School of Charm Read online

  Charlene looked at me and smiled. “It’ll be fun. You can help me pick the color. It has to be just right. I’m thinking turquoise or purple, maybe.”

  My mouth dropped open. “That’s our big day?” I looked around at their blank faces. “It’s July seventh. Seven, seven, seventy-seven! Don’t you get it? This will be the luckiest day ever. Something magical should happen today. Not a trip to pick out stupid pageant material.” Something sad was crawling up my throat and I swallowed hard to push it back down.

  Charlene’s cheeks glowed red. “Brenda! You are so selfish. This could be a magical day—for me!” She pressed her hand against her chest in case I didn’t know who she had meant by the word me. “If we pick out the right material, I just might win that title.” She clanged her spoon on the bottom of her cereal bowl and shot a mean look my way.

  Grandma’s lips were puckered; could’ve been because she was eating a grapefruit, could’ve been because of my cutoff shorts. She was staring at them. But it was probably because of what I’d said.

  “People who rely on magic are usually disappointed,” she said. “There’s no such thing. And luck? The only thing lucky about today is a sunny forecast. Come into town with us. You need some proper clothes for the dinner table. You’d look quite nice in a dress, Brenda, and I’ll be happy to buy you one.”

  “So will you come?” Mama asked. Her eyes looked so hopeful, I felt sad.

  But I wasn’t going shopping on the luckiest day of the century. I’d rather go back to the dentist and get my teeth fixed again. I’d rather put in two more weeks at school. I’d rather sit next to Joey Booger Beyers at lunch, with his finger right up his nose. “No, thanks. I’d like to explore the woods around here if that’s all right with you.”

  Grandma opened her mouth, but Mama touched her hand. “Sounds real nice,” Mama said. “I know how you love nature.” Mama stared at me and pushed her eyebrows together like she might cry. “I’m sure once you do some exploring, you’ll see this is a fine place to live.” She quickly looked out the window.

  Grandma snapped her mouth shut and made that deep humming noise again.

  I shoveled down my Grape-Nuts and burst out the back door before anyone could stop me. I ran down the driveway like something was chasing me. Maybe I’d find something lucky outside. Maybe Daddy would come through with my sign. I swung my arms and strode out onto the long empty road without looking back.

  Grandma’s road was a lot different from ours. There wasn’t a ditch filled with wild flowers like we had back in New York. The woods bumped right up to the street, all thick and dark. The morning air wasn’t fresh and cool, either. It was already breathing down my neck. And it smelled different, like laundry on someone else’s line. The stones on the side of the road were odd colors too. Reddish-brown and round. The ones back home were gray and jagged. My feet felt different stepping on these strange rocks.

  I stopped and closed my eyes. Back home I knew what time of the month it was by what was happening outside. The jellied mass of baby catfish eggs hatched in the pond when school ended. Tiger lilies bloomed up and down our road right on my birthday, July 4. Mom would pick a bunch before we went to see the fireworks.

  This year we skipped the Fourth. We were so busy getting ready to leave for Grandma’s. So me and Daddy missed the fireworks for the very first time—on my eleventh birthday—all because he was riding his motorcycle on the road when another man was driving with an empty six-pack of beer in his passenger seat.

  I scuffed along Grandma’s street as a car slowed down behind me. Charlene leaned out the window in her polka-dot halter top. “You sure you don’t want to come? We’re stopping for sundaes afterward at Snappy Lunch.” Her new southern accent was even thicker.

  Ruthie popped up underneath Charlene and pressed her hands against the window. I could see Mama leaning past Grandma, smiling. They looked like one big happy bunch going into town for a fun time. I thought about jumping in the car to be part of it, but then I remembered where they were going. They’d probably spend hours in the store, feeling every piece of material, and I’d end up outside, leaning against the building counting ants on the sidewalk all by myself.

  I stepped back and shoved my hands in my pockets. “No, thanks.”

  “Suit yourself,” Grandma said.

  “Suit yourself,” Ruthie said from the backseat.

  Mama looked away and settled back.

  Charlene made a face at me and rolled up the window.

