The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)

At Home with Shelly Nolan

Previously: "Little Miss Magic" 

You don't know why that "robotic" feeling overwhelmed you, unless it was, like, something shutting down inside your head before you totally freaked out over this stuff. Now, you tamp down the excitement firmly as you study yourself in the mirror.

Shelly Nolan is a small and skinny girl—bony, almost—with pasty white skin and lank red hair that falls to just above her shoulders. She's got a pert nose and squinty eyes, but her face comes alive when she grins.

You're grinning now. I can't believe this worked! you exult. This is even better than the Polyjuice Potion, because I can even think like Shelly! Like, would I even know what Polyjuice Potion was if I didn't have her memories?

You give yourself a big thumbs-up, then run back to Ms. Cho's classroom.

The lights are back on, and the two teachers—Ms. Cho and Mr. Hagerman—are talking in low voices.

"Look, this has been fun and all," you tell them as you sweep up your backpack, "but I really gotta go! The longer I wait before I text my mom—"

"When are we going to talk again?" Mr. Hagerman asks. He seems a lot bigger than he was before, maybe because Ms. Cho, though still a small woman, is half a head taller than you are now.

"Tomorrow?" you hazard. "I guess I can take my lunch in here with— Oh, except you and me don't have the same lunch!" you exclaim with a frown at Ms. Cho. "But I'll have something written up for you!" you promise Sydney. "After school?"

"Tomorrow's Saturday."

"Oh! Right! Dur!" You snap your fingers. "Um— Well, look—" You glance around, nervously. It is so weird being in a classroom after school. "Can I text you? I'll have to set something up with my mom. Maybe I can tell her I'm meeting friends? Like, we're going mini-golfing?"

"I guess that'll work," Mr. Hagerman says. But he sounds dubious.

It'll have to. Because you will just bust if you don't get out of there and get a text in to your mom so she doesn't worry.

You hike your pack onto your back and dash out the door.

* * * * *

You are blind to everything else when you burst outside onto the front quad, and wriggle free of your pack so you can pull out your phone. You're just starting to compose the text to your mom when a voice sounds nearby. "Hey."

You squawk, and the phone almost flies from your hand.

"Sorry," Addison Ricci says. "Are you okay?"

You boggle at her. "I'm fine! You just scared me is all! What are you, one of the cat people?" You can hardly catch your breath.

There is something very feline about Addison. She is soft and silky and graceful. But she took your question the wrong way, and with a puzzled frown says, "Yeah, I like cats. But are you okay? You were being sick in Ms. Cho's room."

"Oh! That. It was nothing." You crinkle your nose and wave your hand at her. "Just the chocolate pudding from lunch making a return visit. I think that stuff was off. Did you have any of it?"

Addison looks very doubtful, but she only shrugs. "So, what are you doing tonight? It's Friday, you know."

"I don't know. Probably nothing. I missed the bus, you know! My mom's probably going to ground me!"

Addison glances back at the parking lot that fronts the school. "I can give you a ride home. My mom's late picking me up."

"Oh! That'd be ... great!" You swallow. Addison is one of the cool, popular girls, and she doesn't say much to Shelly, though you don't have a memory of her being unkind.

She says, "If you don't get in trouble, some of us are going to see a movie tonight. Howling Skies? It just opened today. It's about werwolves and pirates."

"Oh, yeah! I've seen the trailer! It sounds awesome!"

Addison glances over her shoulder again, then leans in close. "Actually," she says in a low voice, "that's just the excuse we're telling our folks. There's a party we're going to. Think you could make it?"

Your heart rises in your chest. A party? Like ... with alcohol? You could get in so much trouble!

Fortunately, before you can answer, you see a familiar-looking sedan swing into the parking lot, and recognize the back of the girl walking out to meet it. You grab up your pack and brush past Addison.

"Sorry!" you shout back at her. "But that's my friend Caitlyn, I bet I can get a ride from her! Thanks for telling me about the party, though! Um—" You gulp. "Text me later, and I'll tell you if I can make it!" Without waiting for an answer, you gallop off to meet one of Shelly's best friends.

