Hannah took the tin and translated the writing on the bottom: “‘Mexican Moon Honey. Gathered from Cedronian bees the morning after the full moon. Full moon beams have the power to mend wrongdoing.’”
Darbie said, “That sounds like an antidote to me. Good job.”
“What’s ‘Cedronian’?” I asked.
“A certain breed of bees, I guess,” Hannah said. “I’m not a bee expert.”
We looked at her and laughed. She joined us. “Except for bee stings, of course,” she added.
Hannah sucked in a big sip of her chocolaty drink and grabbed the bridge of her nose. “Ah! Brain freeze!” She pushed her palm out, signaling for us not to talk. She switched to the one-minute finger, then opened her eyes. “Okay. It’s better now.”
Darbie asked, “Why do you always do that? You know it hurts your head, but you slurp really fast anyway.”
“I can’t help myself. Maybe that’s why the Swirley is called Death by Chocolate . . . you die from a frozen brain.”
Suddenly a cool breeze slipped through the door—along with Frankie Rusamano and a cardboard box that I guessed contained cannoli.
Immediately the sight of him made me nervous. I hadn’t told Hannah about Frankie being in love with me. I hoped he wouldn’t swoon over me—she’d be so bummed.
He waved cautiously, like we’d made him self-conscious. “Hi, guys,” he said. “I mean, girls. I heard there was a pastry emergency and I had to come right down. What’s up?” He did a double-take when he saw the goop on Hannah’s face, but quickly and politely averted his gaze to the rows of ice cream. I was so used to looking at her by now, I’d forgotten to remind her about the lotion.
He slid a chair over to the table and sat between me and Hannah. Surveying our tall, frosty glasses, he picked up Hannah’s and took a sip. “Mmm. Chocolate. My favorite. Hey, Sam,” he called. “Can I have one of these, please?” He rested his elbows on the table. “So, my mom says you needed cannoli right now. She says Hannah is too skinny and why didn’t I tell her that sooner.” He set the box on the table, all the while looking at Hannah. “There’s a tiramisu in there too. Tony thought you liked tiramisu, Kell.”
“I do. But I didn’t know he knew that.”
Sam yelled over, “You’re all set, Frank-o.”
I was closer to the counter. “I’ll get it.” I went to the counter and picked up the freezing brown Swirley. It was my chance to reverse the Love Bug Juice.
With my back to my friends and Sam busy wiping down the counter, I slipped a square of crystallized Moon Honey into the glass. I took a long spoon and stirred. I imagined the Swirley was going to bubble and steam like a brew in a cauldron, but the crystal just dissolved.
I gave the Swirley to Frankie along with a straw, which he depapered, slid in, and took a long pull from.
Frankie held up his hand, closed his eyes, and winced.
OMG, I’ve poisoned him!
20
Brain Freeze
Freeze:
Ice cream in large quantities
Chocolate and other candy
Cream
Direction:
Mix it all together and suck as hard and as fast as you
can until you numb the front third of your brain. Continue
until it causes extreme pain.
“Sorry, brain freeze.” Frankie grabbed his head. “Oh! Man, that hurts.” He remained like this for a few seconds. “But I can’t help myself. It’s so good.”
Hannah smiled.
“How do you feel?” I asked. Darbie looked at me questioningly. I nodded—yes, I’d given him the honey. We watched carefully for his expression as he replied.
“Fine. Why?”
“Just wondering,” I said. There was no sign that he was in love with me.
Looks like the Moon Honey did its thing.
We continued staring at him, waiting for some kind of reaction. “What?” He looked at his shirt. “Did I spill?” He wiped his nose. “Booger?”
Hannah looked from person to person like there was something going on that she didn’t know about, which there was.
“Who do you love?” asked Darbie, always the subtle lady.
“What?” he shouted.
“Just making conversation.” She casually examined her cuticle.
“Come on. What gives? I already think you guys, ah, girls, are nutso. Believe me. Nothing you tell me is going to change that.”
