My Wishful Thinking (14 page)

“What happened?”

I straighten my shoulders and take a deep breath before heading back into the den. “We, um‌—‌”

“Had a fight?” Mom finishes.

“No. We didn’t fight. Not exactly. But…” I hesitate, because I hate to admit this to her. Finally I decide it’s like taking off a bandage. Don’t fiddle around. Just rip it off quickly. “I don’t think there’s any future with this guy.” This statement‌—‌this fact‌—‌makes Eugene sound like all the other guys I hook up with. I know better. He’s not like them and the fact that he’s a genie is the least of the differences.

“That’s not too surprising,” Mom says and then takes another swig.

My eyes sting and I squint to keep from crying. I’m not sure why I want to hide it. Mom’s cried over Dad plenty of nights. Come to think of it, maybe that’s exactly why. I need to be different from her. Stronger.

“Aww, forget about him, Lo. You don’t need him. Besides, it’s better that you find this out now. I mean, you wouldn’t want to end up like me, right?”

No effing way
.

Mom uncrosses her leg and drains the glass. She sets the empty goblet on the coffee table then re-crosses her leg in the opposite direction. “Wouldn’t you rather avoid the whole love-marriage-betrayal cycle? It’s worse when they leave you with a kid, like your father did.”

Can this night get any worse?
“Did you have to bring that up? Wasn’t there at least one good thing about your marriage with Dad?”

Mom snorts. “Not that I can think of.”

“What about me? Or do you wish that hadn’t happened too?”

Mom’s expression slides down her face. “That’s not what I meant.” She gets up from the couch. “Oh, honey, I didn’t mean‌—‌” As she tries to make her way over to me, she stumbles and uses the arm of the sofa to right herself. “I just meant guys can be shitty, you know.”

I can’t take any more of this. “Right, Mom. You’re probably right.”

“I know I’m right,” she says without a hint of slurring. She straightens her shoulders. “It’s a good thing I taught you to be self-reliant like me.” Mom seems strangely authoritative. It’s the most parental she’s acted in a long, long time. She lights a cigarette, balances the ashtray and takes the wine glass in her other hand. Time for a refill.

“G’night. Mom.”

“Night, Lo. It’ll all look better in the daylight tomorrow. You’ll see.”

I head off to my bedroom before she can finish pouring a new glass. I start to reach for the SAT prep book but pull my scrapbook from the shelf instead, then cozy into my beanbag and page through it.

Em. Mom & Dad. Em. Mom. Em. Em. Em. I wish I had a photo of Eugene.

I wish tonight hadn’t happened. I wish Eugene wouldn’t have hid part of himself from me. I wish Em had trusted me more. I wish I hadn’t blown my very short fuse.

Wish, wish, wish. I’m addicted to always wishing for things.

Those wishes can’t be made. Em’s not here, and neither is my genie.

One more wish. I wish Mom’s view of things wasn’t so blurry from her drinking. Eugene is not like Dad. And he’s not like the other guys I’ve gone out with

Because if Mom could see Eugene as I do, she’d understand he’s worth crying over.

CHAPTER 32

MOM WAS WRONG ABOUT A LOT LAST NIGHT. Namely that things would look better in the daylight. They don’t. They look exactly the same, minus the fireworks.

What is completely clear to me is last night sucked. The other thing that’s been illuminated is there’s very little I can do to fix things. Item number three in chronological order of suckage is that I have to be at Rags to Ritzy in less than an hour. The only blessing is Em has the day off from Perks; otherwise I’d feel guilty if I didn’t drive her. Can you say awkward?

Marcia’s already at the store when I get there. There are plastic bins of clothes brought from the warehouse, which means she plans on me redoing the displays. Sure. Fine. A day with Betsy, Trudy and Monnique is probably what I need. At least I won’t fight with them.

Aunt Marcia pops the lid on one and starts looking for something a quarter of the way down. “Did you and Em have an enjoyable fourth with the boys?”

“Yes.” It’s not exactly a fib. Most of the day was amazingly great.

“That’s nice.” Marcia stops what she’s doing, freezing like one of mannequins. “I just remembered something I needed to tell you about. My mind!” She laughs at herself and walks to the counter. “Logan, the strangest thing‌—‌wait…are you okay?”

“Huh?”

