A Tale of Highly Unusual Magic by Lisa Papademetriou Read Free Book Online Page A

book beside her, even with her eyes closed.
    It doesn’t matter, Leila told herself. I’ll put the book back on the shelf in the library in the morning. Then I’ll forget all about it.
    Which just goes to show you that people have no idea what’s going to happen to them.
T HE E XQUISITE C ORPSE
    But the magic Ralph loved was fake. It wasn’t real.
    â€œHow did you do that?” Ralph asked the man in the hat.
    â€œDo what?” The man smiled, each tooth like a pianokey, as his fingers danced over the walnuts.
    â€œHow did you make the pea disappear?”
    â€œWhy, magic, young lad.” The man leaned down, and placed his lips near Ralph’s ear. “You do believe in magic, don’t you?”
    â€œOf course,” Ralph whispered.
    Leaning back, the man narrowed his eyes and looked down his long nose. “Yes,” he said slowly, hissing like a thoughtful snake. “Yes, I believe you do. It’s not everyone that does, these days.”
    â€œCan you teach me?”
    â€œI can do better than that.” Reaching into the pocket of his vest, the man brought out a small glass vial with a silver stopper. “I can give you a bit of magic, if you like. Three magics per bottle.”
    â€œWow!” Ralph reached for the vial.
    â€œNot so fast, young man! Something this precious costs money. I can’t go giving it away for free.”
    The silver stopper winked in the sunlight, setting Ralph on fire with wanting. He had to have that bottle. He had to! “How much?” he asked.
    The man wrapped his fingers around the bottle andclosed his eyes. “Two paper dollars . . . one half dollar . . . five quarters . . . a dime . . . three nickels . . . forty-seven pennies.”
    Ralph began to feel very queer. How strange that this man would list exactly the coins that Ralph had hidden behind the loose board at the back of the bread box. All of the money he had earned from doing odd jobs and helping his father at the store for the past two years.
    The man’s black eyes were open now, and so was his palm. The vial shone like a faint star. Ralph had to have it.
    â€œI’ll be right back,” Ralph said.

CHAPTER FIVE
Kai
    T HE MOMENT K AI PUSHED open the door to the kitchen, she was overwhelmed by the smell of apples and cinnamon and something else—ginger?—and she saw herself as a small child, reaching for the stove, and someone bending down to tell her gently, “No, no, Kai, the cake isn’t finished yet.”
    â€œI’ve made my famous apple cake for dessert,” Lavinia crowed. “It was your daddy’s favorite! He drug the recipe out of me when he was in high school.”
    Kai did not know what to say. Her mother always whispered the words, “your father,” as if he were something too special to share with the world. Kai was used to thinking of him as a myth, or maybe a magical creature—not as someone who ate cake. Or baked it. Kai stood fora moment, just breathing. For some reason, she could not imagine the taste. “It smells really good.”
    â€œWell, let’s eat, then!” Lavinia boomed. “The sooner we get to dinner, the sooner we get to dessert. Go wash up, sugar.”
    Kai used the small downstairs bathroom, enjoying the fancy soap cut into the shape of a rose and the lace-trimmed towels. Those were the kind of things her mother always said were “too good to use,” so they sat in a closet, collecting dust, while they used the same old set of rose-patterned towels that had faded to gray with too many washings. Schuyler was a very careful woman. Very careful and reliable, which was, Kai thought, mostly good. But she was also a woman who knew that good things could be used up too soon, gone before their time, and that fact ruled both her life and Kai’s.
    Kai walked into the dining room. Lace doilies covered every available surface, and oil paintings of roses covered the