There was silence, which I felt compelled to break. “We’re having a disagreement.”
I explained to Frankie about the Secret Recipe Book, the potions, and how strange things had started to occur. I didn’t know how good it would feel to put it into words. At first the girls seemed hesitant, but soon they joined me, and I couldn’t get a word in.
“It was all a coincidence. It’s not possible,” Hannah interrupted.
It was like we’d all been dying to get this off our chests and reveal the big secret.
Darbie ignored Hannah and told Frankie about the “Beware of the Law of Returns” note and the bad things that happened: Hannah being stung by bees, me having to carry Charlotte’s books, her falls, and Mrs. Silvers going to the hospital.
“You sent some lady to the hospital? What did you do to her, knock her over?”
“Kelly brought her some juice,” she said.
He stopped mid-sip. “Whoa. Stop right there. Brought her some juice? That sounds familiar.”
“Well . . .” Darbie hesitated.
“Oh, man,” he said with a big shake of his head. He took a hard sip of his thick drink. “I’m gonna be flippin’ mad if you guys got me cursed.”
“You’re not cursed,” Hannah said. She blew her bangs out of her face with gale force, clearly annoyed with Darbie and me.
Darbie said, “Since the three of us couldn’t agree whether there was really something special about these recipes, we thought we would do an experiment.”
“That sounds logical. Coach Richards would be very proud of you for testing your hypothesis.” He slurped up the last droplets in his glass. “And how did you plan on doing that?”
Darbie looked to us for approval, but I didn’t know what she should say. I didn’t think he was gonna like the idea of us giving him a love potion. Not to mention that Hannah would die of embarrassment. I could already see her face flushing a shade of Bubblegum Swirley.
“By creating a love potion,” Darbie said.
I saw the heat of anger fume out of Hannah’s ears. In an effort to contradict Darbie, she said, “There are no potions. There is no curse. It’s like a superstition or a self-fulfilling prophecy—if someone thinks that a black cat crossing his path will bring him bad luck, then it will.”
Frankie said, “I don’t believe in this stuff either.”
I took a sip of my drink to wash the lump of embarrassment out of my throat. “These things can’t all be coincidences. That would be too much of a coincidence.”
Frankie stared at the bottom of his glass. “I don’t believe it.”
There was no way to avoid it. I had to ask him. “Then why did you fall in love with me after you drank the love potion?”
Hannah’s straw fell out of her open mouth. This could be her final moment before she died of humiliation.
The tops of Frankie’s ears reddened. “You potioned me?” Then he got louder. “I was right, you guys are crazy!” He went to take a swallow of his drink and realized that it was gone. “Sam!” he called. “Can I have another?”
It felt like a two Swirley sort of day. “Me too.” I said. Then I checked out the other two empty glasses. “Actually, can you make everyone a refill?”
I couldn’t tell if Frankie was shocked or angry. He didn’t speak for a minute. But when he did, he asked the next logical question. “And who exactly was I supposed to fall in love with?”
I saw Darbie ready to open her mouth. I couldn’t do this to Hannah. I had to jump in before Darbie told him. “You came into Home Ec saying all
those nice things to me,” I said.
“He did?” Hannah asked, confused.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoooooa! Kell, you’re a cool girl and all, but potion or no potion, I totally did not fall in love with you.”
“You didn’t?” I asked.
He combed both of his hands through his hair the way my father does when I drive him crazy. “I was being nice to you because . . . because. I didn’t want to be in Home Ec. I don’t want to cook. And if I don’t keep my grades up, including flippin’ Home Ec, I have to quit working. I thought you would do the assignments for me.”
There was an uncomfortable silence. He wasn’t in love with me? Maybe he was in love with me, only he didn’t realize it.
I said, “Maybe you just think you aren’t in love with me because of the Moon Honey.”
“What’s that?” he asked.
“The antidote to the Love Bug Juice,” Darbie said.
