Falling In by Frances O'Roark Dowell Read Free Book Online

school, the sky a soft blue, the sun warm on her shoulders but not burning. Although it hadn’t rained in the night, everything around her looked freshly washed. The dirt beneath her feet was as fine as powder; in fact, Isabelle could imagine mixing it with boiling water to make hot chocolate, throwing in a few choice white pebbles for marshmallows.
    There had been dirt like this at Isabelle’s elementary school. She could almost feel it sifting through her fingers as she remembered all those recesses she’d spent digging and stirring, adding water, creating a world out of the milky brown muck. She’d dug a hole six inches deep and twelve inches across in a spot behind the cafeteria Dumpster and lined it with small rocks to make a sort of mixing bowl. She’d used sticks for spoons, sometimes brought a plastic knife from home, sometimes a handful of marbles to decorate the cakes and pies she made.
    Kindergarten, first grade, second grade, third grade. Each year she’d rediscovered the dirt, some years in September, other years not until spring. In second grade a new girl had joined her, and for the first time Isabelle had known the pleasure of companionship, the two girls murmuring to each other as they stirred the batter for muffins or fashioned dolls from sticks and clay. A few words here and there. They hadn’t needed many.
    Angel Fisher. Isabelle had thought that was the most wonderful name in the world, had drawnpicture after picture of a girl sitting by the edge of a stream with a net strung from silk, pulling angels out of the water. She’d mailed them to Angel using Christmas stamps. Angel had loved the dirt as much as Isabelle, had understood that it had magical properties, had understood without being told that you should never use a word like “mud” when you had the word “clay” at your disposal. Angel with her dark hair always captured in a braid, her fingernails bitten to the quick.
    They’d stolen her, of course. Isabelle saw it happening. The day Angel had arrived at the dirt with a foil-wrapped chocolate kiss in her hand, her eyes wide with surprise, Isabelle knew it was only a matter of time.
April gave this to
me, Angel had said.
Right out of the clear blue sky, she gave it to
me. April Hennessey, with her yellow hair and pink skin, her nose turned up like a pig’s. April, who did not want Angel’s friendship, only Isabelle’s misery.
    “I’m going to kill her, miss.”
    Isabelle stopped short, scattering pebbles to the edges of the path. “Going to kill who, Hen?”
    “The witch, miss,” Hen replied without breaking step. “I think God sent you to lead me to her. Could it be more clear, you there waiting for me on a rock in the middle of the path? Like the Lord himself had set you down.”
    “How old are you, Hen?” Isabelle scrambled to catch up with the girl.
    “Nine, miss. Ten in three months’ time.”
    “Do you really think you could kill a witch? You don’t have any weapons, any magic.”
    Hen came to a halt. “I’ve got strong hands, miss, strong enough to choke an old hag,” she said, squeezing one hand around the other wrist as if to prove her strength. “The witch must be ancient by now, nothing more than a bundle of twigs wrapped in skin. It came to me last night, as I was falling asleep. I was thinking how weary I am of being frightened. Now it’s the witch’s season in Corrin, and then she’ll hunt the children in Stoneybatter, and it will go on like that, village by village, round and round, until she dies. A witch can live two hundred years or more. So there’s years left of it, unless she’s stopped.”
    Hen turned and looked at Isabelle. She was quiet a moment before she spoke again. “You could help me, miss.”
    “Help?” Isabelle blinked several times.
    “Yes, miss. You could hold her while I have my hands around her neck.”
    Isabelle started down the path again. The sun flared above the trees, and a squirrel perched on a tree stump chattered