Hand-Me-Down Magic #2
Page 4
“And that only caused trouble,” Del finished.
“I guess we don’t really understand fortunes,” Alma said.
“Or crystal balls,” Del said.
“Or kittens,” Alma said.
“Or magic,” Abuelita said.
“Especially magic,” Alma said.
“But we don’t have to understand everything,” Del said.
“We don’t?” Alma asked.
Del did an Abuelita shrug again. Abuelita did one too. “We all get scared sometimes,” Del said. She held the kitten closer and wrapped the dishtowel around its hurt paw. She let it drink milk out of her hands. “And there will always be something or someone we don’t really understand.”
The kitten still looked scared. Del looked a little scared too. Alma supposed that was something they all had in common.
“Look at it,” Alma said. “Just a little fraidycat, like me.”
Del grinned. The kitten was purring. It would still have to go to the vet, but it was already feeling so much better, Alma was sure.
“What?” Alma asked. “Why are you smiling like that?”
“That’s the perfect name for our kitten,” Del said. “You’re not the fraidycat anymore. Neither am I. The kitten is. We’ll name it Fraidycat.”
“I like that,” Alma said. She was happy to not be the only fraidycat anymore. Everyone was a fraidycat sometimes, after all.
15
The Best Fortune-Teller Around
-Del-
The vet said Del had done a very good job taking care of Fraidycat. He also told them that Fraidycat was a girl cat and that she was under one year old and was very lucky indeed to have met Alma and Del. The vet sent Fraidycat home with some bandages and a little dropper of medicine and orders to bring her back in a week.
“Oh,” Del said. “She’s not ours.”
“She’s not?” the vet asked.
“She’s not?” Abuelita asked with a glimmer in her eye.
“We can keep her?” Del asked. She raised her eyebrows. Her heart thumped. A tiny black kitten would be the best birthday present of all.
“I don’t think we have much choice,” Abuelita said. She nodded at Fraidycat, who was curled up and purring in Del’s lap. Cats usually were scared of the vet, but Fraidycat didn’t seem very afraid at all when Del was around.
Back home, Del and Alma gave Fraidycat a tour of 86 ½ Twenty-Third Avenue. Fraidycat was a little afraid of the stairs and Evie’s talking baby doll and Titi Rosa’s rocking chair.
But Fraidycat loved the long pink curtains in Alma’s living room and the tassels on Abuelita’s rug and the wind chimes hanging in Del’s kitchen window.
What Fraidycat loved most of all, though, was the crystal ball. She found it in Del’s closet and curled herself around it. She pawed at its surface. She ran in circles around it, then nuzzled her nose against it, purring.
Alma and Del watched her play with the crystal ball.
“She’s not afraid of that, I guess,” Alma said.
“I guess not,” Del said.
“What about you?” Alma asked. “Are you still afraid?”
“A little,” Del said. “I’m still scared my bad fortune will come true.”
“But your fortune did come true,” Alma said. “And it wasn’t bad at all.”
“It did?” Del asked. She’d been so busy worrying about something horrible happening, she hadn’t thought about what had actually happened. A black cat had come into her life, just like Madame Alma had predicted. “Oh!” Del said. “Oh my gosh! You’re right! I got a black cat, just like you predicted!” Del’s eyes were wide. She felt the way she always felt when magic was around—excited and in awe and ready for anything.
Well, almost anything.
“I guess not all my fortunes are cursed after all,” Alma said. “But still, I don’t think I’ll be turning into Madame Alma again anytime soon.”
“I don’t think I want to be Madame Del again either,” Del said.
“There’s really only one person who wants to use that crystal ball,” Alma said. “One cat, that is.”
Fraidycat purred and waved her tail. Her tiny tongue licked the crystal ball’s surface.
“Madame Fraidycat,” Del said.
Fraidycat purred in agreement.
Alma and Del leaned in close to the ball. They wondered if Madame Fraidycat could see anything inside. They wondered if they could see what she saw. What might their future hold? What kinds of adventures were ahead for them?
