The Glitter Trap

by Barbara Brauner

Paige shrieks and covers her mouth, but I smile. “Don’t worry. It doesn’t work without the wand.”

  Paige slumps in relief, but Sunny just asks me, “Why do they need to rhyme?”

  “It’s just a rule, like stopping at a stop sign or…never getting your bangs cut without a spotter.”

  We all sit there, thinking. It would be a lot easier to turn Ann into a frog.

  Sunny’s the first to come up with something: “Don’t be really, really specific. Be vague! What about ‘Give Paige the part, but don’t break Ann’s heart’?”

  “That’s pretty good,” I say.

  Paige looks at Sunny, impressed. “That’s really good.”

  We decide that first thing tomorrow, that’s exactly the spell we’ll use.

  Just as I start to fall asleep, Paige whispers, “Lacey?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry I called you Underwear Girl.”

  “It’s okay. I’m used to it.”

  “But I’m still sorry.”

  I never thought I’d hear those words coming from Paige Harrington’s mouth.

  At six the next morning, Mom stumbles into the kitchen and sees the three of us already dressed and eating cereal. “What are you doing up?”

  I say, “We’ve got play rehearsal!”

  “This early?”

  “There’s a lot to do!”

  I’ll be so glad when my lying days are over.

  I remember something as we’re going out the door. I run to my room and put Katarina’s cocoon in my pocket. She might as well come with me.

  As Paige, Sunny, and I walk over to Ann’s, Sunny says, “Can you just aim the wand at her house?”

  “No,” I say. “I’ve got to be looking right at her.”

  Paige looks at me with sudden understanding. “So that’s why you were following me yesterday at school?”

  I nod.

  “I thought you were just being weird.”

  “You can’t get much weirder than being a fairy godmother.”

  When we reach Ann’s house, Paige says, “What do we do now?”

  “Wait here till she comes out.”

  Sunny says, “We could just knock on the door.”

  “What if it’s her mom? I can’t exactly tell her, ‘Hi! We’re here to put a spell on your daughter!’”

  “Good point,” Sunny says.

  “So we wait.”

  We sit on the curb and stare at Ann’s front door. After a while, Sunny asks Paige, “How did you do it?”

  “Do what?”

  “Get so popular so fast.”

  Paige thinks about it. “It’s easy, you just take everything you like…and stop doing it.”

  “But that doesn’t sound like any fun,” Sunny says.

  “Who said being popular was fun?”

  “So why try?”

  Paige says, “If you’re not popular, you’re nobody.”

  Sunny shakes her head. “If you’re not popular, you still matter!”

  Paige doesn’t look convinced.

  Then a faint sound of singing drifts out of the house. “I lost my shoe and you.…”

  “It’s Ann!” I say. “Where’s that coming from?”

  We walk down the driveway, listening. And sure enough, we see Ann’s head through the bathroom window. As the singing continues, Paige sighs. “I could never be that good.”

  I’ve got a straight shot at Ann, or at least her head. I toss the spell and chant, “Give Paige the part, but don’t break Ann’s heart.”

  Ann keeps shower-singing without missing a note.

  “Nothing happened,” Sunny says.

  She’s right. Nothing has happened at all.

  Then:

  There’s a SCRREEEEECCHHH of tires, and a delivery truck barrels around the corner on two wheels—and heads right for us!

  “Watch out!” I yell. We all dive out of the way as the truck roars past us.

  CRUNCHHHHH! The truck smashes into the oak tree in Ann’s front yard. An instant later, the truck’s back door pops open and hundreds of plastic jars fly out like cannonballs.

  We have to duck and dive to stop from getting hit in the head. It’s like dodgeball times a hundred.

  As the jars fly by, Sunny grabs one. It has a label showing a smiling old guy in a green cowboy hat. She says, “It’s Abner’s Pickles. I love Abner’s Pickles.” She pulls one out and takes a bite.

  Paige stares at the street full of bouncing jars and asks me, “Did you do this?”

  “No. You heard the spell. I never said one word about pickles.”

  “Maybe you were thinking about them when you said it,” Sunny says.