  Grandma’s big Lincoln Continental roared down the road, sending up a cloud of dust that swirled around me while I stood there. I coughed as the dirt blew past me. After watching the car disappear, I walked on, kicking pebbles until they bounced, bounced, bounced out of sight. There were no creeks to explore, no ponds hiding murky secrets. I didn’t know what I was supposed to like about this place. I stopped and frowned. Daddy sure was taking his time showing me a sign. Then again, maybe a sign from heaven would be hard to send. And maybe it would be hard to see. How was I supposed to know it was a sign, anyway?

  I thought about it for a moment and decided that when Daddy sent his sign, I’d feel it, ’cause my heart would slide right back into place. I peered up at the sky, hoping the clouds might form a shape to tell me something like a smoke signal would. But it was just pure blue up there with a lonely splotch of sun. Too bad Daddy couldn’t stuff a note in a bottle and send it on down.

  I walked on some more, shuffling down a little dip in the road, when a noise caught my attention, like someone tapping on a door. My throat tightened. Tap-tappity-tap. It was coming from the side of the road. Tap-tappity-tap. Same rhythm. Tap-tappity-tap. I kept walking and the noise got louder. I bit my lip, wanting to charge into the brush and find out what—or who—was making that sound. Not so easy to do without Billy or Daddy by my side. I fluttered my fingers, waiting for courage to fill me up.

  But when I heard it again, I was more curious than scared, so I walked down the slope off the side of the road and made my way through the bushes and little trees, just itching to find out what it was.

  Tap-tappity-tap.

  Tap-tappity-tap.

  I followed the sound until I found it. A branch from a little tree was bobbing, hitting a wooden sign. The weather wasn’t breezy or anything, but still the branch was keeping the beat, hitting the sign. Words were painted on it: “Miss Vernie’s School of Charm.” Shivers tickled my skin and I rubbed my arms, but the goose bumps didn’t go away. Charlene had talked about wanting to go to a charm school to help with her pageants. But weren’t charms about magic too? Which kind of school was this?

  I ran my fingers along the smooth wood. It was a big sign, and I don’t know how I’d missed it in the first place. The words were faded, and it was crawling with honeysuckle and sweet peas. The two o’s in the word school stared at me like that stuffed owl in my room, just waiting to see what I’d do.

  I crossed my arms and tapped my foot. Well, I’d found a sign. Was this Daddy being funny up in heaven? This was not the kind of sign I was looking for and he knew it. No, this wasn’t my message from Daddy, but still, it was interesting. Maybe even more interesting than Grandma’s off-limits room. My insides felt like a hopping, fluttering baby bird trying to leap out of its nest.

  I peered past the sign and spotted a long shady driveway. Chimes tinkled far away. Goose bumps stung my arms again, but I started walking up the driveway. My stomach tightened with each step. I walked a lot slower than I would’ve if Billy had been by my side. He would’ve made it feel like a great adventure.

  At the end of the driveway everything turned bright with color, like when Dorothy enters Oz. I saw a big house, as blue as a robin’s egg, but it was dark and quiet inside. I didn’t see a charm school sign, so I walked around back.

  A woman stood with a silver watering can, sprinkling a great big plant. I didn’t know what kind of plant it was because I didn’t know the plants down south or when the flowers bloomed or the birds hatched or anything.
But this plant was pretty with big cream-colored flowers. The biggest I’d ever seen.

  She looked up at me, and her smile opened like a morning glory. “Hello there,” she said, just like she’d been expecting me. She kept on watering, the drops spilling out like bits of crystal.

  I looked around for another building, but all I saw was the house. “Excuse me, is this the charm school?” I was nibbling on my thumbnail again, even though I’d chewed most of it off on the car ride down.

  “It most certainly is.” She picked a dead leaf off the plant and stepped back to look at it. She turned to me. “Dinnerplate dahlias.”

  “I never heard of that.” My turtle could crawl between the petals and be lost for weeks.

