Cassie’s mother hovered nearby. “What’s this?”
“Shhh!” Cassie said. “I’m telling Daisy now. I’ll tell you later.”
“What did you figure out? What did you figure out?” Daisy asked excitedly. “Tell me!”
“Well,” Cassie said, pulling a kitchen chair out from under the table. It squeaked loudly across the linoleum floor. Then she plopped down into it. “I found out yellow isn’t really a primary color. Green is. Or something. Anyway, I saw, green, blue, and red fairies, so I think they were all primaries.”
“I’m sooooooooo jealous,” Daisy said.
“I know. Sorry,” Cassie said. “Dad thinks the fairies made these glasses just for me. He and Mom can’t see them, either.” She stopped, struck by an idea. “Hey, I’ll ask them to make you some next time I see one that can see me!”
“Yeah!” Daisy cried.
Oh. Cassie’s arm holding the phone drooped at little. “If I see one. I don’t know if I will.”
“Why not?” Daisy asked.
“It’s that thingy I was explaining. I don’t really get it, but apparently your eyes can only see three colors? And I’ve already seen all of the fairies like that? So I don’t know if I’ll see any others.”
Cassie’s mother looked thoughtful and reached down under the table to pull out her laptop. She plugged it in and turned it on. There was a quiet whirring.
“No way!” Daisy gasped. “You mean . . . you think there was a puzzle you were solving? And you think you’ve failed it?”
“I don’t know,” Cassie said. “I think I might have.”
Cassie’s mother leaned forward and squinted a little. She started typing.
“Maybe that doesn’t matter,” Daisy said. “I mean, you can still see them, can’t you?”
“Unless they take the glasses away,” Cassie said. “And I really want to ask them why they chose me!”
“And ask about me,” Daisy added, her voice pleading.
“Uh huh.” Cassie nodded. “And Bianca. And my parents.” She thought. “And Andrew.”
“And Shelby!” Daisy cried. “And my parents! But not Aneeka.”
“Nope, not Aneeka,” Cassie giggled.
“Cassie,” Cassie’s mother said in a funny voice. “Could you hang up the phone and come talk to me?”
“Mom, I’m talking to Daisy!”
“Yes,” her mother said quietly. “But this might be important. Please.”
Cassie sighed loudly. “Daisy, can I call you back in a minute?”
“Yeah,” Daisy said.
Cassie beeped the button to hang up the phone, feeling annoyed. Couldn’t her mother have waited till she was done?
“Here,” Cassie’s mother said quietly, turning the screen around so that she could see it. “Do you know what this means?”
Cassie squinted at the screen, trying to read the words in a tiny font size. There were a lot of big long science-y things. She shook her head.
“It means,” Cassie’s mother said, pointing to a chart on the screen, “there are four types of photoreceptors, not just three.”
“Huh?”
“These are the cones,” Cassie’s mother said, pointing to three of the bumps on the chart. The bumps were red, green, and blue. “There are three different types. They’re active in bright light. They let you see colors.”
“Uh huh . . .” Cassie said slowly, not sure where this was going.
“And this,” Cassie’s mother said, pointing to the final bump on the chart, which was black, “is the rods. They let you see white in dim light.”
“You think there might be a fourth fairy?” Cassie gasped.
“I think it’s very possible,” Cassie’s mother said. “But Cassie, if you’re going to try to find this fairy, I want you to figure out what you want to ask and how you plan to communicate. And the rules still apply.”
Cassie jumped up and down and squealed.
“Calm down, calm down!” her mother said. “It’s only a theory!”
But Cassie couldn’t contain it. She had another chance! She could still ask them to fix Bianca, and ask about her parents and Daisy!
She could still find out about everything!
Chapter Thirteen
“Your plan is ready?” Cassie’s mother asked.
Cassie nodded, a lump of fear in her throat. She was very, very nervous. What if it didn’t work? What if she lost her last chance?
“I’m going to turn off the lights,” Cassie’s father said, his hand on the switch. “Is that okay?”
Cassie nodded again.
He flicked the switch. Darkness plunged across the kitchen. As Cassie’s eyes adjusted, all she could see were grey shapes in the faint glow of the yellow night light.
She fumbled on the table in front of her, and picked up the fairy glasses. Her hands were slick with sweat. She pulled her normal glasses off and nearly dropped them.
Then she slid the fairy eyeglasses slowly onto her face.
They all waited, sitting around the table, saying nothing. For a moment, Cassie wondered if they were nuts, if it was never going to happen. But then, one blink later, a fairy was hovering right in front of her.
Cassie gasped and nearly ripped the glasses off her face. But she kept her arms down, with effort.
“H-hello?” she stammered.
The white fairy stared at her, not blinking. Her hair was long and straight, and her clothes looked to be made of folded paper. Her skin was pale grey, and her hair was so dark, it was practically black. Her wings, raw white, glowed in the darkness.
