and definitely the nicest of my sisters. She commuted to the University of Delaware, and itched to finish school so she could move out of our house and “find herself,” whatever that meant.

  I took the letter, followed Shannon to the car, and climbed into the back with Piper. Eryn sat shotgun. Always. I didn’t even try to
beat her to the front seat anymore. Shannon always dropped us off at Wilmington Prep, then headed to UD. She picked us up later, on her way home. After school, we did homework or whatever until Mom or Dad got home from the law firm where they worked together. They were always home for a late full-family dinner, when we talked about our day, whether we wanted to or not.

  On our drive Piper chattered about our spring break trip, while I just stared out the window.

  “What do you guys know about chain letters?” I asked.

  Shannon said, “You need to send ’em right away, don’t you?”

  I could feel Eryn rolling her eyes.

  Piper asked a hundred questions: “What’s a chain letter? . . . Who sent it? . . . Why? Can you send it back? . . . Why not? How come I didn’t get one? . . . Huh?”

  I didn’t answer her; I responded to Shannon. “I don’t have any stamps or envelopes, and I want the good luck today.”

  “Why don’t you e-mail it?” Shannon asked. “You could do that right now on your phone.”

  Piper said, “Problem solved. Shannon is supersmart. . . .” She continued to ramble on while I typed the letter quickly with my thumbs. I reread it to make sure I hadn’t made any mistakes. I put my name on the bottom and didn’t put Clare’s. When I finished, Piper was still talking. “She gets As in college. That’s a lot of hard work.”

  I hit the send button on my phone, and e-mail chain letters went out to three friends from summer camp. “Okay. It’s done. Let the good luck begin!”

  Eryn snickered.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Oh, nothing,” she said with a smirk. “Let me know how that works for you. On second thought, don’t. That would mean you’d be talking to me.” She made a grossed-out face that I caught in the side mirror. “But any moron knows that you can’t e-mail a snail-mail chain letter. It’s cheating. And chain letters have a way of messing with cheaters.”

  Piper said, “Uh-oh.”

  Uh-oh?

  I couldn’t have any uh-oh.

  Not today.

  Two

  As soon as I walked into science class, it looked like Eryn might have been right. “Miss McGlinchey,” Ms. Geneva called to me. “Please report to the front of the classroom for a demerit.”

  A demerit? I didn’t get demerits. I followed all the rules all the time, to avoid getting demerits. I followed the rules even when demerits weren’t involved. I flossed, waited twenty minutes after eating to swim, and wore SPF 50 sunscreen every day.

  I took the yellow paper from her hand. For each demerit you got, you missed one recess. If you got five, you were suspended from school for a day. Ms. Geneva must have read the puzzled look on my face. She gestured toward my feet. “Your socks.”

  I looked down. One black, one blue.

  OMG! Somehow, for the first time in my history of wearing kneesocks, I had accidentally mismatched them. But that could happen to anyone, right?

  I sulked all the way back to my desk.

  “What the heck?” Carissa looked shocked as I sat back down.

  “My stupid socks don’t match,” I grumbled.

  Carissa chuckled. “You can hardly tell,” she said a little bit too loudly.

  “Shh,” I said. “Or you’ll get one too.”

  “Oh, like that would be something new. You know they named a desk after me in detention. Not many people can claim that.” Carissa missed a lot of recesses, and she’d been suspended twice. On those days, she said she’d sat on the couch all day eating popcorn and watching on-demand movies—R-rated. Her mom was home way more than mine but never had a clue what Carissa did. Carissa’s life was kinda the opposite of mine.

  The teacher said, “Mademoiselle Carissa Lyons, fermez la bouche!” Everyone has to take French as part of Wilmington Prep’s curriculum, so we both knew that was a teacher’s polite way of saying “Shut up.”

  Considering all the preparation I’d done, I was way more nervous for my speech than I should’ve been. I sat on the stage, in mismatched socks, in front of the entire eighth-grade class. This speech would seal the election for me. I’d worked hard on it, and it was—how can I say this so that it doesn’t sound like I’m bragging?—perfect! I had nothing to worry about.

  I imagined the scene as though it was frozen in one of my lucky snow globes: I’m on stage delivering my last sentence, but before I finish, the room booms with applause. Kids stand up and cheer. My opponent is so intimidated, she walks offstage—she doesn’t stand a chance. She knows it. I know it.

  The principal introduced me and my opponent, Avery Brown, and she explained that we each had four minutes.

  I was up first. I stepped to the podium and began:

  “Fellow classmates,” I started confidently, “my name is Meghan McGlinchey. I want to be your class president for three very important reasons. First, I am filled with Wilmington Prep school spirit. . . .”