He looked at me with confusion and anger in his eyes. “An antidote—”
I said, “Yeah. I sort of gave you one just now in your Swirley.”
He nodded and looked at his cardboard box. “And the cannoli?”
Darbie said, “That was a way to get you down here so we could prove to Hannah that the juice worked by showing her you had fallen in love with Kelly. Good plan, huh?” She smiled.
Frankie didn’t. “Great plan.” He was furious.
Hannah made squinty little eyes at me and Darbie. “Well, it looks like your big experiment was a flop, which proves my theory. There are no potions.” I’m sure she was angry with me for not telling her about Frankie falling for me, but she should have just been glad that we got through the entire rendezvous without him knowing that Hannah was actually the target for his affection.
Frankie asked Hannah, “What’s with the pink glob on your face?”
She touched her cheek self-consciously, then looked at the cream on her fingertips. Her face turned the same color as the lotion that she wiped off with a paper napkin. “I can’t believe you guys didn’t remind me that was there,” she said to us quietly, so that it didn’t appear to Frankie that she was furious.
Sam brought four giant glasses full of Swirley goodness to the table.
There were no more brain freezes, and no more talking with Frankie—or with each other.
But I didn’t buy that the experiment had failed. Quite the opposite, actually. Frankie could’ve just asked me to help him with Home Ec. I would’ve said yes. He had been into me, and the Moon Honey had snapped him out of it.
21
A Good Deed
Question: If there was a smell, any smell, that I could choose
to not smell for a year, what would it be?
Answer: Chili.
After the meeting at Sam’s, I came home to several pots simmering on the stove. I had to do two things: get antidotes to Mrs. Silvers and Charlotte Barney to undo hexes, and think of some really good things I could do to end my bad luck. I looked around the house, but your average chore wouldn’t cut it. I needed something unexpected. Something out of the ordinary. Something I really didn’t want to do.
The chili looked warm and bubbly. . . . The kind of thing that would be nice for an old woman on a cool afternoon.
I filled a plastic container with some chili, but before securing the lid, I plunked in a cube of Moon Honey. It dissolved instantly.
Armed with the warm container and my pooper-scooper, I headed across the street.
I knocked on Mrs. Silvers’s door.
Joanne answered. I gave her the chili, explaining that it was for Mrs. Silvers because we were all really hoping she’d be feeling better very soon, and that it was for our entry in the annual contest, which was in two days.
“What a lovely surprise,” said Joanne. “Maybe Mom and I will stop by the contest. She might want to get out for a bit.”
After I scooped the poop out of Mrs. Silvers’s yard—without being asked—I also checked the yards of six other nearby houses and scooped anything suspicious.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw the curtain move in the downstairs window of Mrs. Silvers’s house.
In one outing across the street, I’d delivered the antidote and done my good deed.
And that is, as my dad would say, how you kill two birds with one stone.
22
Isla de Cedros
Rosey chased after the leaves blowing around our backyard. Charlotte’s lawn was covered with a thick blanket of unraked leaves. We just had to win the contest or I’d be raking for days. I felt really good about the concoction Mom and I had come up with this year. We actually had a chance of winning. But if we didn’t . . . I looked at Charlotte’s yard again.
I thought about the 1953 World Book Encyclopedia peeking out from under my bed, and I asked myself something that Darbie had asked days ago:
Question: If the recipe book made someone lose their voice,
go to the hospital, get foot blisters, and fall in love, why can’t
it ensure that the Quinns take home the chili pepper necklace?
Answer: Actually, it could! But at the cost of a return.
I studied the thick, worn stationery pages, looking for something that might work for Mr. Douglass’ taste buds.
At the bottom of one of the pages was a very simple recipe. It didn’t have a title, but I could tell by looking at it that it was homemade vanilla ice cream. Next to the instructions was a note: “If made with vanilla beans from the western shore of the Isla de Cedros, enhances la narize and la boca—rs. Google confirmed that narize was “nose” and boca was “mouth.” I also Googled rs, but no English translation came up. I wondered if ip and rs were a special code. I played with the letters, but I couldn’t spell anything: spir, risp . . . nothing.
