Missing Magic

B Magical

The Missing Magic

Lexi Connor

To Daniel

“Beeeee-atrix,” B’s mother called up the stairs. “Breakfast!”

B cinched her ponytail and took one last look in the bathroom mirror. “Maybe today,” she told her reflection. Then she plucked a little pot of her sister’s lip balm from the medicine cabinet and chanted softly:

“Let this be my first spell in rhyme:

Cherry lip gloss, change to lime!”

She squeezed her eyes tight, then opened them. Nothing had happened. She sniffed to make sure. It was still cherry. Just like yesterday, and every day since her eleventh birthday, more than three months ago.

Her cat, Nightshade, twined himself between her ankles and meowed.

“I
know
it didn’t work,” she told him. “Don’t remind me.”

He purred in answer. He probably didn’t understand her, but with Nightshade, B could never be sure.

B grabbed her backpack from her bedroom and stuffed her battered copy of
Through the Looking Glass
inside. She hurried down the stairs, two at a time, and slid into her chair, the last one at the breakfast table.

“Dawn, please,” B’s mom said to B’s older sister. “No mascara at breakfast.”

Dawn sighed and shoved her makeup back into her purse, muttering:

“Dawn is quick, her rhymes are cunning.

Dawn’s dark lashes are thick and stunning!”

And, poof! She looked like she’d just had a makeover.

B rolled her eyes. Her sister’s spells were
so
superficial.

Dawn made a face. “What’s the matter, B? Jealous?”

“Girls, girls,” their mother scolded. “No time for bickering. The bus will be here soon.” She pointed toward the table and said, in a singsongy voice:

“Butter melt and batter bubble,

Golden pancakes! On the double!”

And fragrant stacks of steaming pancakes, drenched in syrup and butter, appeared on everyone’s plates.

B’s dad rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, mumbling:

“Roast it, grind it, brew it up.

Coffee, black, in my favorite cup.”

The coffee machine on the counter whirred and hissed, then beeped. A full pot detached itself and floated over to the table. It dipped low over Dad’s summer solstice celebration mug, filling it without spilling a drop. It then paused by Mom’s cup, but she shook her head. “No, thank you. I’m cutting back.”

Dawn frowned at her plate and said:

“Lighter, please. Fewer calories.

A syrup smile is all Dawn needs.”

That’s not even a perfect rhyme,
B thought,
but it doesn’t matter.
Dawn’s pat of butter and half her syrup vanished, leaving a happy face made of syrup on her top pancake. She grinned and flicked her long blond hair behind her back before digging in.

It was so unfair. Everything Dawn did came out perfectly.

B’s annoyance faded when she tasted her pancakes. Mom’s breakfast spells were the best. She’d won first prize at the Witchin’ Kitchen Competition for her dandelion donuts, three years straight, with a second place prize for her famous eel soup.

“Great pancakes, Mom,” B said. “Will you pass the apple juice, please?”

Her family lowered their forks and studied her. B felt her face turn red. She should have just gotten some milk from the fridge, instead of drawing attention to the fact that she still couldn’t perform spells.

Mom’s kind face was full of concern. “Try it,
dear,” she said. “Just a little juice-summoning rhyme. Who knows? This might be the day!”

But of course B already knew that it wasn’t. While her family and all their witching friends could rhyme their way out of stomachaches, traffic jams, and washing dishes, B was left doing things the hard way.

B sighed. She’d have to try. It didn’t help, her family waiting and watching like that. Performing in front of crowds, even just her three family members, made B extremely nervous. She tried to think. What rhymed with juice? Loose, goose, hangman’s noose. Arg. Her family made this rhyming business seem so easy.

Well,
she thought,
here goes nothing.
She closed her eyes and recited:

“Syrup sweeter than chocolate mousse

Makes me want some apple juice!”

B opened her eyes again. Her glass was still empty, and the juice carton hadn’t budged. Her parents’ hopeful expressions froze and Dawn went back to eating her magically cheery pancakes.

Her mom poured B some apple juice by hand. B was grateful she didn’t use magic.

“That was a lovely rhyme,” she said, smiling sweetly at B. “Rhyming ‘mousse’ with ‘juice.’ How original!”

“Yes, nice touch with the chocolate part,” B’s dad said, ruffling B’s bangs. He worked as a senior marketing manager at Enchanted Chocolates Worldwide. “Which reminds me …” He flipped out his portable Crystal Ballphone. “Marcus! Hey, this is Felix. Can you conjure up sales figures for last quarter in our mousse and pudding sector?”

Her parents’ efforts to cheer her up only made it worse. B poked at her pancakes with her fork. She wasn’t hungry anymore.

“I just remembered something I need for school,” she said, tossing down her napkin. “Can I be excused?”

Her mother nodded. B ran back upstairs. In her room she reached under her mattress and pulled out the rhyming dictionary she’d bought with her birthday money from Granny Grogg. She hid it in
her backpack, then slid down the banister and out the front door just as the bus stopped at the end of the street.

“Bye, girls,” her mom called as Dawn and B ran to the bus. “Have a charmed day!”

B braced herself, expecting Dawn to say something about her magic before they got on the bus, but her older sister didn’t say a word. She just hurried to the back to sit with her high school friends. B searched around for her best friend, George, but he hadn’t made it in time. For a kid who won the 50-meter dash last year on track and field day, George sure moved slowly in the mornings. B took an empty seat near the front, where she could practice rhyming without anyone seeing.

“H … I … J … juice,” she said under her breath. “Here it is.” She scanned up and down for interesting words. “Chartreuse? Mongoose. Obtuse.
Sluice?
Huh?
Truce. I’m going to need a regular dictionary to look these up.”