  I looked into the crowd and noticed that everyone was talking to each other like I wasn’t even there.

  I held up two fingers. “Secondly.” Still the crowd talked among themselves. I could hear them like a rumble. Why weren’t they listening to my amazing speech? I was being very clear, articulate, and was holding up fingers.

  Principal Jackson came out from behind the stage’s curtain and walked over to the podium, where I was already talking about point number three and holding up three fingers.

  “Excuse me,” she whispered, interrupting my flow.

  I whispered back to her, “What’s the matter?”

  “The microphone—” She flipped a switch with her thumb, and her words bellowed: “IT ISN’T TURNED ON!” She moved it away from her mouth. “It is now.”

  My fellow classmates laughed.

  They hadn’t heard a single perfect word I’d said. I started over. “My name is—”

  The girl who was keeping time in the front row said, “One minute.”

  One minute?

  “Reason number one . . .” I raced.

  “Number two . . .” I spoke faster, threw up two fingers.

  “And number three—”

  “Time!” the timekeeper said.

  Principal Jackson walked out clapping her hands. “Thank you, Meghan.”

  “B-but,” I sputtered. “The mic.”

  “Very good job. Next we have Avery Brown.”

  I passed Avery as I went back to my chair and she approached the podium. She said, “Bad luck for you.”

  It was.

  What have I done?

  Three

  The election was during lunch in the school courtyard. I stood near the ballot box, ready to shake hands with my fellow eighth-grade voters. My hands were sweaty.

  Carissa entered the courtyard covered in VOTE FOR MEGHAN buttons.

  “Did you hear that speech?” I asked her.

  “I couldn’t hear much.”

  “Thanks a lot,” I said.

  “Just being honest. It wasn’t great,” she admitted. “But we can’t go back and change it. You’re gonna have to win this election right now.”

  The spring breeze picked up. It was cool and felt good.

  “I am?”

  “Yes. Ready?”

  I nodded.

  Loudly Carissa asked me, “So, what do you plan to do about our aging technology in the computer lab, Candidate Meghan McGlinchey?”

  She knew I had a good answer to this. “A car wash!” I said, loud enough for everyone to hear. “We’ll have a car wash in the parking lot during the statewide track meet that Wilmington Prep is hosting. Over two thousand cars will pass through here that day.”

  “That’s an incredible idea,” Carissa said. “It sounds like a lot of fun, too!” Some of my classmates seemed to perk up at the idea, but it started to get colder in the courtyard, and they slowly migrated inside. Carissa tried to keep the voters in the area by yelling, “What about cafeteria food? Who’s concerned about the quality of our cafeteria food?”

  “I am!” I said, and I d
etailed my plan.

  I could hear some of the girls who were waiting in line to cast their vote say how excited they were about my idea for a student cooking contest in the cafeteria to improve the food. It was something I’d read about in an ebook.

  Carissa was brilliant. Heck, I was brilliant! Maybe everyone in line voted for me before they ran inside to get out of the cold wind.

  Things were looking good, until a big gust of wind knocked over the ballot box. Papers—all of the ballots—scattered everywhere.

  Four

  In between the election and our monthly school assembly—a magic show by the Fabulous Frank-O—Carissa asked, “What’s with you today?”

  I quickly explained the snail-mail–e-mail chain letter conundrum and showed Carissa the letter. She instantly pulled me into a nearby restroom and into a stall.

  “What are we doing here? Whatever it is, I don’t think it’ll cheer me up,” I complained.

  She took out her state-of-the-art—and strictly off-limits during school—phone. I’d put mine in a cubby when I’d walked into school, just like we were supposed to. Carissa never did.

  “Are you kidding me?” I asked. “You’re holding enough demerits in your hand to get us both expelled.” I started to shake in my mismatched socks.

  “Rules, rules. You’re always about rules. Let’s think of the cell phone rule more as un conseil, or a guideline. I mean, what if there was an emergency? This is an emergency. You’re lucky you have me to help you put things into perspective.”

  “I’m feeling anything but lucky today. In fact, I feel like any minute the sky might fall right onto my head.”

  “Don’t pull a Chicken Little on me just yet.” She touched the phone’s screen. I would’ve paced around if I could, but it was cramped in the stall, which was a gross place for our rendezvous.

  “Don’t worry. This thing is faster than lightning,” Carissa said. “It’s got, like, six or eight Gs. Gimme two secs, and I’ll figure out the official way you can reverse the bad luck of a snail-mail–e-mail chain letter sitch.”

  “How are you going to do that?”