Kelly McClymer-Salem Witch 02 Competition's A Witch (20 page)

Besides potions, it was summoning that really tripped me up. I’d improved a lot. I could summon more than one object. I could summon things from more than one place at the same time. I almost never dropped anything I summoned either. But my fine-motor summoning was still at the kindergarten stage.

So when Mr. Phogg zapped a pile of brightly colored LEGOs on the table in front of me and asked me to build a castle, I started to shake. But I did it. True, my castle looked like a big chunk had been taken out of it by a tornado. But I did it all with magic. Look, Agatha! No hands!

I could document all the disasters that I had to face during the test. But it would be too depressing. A three-hour witch test was more exhausting than two days of intensely acrobatic cheering tryouts. By the time I’d finished creating my last charm—a cute little locket that was supposed to
help someone keep focused on her goal—I was ready to do a Rip Van Winkle and sleep for a hundred years.

No such luck.

Mr. Phogg, looking sad—although he always looks sad—stood before me. “Thank you, Miss Stewart.”

“Did I pass?” I really didn’t want to know, but I knew I would want to know later. In about fifty years.

He didn’t look very encouraging. But, again, what was new with that? “I’ll take the results of the exam under advisement, discuss them with the headmistress, and let you know.”

“Can you give me a hint?” Crappiola times ten. I hadn’t thought about having to wait to find out whether I’d passed or not. “Did I nail it? Did I come close?”

He smiled. Skin and Bones smiled! “I’m afraid the details matter more than you realize, Miss Stewart. They will have to be carefully weighed. That is not a process to be done in the snap of one’s fingers.” He snapped his bony fingers, and I swear I saw a spark.

Okay. Waiting was necessary. I could do it. I could. But I was bummed. Majorly bummed.

Everything depended on whether or not I passed that test. Everything.

I couldn’t utter a word to Mom and Dad, who were sitting at the kitchen table waiting for me. I wrote “grade still pending” in glowing letters on the kitchen table. Then I popped directly to my room, cried, summoned Ben &
Jerry’s ice cream, and ate it from the carton without a spoon. Then I cried some more. Then I went to sleep, wishing very much I’d wake up and find out the whole moving to Salem thing was a
really
bad nightmare.

The next morning, the world was still the same as it had been. I’d taken the test, but it hadn’t changed anything. Yet. My life was a nightmare, but not one I could wake up from. Worse, my fate was in the hands of Agatha. If she thought I hadn’t passed, Mr. Phogg wouldn’t argue. I’d be burnt toast with rancid grape jelly on top.

For the first time since I could remember, I had trouble putting on the cheerleader-confident smile I needed to face Mom and Dad at the breakfast table.

“Good morning, Pru. Would you like eggs or cereal?” Mom didn’t seem upset, which I had expected. Although it didn’t escape my notice that she had asked me what I wanted for breakfast when I was perfectly capable of popping it myself.

“So? Did you suck as bad as you thought you would?” Dorklock was, as always, as diplomatic as a buzz saw.

“I don’t know yet.” It was hard not to cry. “Mr. Phogg said he had to consult with Agatha before … before …” I couldn’t finish the sentence. Tears started trickling down my face.

Dad flipped out. Seriously.

He stood up, dropped his napkin on the table, and looked straight at my mom. “Prudence, say the word and we’ll go back to Beverly Hills. We won’t even wait to find out how you did on the test.” Apparently, seeing his baby girl hurt and devastated by a test when she’d never failed at anything in her life, was the last straw for him. Apparently, Dad had finally had it with witch world.

Mom didn’t get too upset. She took another bite of eggs before she responded. “You’re overreacting.”

But Dad was serious this time. “You’re underreacting.”

Mom put her fork down and took a sip of her coffee, as if we were discussing whether to have roast beef or salmon for dinner tonight. “You don’t have a job there anymore.”

“I could get it back.” Dad didn’t sound at all doubtful. “My old boss has called me for advice and told me so more than once.”

Mom looked surprised at that. “We said we’d give it a year. It hasn’t even been six months. Pru is settling into her school—”

“She’s a wreck. Look at her.”

Ouch. Did I look that bad that even Dad noticed? Maybe I
should
go back to Beverly Hills.

“She’s tired from cramming, that’s all. She and Seamus packed quite a few days’ time into their study sessions. Besides, Prudence can handle it. She made the cheerleading squad, didn’t she? She’ll catch up.”

“Catch up? She’s always been the head of her class.” Dad wasn’t ready to calm down yet. “And Tobias? What is he learning in those Gifted and Talented classes of his?”

Mom stood up to meet Dad’s eye. “He’s learning how to be a responsible witch.”

“There’s an oxymoron if ever I heard one.” Dad was really upset. He never attacked witchcraft like this—he knew it hurt Mom way too much.

“That’s unfair.”

“What was unfair was for us to take the kids out of the life they knew to come here. We need to go home,” Dad said.

Mom and Dad didn’t usually fight in front of us, so even the Dorklock and I were standing now. Frozen, staring, horrified. Wanting to run, but like rubberneckers on the L.A. Freeway, we were helpless to do anything but watch.

Dad turned to me. “Pru? Say the word and we’re going home.” If Dad had had any witch powers, he’d have used them right then and there to pop us back into our old life. If only he could pop us back to where we’d started from,
before all this Salem stuff started. Then Maddie wouldn’t have had a chance to stab me in the back long-distance. And I’d be captain of the cheerleading squad—and acing every test I took.