  “I was not thinking about them!”

  The truck driver stumbles out in a daze. “I kept pumping the brakes and pumping the brakes! But then, tree! Blammo! Pickles!”

  Paige looks at me, appalled. “You did do this.”

  The spell was supposed to be so simple nothing could go wrong. And look what happened.

  Suddenly, a news chopper hovers above us. A moment later, news vans from channels Two, Five, and 56, the Spanish station, pull up in front of the house. Reporters and cameramen jump out of the vans and start filming.

  Sunny says, “All this for one smashed pickle truck?”

  I say, “Maybe they are here by magic. But what does this have to do with Ann?”

  The reporters face the cameras as if the spilled pickles were the biggest story ever.

  Channel Two reporter: “It was raining pickles here on Parkdale Street.…”

  Channel Five reporter: “This is Ralph Render reporting live from the site of the great pickle calamity.…”

  Channel 56 reporter: “La tranquilidad de la mañana fue rota por el ruido de la caída de los pepinillos.…”

  When the guy from Channel Two sees me, Sunny, and Paige standing near the house, he hurries up to us with his microphone. “Here, with a Channel Two exclusive, are three eyewitnesses to the disaster. Girls, tell the viewers what you saw!”

  I’m going to be in such big trouble!

  I’m about to say how sorry I am when Paige jumps in. “We didn’t see a thing. Not one thing.”

  Sunny adds, “Magic had nothing to do with this at all. Besides, there’s no such thing as magic.”

  And I say, completely truthfully, “I don’t know what happened.”

  The reporter stares at us, disappointed. Suddenly, there’s a voice behind us. “I saw the whole thing!”

  It’s Ann Estey. She’s gotten dressed and looks prettier than I’ve ever seen her—as if she planned to be on TV. She’s got makeup on, and even though her hair is damp from the shower, it’s pulled back neatly with a tortoiseshell clip.

  All three reporters jam their microphones in her face.

  “What did you see?”

  “What were you doing when the accident happened?”

  “¿Estabas asustada por los pepinillos?”

  Ann faces the reporters like she’s been waiting for this on-camera moment all her life. She says, “I was so scared! I was sure it was an earthquake. My first thoughts were for my parents and my dear little dog, Binky. I am so grateful we are all safe.”

  There’s the sound of a siren, and one of the reporters says, “The police chief’s here!”

  Oh, geez! The police chief!

  When the reporters start to move toward the approaching car, Ann reaches out and grabs the Channel Five microphone. “I wanted to mention, if there are any talent scouts in the TV audience, that I will be appearing onstage this Saturday night as Cinderella in Cinderella, the Rock Opera.”

  The Channel Five reporter tries to yank the microphone from her, but Ann won’t let go. She sings in a loud, clear, pretty—and totally inappropriate—voice, “I lost my shoe and you! I can’t believe it’s true! I don’t know what to do!”

  The reporter finally grabs the microphone back and walks away. Ann watches him go like a Miss America contestant who’s just blown the talent competition.

>   Weird. Pickles, reporters, and the police chief. Maybe a vague spell wasn’t such a good idea.

  As we walk toward school, Paige says, “Don’t feel bad, Lacey. You tried.”

  Why did she have to be nice? If Paige had been the snotty person I thought she was, being a fairy-godmother failure would have been way easier.

  “It’s only Wednesday. We’ve got plenty of time to get you your dream,” I tell Paige, trying to sound sure, but feeling really worried.

  I don’t fool Sunny, because she gives me a quick hug and says, “I’ll help you come up with a new spell in homeroom.”

  It might work. I always get a lot done in homeroom. I wrote half my zoo essay there, didn’t I?

  OMG!

  The zoo! The interview’s today! I’ve been so busy with Paige that I forgot all about it. Those animals are going to eat me alive—for real. I have to get out of it! I just need a little time to think…

  …which I don’t get. When we turn the corner near the school, Principal Nazarino stands right by the front door. I take a deep breath and tell myself it’s just a coincidence.

  Except it’s not. Principal Nazarino says, “There you are, Lacey! The zoo people just called. Your interview’s at nine.” She reaches over and straightens my collar. “Don’t slouch! You know how important this is!”