“I don’t know if you can communicate with me,” Cassie said, her mouth dry, “but I’m hoping you can. Can you nod your head like this if you understand me?”
Cassie bobbed her head quickly. She waited and held her breath.
Very slowly, the fairy nodded.
Cassie squeaked with excitement. She seized the pen and paper in front of her and held them out in both hands.
“Okay, then,” she said, her heart hammering, “what about reading and writing? Because all I can do is see you. But if you write, that is a way you can talk to me.”
The fairy reached out and took the pen in both arms. She held it with obvious effort, as if it were very heavy.
Cassie’s mother gasped.
“What?” Cassie asked, not taking her eyes off the fairy. “What do you see?”
“It’s what I don’t see,” her mother whispered.
“The pen vanished,” Cassie’s father said, wonderingly.
The fairy fluttered down to the piece of paper in front of Cassie.
HELLO
she wrote.
“Hello,” Cassie whispered. She was talking to a fairy. She was talking to a fairy! “These eyeglasses I’m using. Were they something you fairies gave to me?”
The fairy flew down a line, dragging the pen after her.
YES
she wrote, with effort.
“Why?” Cassie asked, her mouth dry. “Why did you choose me?”
The fairy gave her a pained look. But she flew down to the next line and began writing, slowly, one letter at a time.
YOU PAY ATTENTION
the paper said finally.
Cassie stared at that, not understanding. “I pay attention to what?” she asked.
The fairy labored to write another word.
SIGHT
Cassie sat back. She was reeling. Did that mean what she thought it did?
“You mean . . . you chose me because I’m farsighted? Because seeing doesn’t come easily?”
Cassie’s father inhaled sharply.
YES
the fairy wrote.
“Ask it what they want,” Cassie’s mother blurted out. “Ask it why it cares that you can see them.”
“Fairy,” Cassie said carefully, “why does it matter to you that I can see you?”
The fairy wavered for a moment, as if trying to figure out what to write. Finally, she dragged the pen further dow
n, and carefully etched
WE LIKE ATTENTION
Cassie burst out laughing.
“What?” her father asked. “What is it?”
“She says they like attention,” Cassie managed, between a burst of giggles. “I think they’re sick of being ignored!”
“Ask what it is they want you to do,” her mother said, her voice serious. “Attention can be good or bad.”
Cassie nodded and stopped laughing.
“Fairy,” she said, “is there something you want me to do?”
The fairy stared at her for a long moment. She looked down at the paper, now covered with her shaky writing. The fairy heaved a long, silent sigh. Then she pushed the pen across the paper, slowly and carefully.
PROVE THAT YOU WILL KEEP PAYING ATTENTION
the paper said at last.
Cassie stared down at the paper, not sure what that meant. Wasn’t there supposed to be some specific test? Wasn’t she supposed to do some huge task?
Cassie looked up, and the fairy was watching her expectantly. The fairy’s raw white wings beat in a slow rhythm behind her.
“I promise to keep paying attention to the fairies,” Cassie said slowly. “I promise to never stop watching.”
The fairy dropped the pen and dove towards Cassie’s face. Cassie gasped and jumped backwards. Quick as a wink, the fairy reached out and seized the eyeglasses.
“Wait! No —” Cassie yelped.
But the fairy was gone. The glasses had vanished, too.
There was nothing.
Chapter Fourteen
“Just don’t understand!” Cassie sobbed, burying her head in her mother’s chest. Her mother stroked her hair over and over again. “I thought I did and said everything right! Why wasn’t that enough for them?”
“If that wasn’t enough, you probably wouldn’t have liked what they did want you to do,” Cassie’s father said.
Cassie wailed and buried her head farther.
“Maybe the glasses weren’t meant to be a permanent thing,” her mother said comfortingly. “Maybe they were only meant to introduce you to the fact that they existed.”
“But it’s not fair!” Cassie cried.
“I know,” Cassie’s mother said, stroking her hair. “I know.”
“Maybe it’s for the best,” Cassie’s father said. “Being able to see things nobody else can could cause you trouble later in life.”
Cassie unburied her head and glared up at her blurry father. She hadn’t put her glasses back on, so she couldn’t see anything.
“At least you succeeded in doing what you set out to do,” her mother said. “You got the answers to your questions.”
“I’d rather still have the fairy glasses,” Cassie mumbled.
“Let’s take you upstairs,” Cassie’s father said, picking her up from her mother’s lap. “It’s past your bedtime, anyway.”
Cassie started crying again, burying her head in his shoulder.
“I’ll bring up your glasses in a minute,” Cassie’s mother said. “Um, will you two be all right?”
“Oof,” her father grunted. He swayed underneath her. “I hope so. Cass, how did you get so heavy? You used to be as small as Andrew.”
“I ate my vegetables,” Cassie mumbled.
He stumbled up the stairs, anyway, carrying her until they reached her bedroom. Then he set her down to turn the doorknob. Cassie followed after him, still hiccuping in sadness, and let him tuck her into bed.