None of the words worked any better than “mousse.” B flicked through the book, checking for words that rhymed with “drink” and “glass.” Nothing exciting there, either.
Pass a glass? Fink, stink, juice to drink
… hopeless.

B didn’t know if it was her rhymes that didn’t work or if it was just her — the only eleven-year-old witch in the whole Magical Rhyming Society that didn’t have her powers.

The bus stopped at the high school. Dawn and her friends made their way down the aisle. Just then Jason Jameson popped up in the seat in front of B and grabbed her book.

“Hey, everybody, look at this!” he yelled. “
Hornet
reads the dictionary!”

The sight of Jason’s freckle-plastered face leering down at her, plus yet another of his awful bee-related nicknames, was enough to ruin even the happiest day. And this wasn’t one of those days.

Dawn shot out her softball fast-pitch arm and snagged the rhyming dictionary out of Jason’s hands. “You should try reading the dictionary sometime,” she said, glaring at Jason. “You might learn a thing or two. And my sister’s name is B. Not ‘Hornet.’” Dawn glanced at the book, then handed it back to B. Her high school friends laughed at Jason’s stunned expression.

B wished she could disguise herself as an empty bus seat and vanish. It was bad enough that Dawn saw her rhyming dictionary and that Jason would spend all day plotting ways to get even. But the worst part was that everyone on the bus was staring at her. She hated it when people stared. Still, Dawn had stuck up for her. That was better than a poke in the eye with a sharp mascara wand.

In first period art class, B secretly tried to transform a clay piggy bank into a toad, but it kept collapsing. In second period history, the teacher, Miss Taykin, assigned a three-page essay on the Salem witch trials. Like everyone else at school, Miss Taykin had no idea that for B, the subject was personal.

B was so depressed by the time the bell rang for third period that she almost forgot where she was going. Then she remembered. English! Her favorite class. Her first class of the day with George.

George had lived next door to B since preschool, and they did everything together. Well,
almost
everything. Anything witch-related, B had to keep a secret. But it wasn’t like she was keeping a secret from George, since she didn’t appear to have witching powers anyway.

She plopped down in her seat beside George. He was a head taller than any other sixth-grader, with his crazy curly blond hair spilling over his glasses, and, as always, a Wilmington Warlocks soccer jersey worn over his T-shirt.

“Hey, B,” George said. He looked around for their teacher, Mr. Bell, then slipped B his open package of Enchanted Chocolate Nuggets.

“Ahhh,” B said, “just what I needed. Thanks.” She took a huge handful.

“Got a new joke for you,” George said. “How do you fix a flat pumpkin?”

“Um … how?” It was hard to talk with a mouthful of chocolate.

“With a pumpkin patch!”

B swallowed. “That’s pretty good.”

George mimed shooting a basket. “Two points for me,” George said. “Got another one: What happens when a ghost gets lost in the fog?”

B shook her head. “I give up.”

“He is mist!”

B grinned. George always cheered her up. “Where’d you get these?”

George popped some Nuggets in his mouth. “Found a Halloween joke book in the attic.”

Just then Jason Jameson came into the room and B remembered the bus incident.

“Uh-oh,” George said. “That’s not your happy face. What’s the matter?”

There wasn’t much about her horrible day she could tell George. Except for one thing.

“It’s Jason,” she began. “He was being mean on the bus this morning.”

“And I heard he shut a fourth-grader in his
locker before second period.” George shook his head.

B fumed. Why did Jason have to be so horrible?

Just then, her ears caught the sound of Mozart, the class hamster, squeaking in his cage. She turned to see that Jason had the top off and was prodding Mozart with a pencil.

“Jason Jameson.” B jumped out of her seat, storming over. “Leave poor Mozart
alone!”

B grabbed for the lid to the cage, ready to force it back on.

“Hey, these guys are going to fight,” shouted Jenny Springbranch, who sat next to the cage. The other kids all stood up to see.

Just then, the lights in the room flickered off and on. A man stood by the door, his hand on the switch.

Jason hid his pencil behind his back.

B stared at the man. He was taller and leaner than Mr. Bell, with a black goatee that curled to a point, and quick, darting eyes that seemed to take everything in. His clothes were dark, just like his
narrow horn-rimmed glasses and cowboy boots. Something about him reminded B of Nightshade, her cat.

“What’s going on here?” he asked, his eyes resting on B.

B suddenly realized she was standing there holding the lid to Mozart’s cage like she was ready to whack Jason in the face with it. This did
not
look good.

“Everyone, sit.” The man didn’t yell, but his voice was stern. The kids filed back to their seats.

“Are you a sub?” Jenny Springbranch asked.

The man shook his head, still watching Jason and B. Jason pointed an accusing finger at B, as if she were the one who had started the trouble, and slipped back into his seat. B replaced the lid to Mozart’s cage and returned to her desk, still angry, but also hoping she wasn’t going to get into trouble.

“Nice job, Bumble,” Jason muttered as B passed his desk.

The man walked over to the chalkboard and started writing in the upper left corner.

“Mr. Bishop,” he wrote, and turned back and faced the class. “I’m Mr. Bell’s replacement.”

A few kids whistled in surprise. B felt a stab of worry for her old teacher, Mr. Bell. He had been her favorite. He recommended that she borrow
Through the Looking Glass
from the library.

“Now, don’t worry,” Mr. Bishop said. “Mr. Bell is just fine. But he won’t be coming back. He’s in Hawaii on an extended vacation. After twenty years of trying, his lucky lottery numbers finally hit the jackpot.”

A bunch of kids started cheering. Was that because they were happy Mr. Bell got rich, or happy that he wouldn’t be coming back? B couldn’t tell. She knew one thing — now she was stuck with a teacher who already thought she was trouble.