  The yard was stuffed with flowerpots and decorations and statues. I turned in a circle to take it all in. Vines wrapped around trees and trellises, trying to touch the sky. Benches snuggled up to huge bushes. Hundreds of pink roses dangled from a wooden archway. The flowers were brighter and bigger and stranger than any I’d ever seen, like in a Dr. Seuss book. Wind chimes tinkled, but there still wasn’t even a breeze. I felt out of breath, but I hadn’t been running.

  The lady stood there watching me. Her shoulders were straight and she held her head high, like Charlene did at her beauty pageants. A bad feeling settled over me. “Is this a charm school for magic—or for beauty?” My cheeks burned. Rats. This was embarrassing.

  “Which would you like it to be?” she asked.

  Magic, I thought. It was supposed to be a magical day, after all. I lifted a shoulder, and I expected her to scold me like Grandma probably would have for shrugging instead of answering. But this lady smiled at me.

  She set down her watering can and looked at me as if I was a flower she was deciding whether or not to pick. “All students who graduate from this school leave more beautiful.” She brushed her hands off and walked over. “And all students who graduate from this school take a bit of magic with them.”

  I stared at her, not really sure what she meant. She was either an old woman who looked younger or a young woman who looked older. She was tall and a little plump. Her hair was blondish-white, pulled up in a bun, almost the same color as her dinnerplate dahlias. Wisps of it were stuck to her moist, tan cheeks.

  “What’s your name, dear?”

  “Brenda Anderson.” I twisted my hands in front of me and looked up to the house. “Where is Miss Vernie? And who can join her school?”

  Her lips fluttered into a smile again. “I am Miss Vernie. And you’ve joined just by showing up.”

  I took a step back. Then another. I crossed my arms. “I probably don’t have enough money for your school.”

  “My charm school is free to those who need it.”

  I sucked in my bottom lip. I didn’t need to be coming for free. I had thirty-five dollars hidden in my pajama drawer. Two years’ worth of birthday and Christmas cash. I didn’t even know for sure what kind of school this was, so how was I supposed to know if I needed it? My mouth was dry, and the words ran out of my head.

  I figured Miss Vernie could tell what I was thinking. Her eyes got all crinkly around the corners. “The only people who find their way here are the ones who need it. You’re free to stay if you choose. And you can stay for free.” She smiled at me like she was the sun, granting me some of her rays. Then she picked up a small shovel that was resting against a tree and walked toward a garden next to her house.

  Without any straight answers, Billy would have said this was stupid and run back down her driveway searching for our next adventure. But Billy wasn’t there. I followed her and watched while she dug up a clump of red flowers.

  “Would you believe I have to move all these?” she said, as if we hadn’t even been talking about the school.

  I kicked at a mushroom growing in the lawn. “Why?”

  “Too shady in this spot. I’ll try them somewhere else.”

  I cupped my elbows and squeezed hard. “Will they survive?”

  “Flowers are a lot hardier than you might imagine. Most things are, really.” She stared at me until I felt my skin prickle again.

  I cleared my throat. “About the school. When do classes start?”

  “Why, class is in session right now.”

  I locked my gaze with her, trying to see if she had squinty, liar eyes, or worse—wild eyes. Billy said you can never trust someone with wild eyes. “There’s a class?” I asked in a shaky voice. “Where?”

  She spread her arms wide. “Right here in the garden.” Her eyes were soft and blue and clear.

  I looked around for desks or books or something. Two squirrels sat on a tree branch, watching us. “What about the other students?”

  She pointed her shovel across the yard, where two girls were kneeling in front of a small garden. “Oh, I almost forgot.” She got up and brushed some dirt off her flowery dress and reached into her pocket. She pulled out a gold bracelet. A charm bracelet. It twisted and glinted like it was a shiny little snake squirming in her grasp. “You’ll be needing this.” She fastened it around my wrist.

  My skin tingled. I wasn’t used to wearing jewelry. I didn’t even have my ears pierced. Every girl in the fifth grade back home had her ears pierced.

  “What am I supposed to do with this?” I held the bracelet up to examine the charms dangling from the chain: a pair of ballet slippers, a mirror, a flower, and a heart. I wanted to tell her I didn’t wear jewelry, and that trying this girly stuff on me was a big waste.