  I say, “I forgot to tell my mom. And I don’t have a ride. Please, can’t we change it to next week?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll phone your mother and get permission, and I’ll drive you myself. Problem solved.” Pulling out her cell phone, she snaps at Paige and Sunny: “Don’t stand there staring, girls! Get to class!”

  Sunny and Paige don’t have a choice. They walk away.

  I call to them, “See you at lunch!”

  Unless the polar bears eat me first.

  Principal Nazarino tells me, “You stay here. I’ll bring the car around.”

  As I wait for Principal Nazarino on the steps, I unzip my jacket pocket and look at the cocoon. There’s not a crack or even a smudge on its shiny surface. One of the nail-polish companies should find out what it’s made of and bottle it.

  Zipping the cocoon back inside my pocket, I know I’m on my own.

  We park in front of the zoo, where a woman is waiting at the curb. Principal Nazarino tells me, “Don’t mess this up.”

  There’s only one other thing I can do: play the barf card. Clutching my stomach, I say, “I don’t feel too good! It must be the Tortilla Surprise my dad made last night.”

  “You’ll be fine. Go! I’ve got a parent meeting, so I’ll be back in an hour.”

  I could drop dead, and Principal Nazarino would still make me do this interview. So I hop out of the car, and she speeds away.

  The friendly-looking woman from the zoo shakes my hand. “Hi, there! I’m Marybeth, the director’s assistant. You must be Lacey,” she says. “We all liked your essay.”

  “Thanks.”

  “The director is waiting for you in his office. It’s just past the gorilla habitat.”

  As we walk toward the stone pillars of the entrance gate, we hear the usual noisy zoo sounds of animals snorting and squawking. But the very instant I walk through the gate, there’s complete silence.

  Scary silence, as if the animals know I’ve arrived and are watching my every move.

  Marybeth doesn’t notice, and I tell myself even zoos have to be quiet once in a while.

  We walk through the African habitat, where elephants, hippos, lions, and giraffes all glare at me like they’re Bambi and I just shot their mother. I stop in my tracks—they hate me.

  Marybeth says, “I know it’s kind of a hike, but we’re halfway there. You can see the director’s office at the top of the hill.”

  Oh, geez. We’re only halfway there.

  Oh, geez. The hippo’s getting up.

  I’ve been to the zoo a million times, and I’ve barely even seen the hippo move. When she’s feeling super energetic, she wiggles her ears to stop the birds from landing on her head, but that’s it. Now she lumbers over to the pond near the fence and looks me straight in the eye for a second, just to make sure I know this is for me. And then she belly-flops into the mud, splashing dirty water right in my direction. I jump back.

  Marybeth looks at the hippo, surprised. “Zenobia’s lively today!”

  Across the path, the hyenas stand in their pen and laugh at me.

  I hurry toward the office, and Marybeth has to jog to keep up. We go past the gorillas, who are behind their moat and fence. Maybe they won’t notice me; after all, they must have plenty of gorilla things to do.

  They notice me, all right—when I walk by, they go crazy. As the gorillas beat their chests and roar, Marybeth stops and stares. “What’s gotten into them?”

  Getting more and more excited, the gorillas fling themselves at the fence. It’s high and strong, but I bet they could get over it if they wanted to. And they really seem to want to. I call over my shoulder, “Last one to the director’s office is a big gorilla!”

  And I run like my life depends on it, which it may.

  The zoo director is scary, like a combination school principal and dentist. He sits behind his big desk and fires off questions, about me, my school, my feelings about the current state of world wildlife, and how I would “best allocate scarce zoo resources.”

  He knows I’m twelve, right?

  Then he asks me to explain my theories about modern zoo management in today’s society.

  Nope, he thinks I’m thirty with a Ph.D. in zoology.

  He puts on a pair of those funny half-glasses and flips through my essay. “I was especially interested in your suggestion about doing a baby giraffe exhibit. You seem to know a lot about them.”

  I remember what Sunny told me and say, “Did you know that people used to call them camelopards because they looked like camels with leopard spots?”