And there, reflected in the crystal ball’s crystal surface, were Alma and Del and their itty-bitty Fraidycat, all smiling and hopeful and not so scared after all.
A very happy fortune indeed.
Acknowledgments
I love spending time in the world of these books, and I’m so thrilled to keep hanging out on Twenty-Third Avenue.
Many thanks to my agent, Victoria Marini, for helping me find the imperfect in the beautiful.
Such a big thank-you to my editor, Mabel Hsu, for taking ideas and making them into magic. Your vision and clarity have proven to be so necessary and inspiring for me.
Thank you, Katherine Tegen, for your ongoing enthusiasm and support.
A very special thank-you to incredible illustrator Luisa Uribe. I see myself and my friends and family in your illustrations, and it brings me so much joy.
Thank you to designer David L. DeWitt for helping make this book truly beautiful and love filled.
Thank you so much to Alexandra Hernandez. I love sharing stories with you.
Thank you to the wonderful team at Katherine Tegen Books who give so much of themselves to the work of bringing books into the world, and who have treated my books with incredible care: Tanu Srivastava, Amy Ryan, Alexandra Rakaczki, Maya Myers, Allison C. Brown, Emma Meyer, Sam Benson, and Robert Imfeld.
And a big thank-you to the readers who keep showing up for my books. You make me brave.
An Excerpt from Hand-Me-Down Magic #3: Perfect Patchwork Purse
Alma and Del’s magical mishaps and fun continue in:
Read on for a sneak peek!
Stripes and Flowers and Polka Dots and Plaid
-Alma-
When Cassie came into the Curious Cousins Secondhand Shoppe, Alma could tell she knew exactly what she wanted.
“That,” Cassie said. She pointed her finger at the purse that had been hanging in the window all month. It was a patchwork bag, made from at least thirty different fabrics. It was yellow and silver and blue and purple. It had stripes and florals and polka dots and plaids. Parts of it sparkled. Parts of it shined.
It was beautiful. It was special. It was strange. And it was supposed to be Alma’s.
“Oh,” Alma said sadly. “Are you sure?”
“Totally sure!” Cassie replied. “I’ve been saving up for the entire school year to buy something special. And this is it. This is my something special.”
Alma nodded. Cassie had talked for months about coming into the store to buy her something special. And Alma had been excited to see what she would pick! But she never imagined Cassie would pick the perfect patchwork purse. Alma wasn’t sure if she believed in magic, but that purse looked magical. It looked like maybe, maybe, it might be the kind of magic Alma could finally understand.
And Alma didn’t know how to say that to Cassie.
“Great pick!” Alma’s cousin and best friend, Del, said. “That purse is really special.”
Alma’s littlest cousin, Evie, ran to get the ladder so she could be the one to climb up to get the purse. Their family cat, Fraidycat, bounded behind her. Fraidycat was always curious, and Evie was always doing something that made her extra-curious. Maybe Evie was Fraidycat’s something special.
Alma had been thinking the purse was her something special. She had been the first person to see the purse. She’d been helping Abuelita go through bags of donations and the purse had been at the very bottom of one. At first, Alma thought it was weird. Maybe eve
n ugly. But the more the purse hung in the window, the more beautiful it became.
Alma loved having the purse in the window. It reminded her that even though she didn’t believe in magic the way Del did or the way Abuelita did—which was a whole lot—she believed things were not always what they seemed. She believed that something ordinary could become something special. And she believed that maybe, someday she’d be the kind of person who could use a magical-looking purse like that.
Alma was thinking all that, but it sounded too silly to say out loud.
“It’s very expensive,” Alma said to Cassie instead of all the other much truer things she wanted to say.
“I looked at the price tag,” Cassie said. “It’s going to be perfect for all the end of the school year stuff—the parade and the picnic and everything else. I can put my sunglasses in it. And books. And a hat.”