  “It’s the only rule at our school: You have to wear the bracelet at all times. That’s how you know when you’ve completed a lesson—when you lose a charm.” She folded her hands and looked very pleased with herself.

  “What are the lessons?” The hot sun was making me woozy. Maybe she was crazy.

  With a smile, she tilted her head. “You won’t know until you’ve learned it.”

  She stared at me and I stared back. Then I let out my breath. “When are the classes?”

  She shrugged. “Come when you like. School ends when you’ve lost all your charms.”

  I shivered, feeling the cold metal against my skin.

  “Go on,” she said, shooing me with her hands. “Join the other girls.”

  I angled my body toward them, but I couldn’t move. I looked over my shoulder at her. “Are you sure?”

  “If you are,” she said, with a note in her voice like one of her wind chimes.

  Not one bit of this made any sense. But I lifted my foot like it had been stuck in mud for a year and walked over to the two girls.

  chapter four

  I SHUFFLED ALONG THE PATH, FINGERING MY CHARMS. I tried not to think of Billy rolling on the ground like a beetle on its back, laughing at me wearing a fancy gold bracelet out in the woods. If he were here, we’d be lifting rocks looking for newts and bugs. My fingers twitched to get in the dirt. To pick a few plants and examine the leaves. To look for moss and forgotten nests. Back home Billy and I had planted corn from seeds in the spring, and the stalks were two feet high by the time I left. We were having a contest to see whose would be the tallest. He and I would be busy in this woodsy garden for weeks. Daddy would’ve loved it too. I swallowed a big lump in my throat. When I reached the two girls planting seedlings in a patch of red dirt, I faked a cough.

  They stopped talking and stared at me. I waved. My bracelet jangled and I grabbed it with my other hand to quiet it.

  A chubby, brown-haired girl about my age squinted at me and rubbed the back of her hand under her nose. It looked like a slug had slunk across her skin, leaving a trail of slime. “What’s on your face?” she asked.

  I touched the red birthmark on my cheek but said nothing. The two girls checked me out as I stood there.

  “What’s your name?” asked a black girl. She looked older than me, and her skin was the color of Mama’s coffee after she adds her double creams. Her long legs were tucked beneath her like a grasshopper ready to pounce. Big yellow eyes stared at me from under a high Afr
o. Her hair could have been a dandelion with reddish-brown fuzzy seeds set to fly. I’d never seen anyone like her, and whatever words I was going to say tumbled back down my throat.

  “Can’t you talk?” she asked, looking me up and down.

  I swallowed hard. “It’s Chip. My name’s Chip.”

  “Like a boy?” the chubby girl asked with a snort. The snot glistened on her hand.

  “It’s my daddy’s nickname for me.”

  “Your daddy sure is funny.” She rubbed her nose again, leaving a streak of dirt on her face.

  Words clunked along my tongue, and I tried not to spit them out. “My daddy’s dead.”

  The black girl shrugged. “So’s my mama. I think.”

  I wanted to ask how she died, but the girl turned back to her seedlings.

  The chubby girl held out her hand. The one with the snot. “I’m Karen.”

  I shook the tips of her fingers and sat next to her, looking around at their work. “What have you guys been learning?”

  Karen sighed. “Not much. I still have all my charms.” She held up her bracelet. She had the same four charms dangling from her wrist.

  I looked over at the black girl, but she didn’t look back. “Does she have the same charms too?”

  I’d never had a black friend. We just had one black student at our school—Michael—and he moved away a few months ago. The only time I even saw any black people was when we drove into the city for the children’s Christmas party at Daddy’s factory. And those kids mostly kept to themselves.

  Karen pointed her shovel at the black girl. “Dana’s got the same charms.”

  Dana. I said her name silently, a tough little word tucked between my tongue and teeth. I looked at her, and my stomach felt squirmy like it did around Michael. Daddy had talked a lot about the bigots who worked at the factory and were mean to his black friends. I did not want to be a bigot. But I wasn’t entirely certain how to act around a black girl who wouldn’t look at me. But if her mama was dead like my daddy, I’d sure like to talk to her about it.