She fell asleep before her mother came upstairs.
* * *
In the morning, everything seemed drab and dreary. Cassie stared around the blurry room gloomily. She’d had dreams all night about the fairies, including one where she argued the white fairy into letting her keep the fairy eyeglasses.
Cassie fumbled for her glasses on her bedside table, and found them. She pushed them onto her face, shoulders drooping.
There was a fairy with green clothes and red wings sitting on top of her desk.
Cassie yelped and snatched off her glasses. A green-and-red blur rose up and zipped across the room.
Cassie shoved the glasses back on her nose just in time to see the fairy fly through the wall.
“Wait!” she cried. “Don’t go!”
The red wings reappeared through the wall. An orange-haired young boy fairy stuck his tongue out at her.
Cassie’s mouth opened further and further and further.
These weren’t the fairy glasses. They were her own. She knew because they fit like they should, not slightly too tight.
And she had seen him moving even without them on.
And he was sticking his tongue out at her.
“You can see me!” she shouted.
The orange-haired fairy smirked and zoomed off.
Cassie felt like screaming in joy. Just wait till she told Daisy. Just wait till she told Bianca!
“Mom! Dad!” Cassie shrieked, bolting through her bedroom door and down the hallway. “Guess what! It didn’t mean what we thought it did! It didn’t mean what we thought it did!”
Cassie leapt down the stairs two at a time and slid into the kitchen to find her parents halfway through flipping eggs.
“What didn’t mean what we thought it did?” Cassie’s father asked warily, holding a spatula.
Cassie drew in a deep breath. “She took away the fairy eyeglasses BECAUSE I DON’T NEED THEM ANYMORE!”
Chapter Fifteen
“Let me get this straight,” Bianca said at recess four hours later. “You asked them about why they chose you.”
“Right.”
“You asked them about what they wanted from you.”
“Right.”
“And you didn’t ask about my itching?”
“Uh . . .” Cassie gulped. “I’m sorry. I forgot to.”
Bianca glared at her.
“I’m sorry. Really I am.”
Bianca kept glaring.
“Maybe we can figure it out on our own?”
“Like how?” Bianca demanded, folding her arms.
Cassie was momentarily distracted by a pair of purple-striped fairies zooming by her, throwing a ball between them. They looked like a father and son, or maybe brothers. The ball looked like it had been made out of a pine cone.
“Maybe it’s like my glasses,” Cassie said. “Did you get something from somewhere before you started itching?”
“No, only my birthday necklace . . . which . . .”
Bianca stopped.
“Oh, no way!” she shouted.
She scrambled behind her neck to unfasten something.
“What is it?” Cassie asked, leaning forward to see. It looked like a tiny silver chain with a locket on it.
“My great-grandmother’s necklace,” Bianca said. “My parents gave it to me for my birthday, and I lost it the next day. They were furious until I found it again.”
“You mean . . .” Cassie said slowly.
“IT’S A FAKE!” Bianca shouted, holding it up.
“Are you sure?” Cassie asked.
“Only one way to know,” Bianca said, breathing through her nose heavily. She shoved the necklace down on the ground, next to where she was sitting. “Test me. Send a fairy my way.”
“Okay,” Cassie said. “Excuse me!” she called to a group of fairies. “Will one of you come this way?”
A sweet-cheeked old lady fluttered over, flapping blue lace wings expectantly.
“Um, can you fly over here?” Cassie asked.
The little old lady obeyed, looking amused. Her blue lace wings flapped right through Bianca’s arm.
“Do you feel anything?” Cassie asked Bianca.
“No,” Bianca said. “Should I?”
“There’s one right here,” Cassie said, poking Bianca’s arm through the old lady’s flapping blue lace wings.
The fairy rose up, looking offended. She glared at Cassie and started shaking her finger and lecturing silently. Then she zoomed off.
“I didn’
t itch,” Bianca said slowly. “I didn’t itch!”
She seized the silver necklace and flung it across the playground before Cassie could stop her.
“But your parents —” Cassie fumbled.
“My parents can get mad all they want,” Bianca said huffily. “I never want to see that blasted thing again.”
Cassie watched the glinting spot in the sand.
She felt sorry for the necklace, and the fairies who had tried to get Bianca’s attention and failed.
But she felt glad for Bianca, who had figured out a way to solve her problem.
Still, after the recess bell rang, Cassie slipped off to the side and scooped up the necklace while Bianca’s back was turned. Even if it required itching, there might be a day when Bianca would want to sense fairies again.
Next Book:
Daisy wanted to be able to see fairies.
But when she comes across an old compass,
she gains the ability to sense them magnetically instead.
You can get it here.
You can get book one for free here!
What's special about Cassandra?
Absolutely nothing. She's as ordinary as any other fifth grader. And yet her ordinary life is riddled with hilarious and sometimes heart-breaking mishaps as she guides herself through the world of pre-teens on the brink of adulthood.
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Tabby, Tabby, Burning Bright Page 4