I did a search on Isla de Cedros. It’s a Mexican island in the Pacific Ocean that was discovered by the Spanish and became a rich farming community.
I investigated our vanilla supply. We had vanilla extract, but the bottle didn’t say anything about where it was grown. Normally, I would’ve used it anyway, but the note in the Book specifically said “if” made with vanilla beans from the western shore of the Isla de Cedros, the vanilla ice cream would enhance smell and taste. So the detail seemed pretty important.
I knew where I’d be able to get the Mexican vanilla beans, but I didn’t want to go there.
At least not alone.
There was no sign of Charlotte around the neighborhood Saturday morning. I tried to resist, but I was too curious. I had to know if my nice scooping might’ve changed my luck. I went to her door.
“Hello Kelly,” Mrs. Barney said.
“Is Charlotte here?”
“No, I’m sorry dear. She and her dad already left for tryouts. Did you need a ride?”
“No, thanks. I’m all set.”
“Well, I’ll tell her you stopped by, but you’ll probably see her before I do. By the way, it’s been so nice of you to help Charlotte with her books, but I think Mr. Barney is going to drive her to school for the next few days, so she won’t need you anymore.”
“Sure.” I said. Okay, now I was truly excited.
“Better get going or you’ll be late for soccer.”
I ran home and got into the minivan, and we picked up Darbie.
“Guess what?” I whispered so Mom couldn’t hear.
“Okay. I’ll guess. What?” Darbie asked.
“I scooped the poop for the whole block last night, and now Charlotte is going to get rides to school from her dad. I don’t have to carry her books!”
“Great,” she said flatly.
The car stopped at a red light, right next to a Rusamano Landscaping truck. Tony looked out the window and gave us a little wave. Frankie looked out the other window.
“I think it’s safe to say he’s not in love with me anymore.”
“Guess not.” Darbie yawned.
“What’s up with you?”
“I was up late last night and I’m ver
y tired. Wake me up when we get to school.”
Soccer tryouts buzzed with whispers. Today was the day we found out who made the cut. I saw Hannah. It looked like her bee stings had healed. She was with Charlotte.
Hannah. Sat. With. Charlotte.
I heard Hannah telling her, “You’ll definitely make the team.”
Stretching my neck, I spied in Hannah’s direction. She asked Charlotte, “How are your blistery feet? I hope they’ll be good enough to play in the game tomorrow.”
Charlotte said, “Me too.” She looked at me suspiciously.
I tapped Hannah’s arm lightly, and out of the corner of my mouth I whispered, “Does the Wicked One have you under a trance?” I was only half joking.
Hannah took my elbow and moved a few steps away, out of earshot from Charlotte. “Kelly, I’ve wanted to tell you something for a while. You need to let go of your obsession with Charlotte. You can’t get jealous every time I talk to her.”
“Are you kidding me?” I asked. “Are you flippin’ kidding me? I’m not jealous. I’m trying to protect you.”
“Get serious.”
“I am,” I said. “Do you remember third grade?”
Hannah blew her bangs way high. “Yes, I’ve heard it all a hundred times. She told you about your surprise birthday party, so it wasn’t a surprise anymore. It was horrible, terrible, very mean. But you still had an awesome party, and it was years ago. GET OVER IT!”
I huffed and maneuvered myself away from an angry Hannah, and closer to Darbie, who asked, “What’s going on?”
“I think Hannah’s on her way to Crazytown. And I’m pretty sure she’s mad at me.”
Darbie asked, “Can you blame her?”
What the heck is happening here?
“What?” I asked defensively.
“She kind of has a right to be mad at you for not telling her Frankie was in love with you, tricking him into coming to Sam’s, and not telling her she looked like a circus sideshow.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But you didn’t tell her either.”
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