Evie came back with the ladder. She was grunting and gasping, pulling the ladder through the store all by herself. Fraidycat swung her tail around, as if she was helping, too. “I’ll get the purse for you!” Evie said excitedly. Fraidycat meowed in agreement.
“We should ask Abuelita if the purse is really for sale,” Alma said. She knew she sounded silly. The purse was hanging in the window! Of course it was for sale!
It was too late, anyway. Evie was scrambling up the ladder and Cassie was counting out her money and Del was heading to the back to get Abuelita to ring it up.
Alma kept trying to think of a way to explain why she wanted that purse to stay put. She wanted to be able to say loving that purse made her feel more like the rest of her family at 86 ½ Twenty-Third Avenue. She wanted to tell them all how special she felt when she was the one who found it. And how when it glittered a certain way, it made her think maybe Abuelita was right, that magic was everywhere.
“¡Qué maravilloso!” Abuelita said when she saw the purse on Cassie’s shoulder. And Abuelita was right, the purse was truly marvelous. It was just what Abuelita had said when Alma had first shown it to her. “It really suits you.”
Alma thought she might cry.
She wanted Abuelita to tell her that the purse suited her. She wanted someone to think she should have a sparkly and plaid and flowery and stripy and polka-dotted purse.
Alma wiped away a tear. She swallowed hard. She tried one more time to think of the right words to explain to everyone why Cassie shouldn’t have that purse.
But no one even noticed.
Cassie was too happy looking at her brand-new purse. Del and Abuelita and Evie were too busy admiring how the purse looked on Cassie.
As usual, Alma was quiet.
She watched as Cassie skipped out of the Curious Cousins Secondhand Shoppe.
“I thought it was supposed to be mine,” Alma said. But no one heard.
About the Author and Illustrator
Photo credit Jessie Weinberg
COREY ANN HAYDU is the author of Eventown and other acclaimed novels for children and young adults. She grew up in the Boston area, earned her MFA at the New School, and now lives in Brooklyn with her husband and her toddler daughter, who already loves being brave, her abuelita’s cremita, and dressing up for costume parties. Find out more at www.coreyannhaydu.com.
Photo credit Manuela Uribe
LUISA URIBE is an illustrator and designer of children’s media. Her art has been selected for Iberoamérica Ilustra, a catalog showcasing the best work by Spanish-speaking illustrators. She was awarded the Society of Illustrators Dilys Evans Founder’s Award for The Vast Wonder of the World. She lives in Bogotá, Colombia, with her partner and cat.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
Books by Corey Ann Haydu
Hand-Me-Down Magic #1: Stoop Sale Treasure
Copyright
Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
HAND-ME-DOWN MAGIC #2: CRYSTAL BALL FORTUNES. Text copyright © 2020 by Corey Ann Haydu. Illustrations copyright © 2020 by Luisa Uribe. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
www.harpercollinschildrens.com
Cover art © 2020 by Luisa Uribe
Cover design by David DeWitt
ISBN 978-0-06-287827-4 — ISBN 978-0-06-297826-4 (pbk)
Digital Edition JUNE 2020 ISBN: 978-0-06-287828-1
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-287827-4
2021222324PC/LSCH10987654321
FIRST EDITION
About the Publisher
Australia
HarperCollins Publishers Australia Pty. Ltd.
Level 13, 201 Elizabeth Street
Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia
www.harpercollins.com.au
Canada
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
Bay Adelaide Centre, East Tower
22 Adelaide Street West, 41st Floor
Toronto, Ontario, M5H 4E3
www.harpercollins.ca
India
HarperCollins India
A 75, Sector 57
Noida
Uttar Pradesh 201 301
www.harpercollins.co.in
New Zealand
HarperCollins Publishers New Zealand
Unit D1, 63 Apollo Drive
Rosedale 0632
Auckland, New Zealand
www.harpercollins.co.nz
United Kingdom
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF, UK
www.harpercollins.co.uk
United States
HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
195 Broadway
New York, NY 10007
www.harpercollins.com