Of course, Dad didn’t have any powers, except to fume and rant. So if we went back, it would be in the yucky mortal way, where we had to go back and start rebuilding. No way would I be captain of the team again. And Maddie would be seeing Brent. And I’d have to see her, knowing we weren’t ever going to be friends again. No thanks.

I looked at Mom and Dad. Fighting. Over me. I realized I was the only one who could end this before it got ugly. Maybe even way too ugly to fix. “Dad. Wait.”

“Pru, honey, it’s okay. You don’t need to be strong any longer. I told your mother we’d try this, but it isn’t working.”

“Going back—”

He interrupted me. “I know it won’t be exactly the same. We’ll have to get a new house, but I promise we’ll get one where you can go to your old school and hang out with your old friends. It will be just like we never moved.” I could see him trying to be the strong dad, protecting his baby.

It was sad to see him lying. And he was lying, my bracelet told me so. Although I think he was trying not to believe his words were lies. He really hated my school struggles worse than I did. And not because of that parent living through their child thing, but because he wanted me to feel
successful. To feel like I belonged. Maybe he knew because he knew what it felt like to be out of place in witch world. Big-time.

“It’s okay, Dad.” I put on my best “rally the crowd” face. “We should stay here. Not just for Tobias, but for me, too. I need to learn this witch stuff. I need to manifest my Talent and learn how to use it.”

“You can do that on your own time, back in Beverly Hills, where you don’t feel so out of place.” He looked at Mom, and we all knew he meant what he said. My dad put his foot down often enough, but never like this. My mom can usually talk him around quickly enough that we don’t have to worry. But that wasn’t happening this time. Dad sounded more sure every time he said we were moving.

“Patience, you can teach them what they need to know,” Dad said.

“I can,” Mom agreed with a nod. “But being around other witches—” Poor Dad winced when she said that, so she stopped and held her hands up, as if that said it all.

Unfortunately, Dad wasn’t hearing any of us. Even Tobias had something to add. “I don’t want to go back somewhere I can’t do my magic except in secret.”

“You did just fine up until two months ago, you’ll adjust. Your sister is a smart, talented, capable girl. I cannot stand by while this school, and all this magic folderol, make her feel like a failure.”

The argument might have gone on for a lot longer, but I said, “Dad! I learned never to give up from you and Mom. Even if I failed the test, I’ll just take it again. I have to take it again. I have to do it. You know I do.”

“Honey—” He looked at me, and I knew he wanted to say something that would rescue me. But he stopped arguing. We both knew there wasn’t anything that could be said. I had to do this. “Fine. For now. But if you”—he looked at Tobias—“if either of you ever want out, all you have to do is—”

“Got it.” The Dorklock and I spoke in unison. We were committed to staying here. It was weird to be on the same page. Even weirder to want to stay in a place I never wanted to come to in the first place.

I lingered in the kitchen for longer than usual that morning. It was one thing to tell my dad I wanted to stay at Agatha’s. It was another thing to actually go back. What if Agatha decided to make the announcement that I’d failed boom into every classroom, like the morning and afternoon announcements did? Everyone would know I was a loser. Everyone. No doubt left. Homeschooling was looking like an option I could live with.

I had about six minutes to pull myself together before I’d be tardy and have to take a detention, as well as embrace my potential loserhood. Until the doorbell rang, and Samuel appeared in the kitchen. Mom and Dad disappeared without a good luck or good-bye.

“What are you doing here?” I didn’t mean to sound surly, but Samuel hadn’t been talking to me because he was jealous of Angelo. And now that I’d taken the test, pass or fail, here he was as if we’d never had our big fight.

“Your mom told me you’re freaking because you have to wait to find out if you passed the test.”

“Great.” Maybe I should have clued Mom in to the big Samuel-Pru rift. “I guess I can count you in on Agatha’s side—hoping I fail.”

He frowned. “Pru, I never—”

“Never want to talk to me again?” I didn’t want to fight, but I couldn’t seem to stop. I’d been working so hard to pass this test, to get the team in shape, to just hold on so my world didn’t go completely crazy. And now there was nothing to study for, just the
tick tick tick
of the clock until I knew whether I was still in remedial magic classes.

I’d never heard Samuel raise his voice. But he did then. And he even made it echo, like a movie special effect: “Never wanted to see you fail!” He continued in his regular voice: “You had a lot to learn, but you’ve learned so much, you know. You’re really smart. And driven.”

“So if you didn’t come to gloat, why did you come?” I asked.

“I guess you may still need tutoring, right? And a friend?”

“Why bother? I’m never going to be able to get out of remedial classes. I’m no good as a witch. I even dare to like mortals.”

Samuel blushed, embarrassed that I wasn’t just going to let it drop. “Pru, I’m sorry. Your mom and dad do just fine. I’m sure if you wanted to date a mortal, you’d handle it no problem.”

“Thanks.” He was lying, according to the bracelet. Which made me happy. Sometimes friends have to lie, and for a fringie to know that this was a good time to tell a whopper—well, that meant he really
was
a friend.

“Now. Are you going to go to school with me, or are you going to stay home?”

“What if I fail?”

“You’ll take the test again.”

“What if I study forever and never manifest a Talent?”

“You will.”

“Right. Maybe I should ask Tara. She’ll tell me the truth, even if I am a little too much of a dirt shuffler for her liking.”

“Stop it.”

“Stop what? Trying to do things the mortal way?” I held up the hand that had the ring. “Do you know how often this vibrates a day?”

He held out his hand. “Give it to me.”

“No. I—” I curled up my fist.