“Your eyes. They look swollen. Is it a reaction to the contacts?”

Oh! Marcia thinks the reason I see better so much better is that I got contacts. Of course she does. Why would she think it had anything to do with a genie or granting a wish of Em’s? The truth is they’re swollen from crying all night, but I’m definitely not gonna tell her that. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

“You should get that checked.” She straightens a heap of papers on the counter. “Oh, right! I started to tell you about this customer who came in the day before yesterday.”

“Yeah.” I nod for her to go on as I walk behind the counter with her and lay my purse on the shelf.

“He swore he consigned a piece a about a week ago. A bag. And that‌—‌“

Oh, God! I had wished he’d go away.

Marcia keeps talking but I don’t hear it, only tuning her back in when she says, “Do you remember him?”

Remember him? Do I remember the creepy guy who totally changed my life and now seems to stalk me every so often? The pick-a-card guy? The cut-my-palm-and-now-we’re-blood-sisters, now-we’re-not guy? Yeah, I know him. “Uh…” I say.

“He must have been here. He described you to a tee.” Marcia smiles warmly. “He mentioned the bag was one of a kind and embroidered. Ring any bells?”

Did he happen to mention if smoke and a dorky teen boy come out when you open it? If so, I might know the bag.

That is not what I say. Instead I lie to Marcia. “I think I remember it, kinda. Yeah, yeah…now I remember. It was the day you had to go to the doctor’s. But he didn’t leave the bag. I guess I didn’t offer enough. Sorry.”

Mannequin Betsy stares at me with a look of disbelief. She’s always got that look, but it makes me uncomfortable because I’m a completely crap liar.

“Well, I told him I’d remember that piece. I’m a little forgetful, but I know my merchandise.”

“You sure do,” I agree. And that’s the God’s honest truth. She knew the pieces she was looking for were a quarter of the way down in that container.

“But what’s so strange,” she continues, “is that he swears he consigned it here. It’s possible
his
memory is a little fuzzy. He was getting up there in years.”

So he’s still aging
. “Did you tell him to try Once and Again?”

“I did. He wouldn’t be the first one to get confused. They always copy our displays.”

They do, but even Mannequin Betsy knows I had just changed her into go-go boots, and they didn’t copy that for at least three days. Besides, his contract is folded into an itty bitty square tucked away in my wallet. I could have come clean, could have told Marcia I’d taken the bag home and asked her to let me bring it in the next day. A part of me would love to stop by Em’s to pick it up, but even if I gave him the bag, he still wouldn’t have the most important thing. He still wouldn’t have Eugene. What held me back was that it basically felt criminal to give that guy Eugene’s home.

“Did he say if he’d be back?” I ask.

“He didn’t say, and I hope not. To be honest, he made me uncomfortable.”

“Yeah, Marcia, he creeped me out too.”

“He got very angry when I said we didn’t have his bag. Then, when he was leaving, it was like he was threatening you or me. He said, ‘Tell her I don’t need that magic genie to get what I want.’ Doesn’t that seem pretty unstable?”

Yeah. Some would call it crazy.

CHAPTER 33

WHEN MARCIA GOES TO LUNCH I search for the contract. It’s dated June 28, just over a week ago. Seems like a lifetime.

The magician’s signature, Richard Nero, is scrawled across the bottom.

I bet he regrets that now. Signing over his genie. Why did he do it? His wishes must be unraveling. He’s older and his magic is decaying. I wonder if he regrets his cruelty to Eugene, like scaring him by dropping him off during the storm. Or does he only regret losing his genie’s power?

I need to warn Eugene that he came back looking for the bag. I slip the contract into my wallet and hold my cell phone for a moment, hesitating. Then, I hit my best friend’s speed dial. Em answers but doesn’t say anything.

Is she waiting for an apology? Because that is so not happening.

“Look,” I start. “Richard came into the store for Eugene two days ago. I thought you should know.”

“Why?” Em’s tone is blasé.

Why?
Is she serious? I roll my eyes at Trudy. For a smart girl, Em can be so dense.

“Beeee‌—‌cuuuz, Eugene needs to be careful.” Then I put on the snottiest Nigel accent I can muster. “He doesn’t have a cell or I’d ring him up directly. If you’d be so kind as to let him know. I truly appreciate you re-laaaying the message.”