  “Yes, I did,” he says over the top of his glasses.

  Oh. This might be bad. Maybe I just insulted his intelligence. Adults can be very touchy when you do that.

  “But I didn’t learn that until I was in college. You’re a bright girl.” He takes off his glasses and smiles at me. “I shouldn’t be saying this, but you’re by far our best candidate for zoo intern.”

  Thank you, Sunny, for giving me that college-level bit of trivia! And take that, Harry S. Truman Middle School!

  The zoo director stands up and says, “Good job, Lacey. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you soon.”

  As he leads me out of the office, all I can think is: Yay! We’re done! I did it!

  Marybeth is waiting outside the door. “Ready for the tour, Lacey?” she asks.

  Tour? What tour? Marybeth sees my blank look and tells me, “You didn’t think all you got to do this morning was a boring old interview, did you? Now comes the fun part. It’s feeding time at the petting zoo, and you get to help.”

  Shoot! Just when I thought I was done here, they throw me into the petting zoo.

  How can I get out of this? I run through excuses in my head: I have a math test in half an hour; I need to get back to the yodeling competition; Bigfoot and I are having lunch. And then I take a couple of deep breaths and calm myself down. It’s the petting zoo, not the lion habitat. They pick these animals because there’s no way they’ll hurt little kids.

  So I smile at Marybeth and say, “Let’s go!”

  Marybeth and I walk up a steep hill and go through a gate into the petting zoo. She points at the animals waiting patiently by their feed troughs and says, “The petting zoo doesn’t open till eleven. So you’ll get a little one-on-one time with the gang.”

  I’m worried that the animals aren’t tied up, but I keep reminding myself that they’re friendly. In fact, I know most of them from when I was little. Gus, the shaggy pony. Two goats named Lewis and Clark (Lewis is a girl). Curly, the sheep. Lulubelle, the potbellied pig. And some rabbits and baby chicks in an open-topped pen. It’s about as scary as Pat the Bunny.
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  A guy wearing blue coveralls comes out of the stable with buckets of oats. Marybeth says, “Lacey, this is Raymond, who takes care of the animals here in the petting zoo. You two will be working together if you get selected.”

  Raymond smiles at me. Instead of shaking hands, he gives me a bucket. “Gus is waiting for you.”

  I take the bucket over to the pony. “Here’s your breakfast!” I say, way too enthusiastically. As I get close, Gus flares his nostrils like I smell bad. I pour the oats into the trough and step back fast. He’s not a big pony, but he has awfully big teeth. Gus sniffs the food but doesn’t take a bite.

  “Yummy, yummy! Good oats,” I say, feeling kind of stupid.

  When Gus trots away without eating, Raymond looks confused. “He’s never turned down a meal in his life! I wonder if he’s sick.”

  He’s not sick. It’s me.

  And Gus isn’t the only one. Instead of paying attention to their food, the other animals stare at me. Even Marybeth notices. “And what’s wrong with them, Raymond?”

  “They were fine a minute ago.”

  Suddenly Lewis bounds over and butts me in the knee with her hard little head. “Ow!” I say. She bleats as if she’s warning every animal in the zoo that there’s a maniac on the loose.

  And the other animals in the zoo hear her, because from outside the petting-zoo fence comes the sound of roars and growls and squawks. I can’t believe how loud they are.

  A scared-looking staff member appears at the gate and calls to Raymond and Marybeth, “The animals are going crazy! We need your help!”

  Marybeth tells me, “You stay here.” Then she and Raymond run out the gate.

  The second they’re gone…

  …I’m attacked on all sides by the petting-zoo animals.

  Gus kicks out with a back leg; Lulubelle bites my pants cuff; Lewis and Clark butt my stomach.

  And Curly baas.

  I know that a baa doesn’t usually sound scary, but the way Curly does it, it makes my blood run cold. He comes closer and closer. Baa. Baa. Baaaaa! Sheep are vegetarians, but I think he’s planning to make an exception for me.

  I back away from him and fall into the pen of bunnies and chicks. I lay there for a moment, the breath knocked right out of me. At least bunnies and chicks are harmless.