* * * * *

Caitlyn's mom is happy to give you a ride to your house, though it is far out of her way, and you and Caitlyn huddle in the back, talking. You lean in to whisper—so her mom won't overhear—about what Addison said to you about the party. Caitlyn tells you she knows, and takes out her phone to tap you out some notes about it. It's at a guy named Joshua Cheswick's house, and it's Addison and some of the freshman football players—Austin Ritter, Ian Peck, the Daniels twins—and other "popular" guys who are going to be crashing it, along with some girls. Caitlyn's not sure she can make it, though.

Then you remember that you couldn't make it out anyway. Stupid special church social!

Shelly and her mother live south of town, where the houses peter out into fields and woods. The last road out to your new house isn't even paved, and to get back out after dropping you off, Mrs. Smart has to turn around in an open, muddy cul-de-sac. It's been raining, and most of the leaves are off the trees, and the bare branches scratch at the October clouds like skeletal fingers. You trudge across a lumpy yard to the sagging porch of the faded, two-story farmhouse that Shelly and her mom moved into two years ago. But though the outside is pure American Gothic—like something out of a Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie—the inside is warm and cozy, with dark quilts and rugs and heavy drapes everywhere.

You actually beat the school bus, so Mrs. Nolan—a small woman, like her daughter, and like her daughter she has trailing red hair—doesn't realize you had to get a special ride home. You confess to her anyway about missing the bus, but she doesn't mind. She never really minds anything, and afterward you realize that there was no reason to freak out. But Shelly hates putting her mother through any trouble, and feels guilty when she does.

She's just finished fixing a beef stew, and after you've unloaded your stuff in your bedroom upstairs she calls you down to take some next door to the Stirlands. "I told them I was making enough for all of us," she says. "You know they brought over that lasagna the other night."

"Payback! Gotcha!" You give her a thumbs' up and a wink.

"It's not like that, honey." Mrs. Nolan gives you a funny look. "It was a good lasagna and this is a good stew. It's not 'payback' for—"

"No, I gotcha! I'll be right back." You take the big Rubbermaid container and trot off down the road toward the Stirlands'.

It's a fair hike down the muddy lane to the house where the neighbors live. Their house is much more nicely maintained, with a neat, well-manicured clapboard exterior and a dainty little garden decorated by a swing set. The door is opened by Mrs. Stirland, but Niamh, the daughter, comes downstairs to chat with you after her mother has taken the stew into the kitchen.

That's good. Because Shelly likes Niamh.

A lot of it—you reflect afterward when, back home, you try to put Shelly's scatterbrained thoughts in order—is because Niamh is three years older and seems very grown up while still being approachable. She also seems very ... sophisticated ... somehow. She wears her yellow-white hair boyishly short (shorter even than Will Prescott wears his) and dresses casually in light khakis and peach tops. Then, too, she goes to a very prestigious academy—St. Francis Xavier—out west of town. Kids from all over the world—even from Europe!—go to school there, and Niamh rubs shoulders with them. Shelly has seen pictures of the place, and of course it reminds her of Hogwarts.

"I got invited to a party!" you excitedly whisper after drawing her out onto the front porch. (You don't know why you are telling Niamh this, except that it's something Shelly would do. But why are you "doing something Shelly would do" when it has nothing to do with your plans with Sydney?) "But, like, we have to pretend we're going to a movie instead?"

Niamh looks alarmed. "You're not going to, are you?" she asks.

"No! I'm only telling you—! Besides." You make a face. "We have a church thing tonight."

"So why are you telling me?"

"Because— I don't know." You squirm with embarrassment. "It's kind of— Well, it's first time anyone's ever asked me to go to a party like that!"

"Oh, Shelly." Niamh gives you a quick hug. "Get used to it. And figure out if it's something you really ought to be doing. You're a good kid, you know?"

You roll your eyes. "I know. But sometimes I wanna be bad! Okay, not bad, but can't I get into a little mischief sometimes? Like Hermione! Would she go to a party like that? What would she do?"

"I don't know, Shelly," Niamh says with a laugh. "She'd probably use magic, though. Right?"

"Oo! Good one!" You laugh, then say your good nights and scamper back to your house.

Your heart is beating hard, though, because Niamh has accidentally hit it right on the head.

Because magic is real!

Next: "At Play with Cousin Brandon" 

*
"Table of Contents (Vol. 4)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)"