I’m about to say ta-ta, when Em blurts, “He’s with you, right?”

“Richard?”

“Not Richard.” She huffs. “Eugene.”

“Um. You must have forgotten the fight and the rain. He followed you and Nigel out.”

“He did, but when we got to the parking lot, he asked if we could wait in the car until the rain stopped or you came out. He said he needed to talk to you. And then when you were putting stuff in Dory‌—‌” She pauses. “He ran after you.”

He did?

A very brief flicker of happiness is obscured by nausea. Because it seems like Em is saying Eugene isn’t at her house.

“Didn’t he stay with you? You have his bag, you know?”

“No. Oh, god. I thought he was with you.”

CHAPTER 34

I PACE FROM BETSY TO TRUDY waiting for Em to show. I convinced Aunt Marcia to let me stay at the shop after closing by telling her I could study better here than at home. It wasn’t impossible for her to believe. I’m not even sure why I felt we should start from the shop; it’s a little superstitious, but when you’re dealing with magic and missing genies, who’s to say what’s superstitious and what’s not?

At night, the store is eerie. I almost expect Richard to show up and when there’s a knock, I practically jump out of my skin.

I unlock the front door and invite Em in. “Thanks for coming,” I say.

She crosses her arms over her fancy, new chest, keeping her distance. “No problem.”

Just to be clear about this: there is a problem. We’re not actually friends anymore. If we ever actually were. Maybe it was an illusion, the combined blood-sister magic of a genie and a magician, which now is fading away, just like Richard’s youth and talent. Or maybe, sharing the genie caused the meltdown. All the wishing for the wrong things, for things we thought we wanted, but didn’t need.

I wish we were still best friends. I miss the old Em.

Yet while that’s gone, we have decided to work together, if only because we both care about Eugene.

“Okay. So I’ve been thinking about what we could wish for‌—‌“

Emily’s hands are on her hips when she says, as “You said no more wishes.” She looks stiff in the darkened shop, like she could be another one of the mannequins.

“I know I said that, but this changes everything. We have to at least
try
. It might not even work without Eugene here to grant it.”

Em rolls her eyes. “Could you be a little more positive about this?”

I go on like she didn’t even say that. “So, I thought what if we could see where Eugene was right now?”

“That’s not bad. But how would we see? Do you have an old TV or something we could plug in?

The answer to Em’s T.V. question is no. I look at Mannequin Betsy like she might have the solution, but she’s facing away from me, glancing at her partners in crime at the back of the store.

I follow Betsy’s sight line to the corner, where we wished right after Eugene popped out of his bag. Feels like I was a different person then. I know Eugene and Em were. The three-way mirror still gives me the impression of going back and back and back. “That’s it.”

“What?” Em asks.

“The mirror. What if we wish to see Eugene in the mirror?”

“Like in ‘Beauty and the Beast?’ I love that movie!”

I smile for the first time since Em got here, because she made me watch it thirty-two thousand times. Maybe thirty-three. It’s probably why I thought of the mirror. “Yeah. Just like ‘Beauty and the Beast.’”

So Em and I work out the exact words for the wish. Making sure its specific. Making sure we have the dual-timing down.
I wish we could see Eugene and his location in the mirror.

We think that’ll do it. Em wondered if we should throw “three-way” into the description, but our tongue trips every time we try to say it together and eventually we decided that would be overkill. Our intention is clear. We’re standing right in front of the effing thing.

One…two…three…and the wish is made. There’s not even the partial shimmer of a granting that is destined to bomb. My heart sinks. The only thing that went
poof!
was my hope disappearing. I slump into the loveseat, and Em sits near me in the arm chair.

She sets her jaw, and thrusts her chin forward. “We’ll think of something else, Lo.”

“He doesn’t even have his bag,” I wail. “He needs time alone.”

“Not as much as he used to,” Em reassures. “Richard never let him out, but we’ve given him so much more freedom. I think he’s getting used to it.”

“You think so? Really? You’re not just saying that to make me feel better?”

“I know so. Look how long he was out on the Fourth and he never asked for a break.” The second this slips from Em’s lips, she looks like she regrets it. Because who wants to go back to that day? Our fight. The reason Eugene disappeared in the first place. The empty spot next to me on the loveseat gapes. That’s where Eugene should be‌—‌next to me, cracking a stupid, unintentional joke.