The Magic Half (4 page)

All at once, a rough roar exploded from the bottom of the stairs. “You up there, runt?” Molly jumped and put her finger to her lips. Miri nodded. It was the teenage boy again, and he was angrier than ever. “Thought you’d fool us, din’t you?” he called out in a voice that sounded mean and glad at the same time. “Thought you’d ring Gran’s bell and watch us jump, din’t you?” The stairs creaked, and the boy huffed as he climbed them. “You’re gonna be sorry when I find you.”

Soundlessly, Molly reached over and grabbed Miri by the collar of her dress, and with one sweeping yank pulled her into the long closet. Miri wondered desperately where they could hide—the boy didn’t sound like someone who could be stopped by a few coats—but then, to her surprise, she saw Molly pull up the top of the long, low bench like a lid. “Get in,” she whispered, gesturing frantically. “Get in and roll back.”

Obediently, Miri climbed inside the bench and lay down, her back pressing against the wall. As the door of Molly’s room was thrust open, Molly leaped into the narrow bench next to—or, really, on top of—Miri. “Push against the wall,” she hissed, closing the lid over them.

What good is that? thought Miri, but the sharp yowl of the cat in the next room warned her not to argue. She pushed—and the wall opened like a door. It was hinged at the top inside the bench, like a cat door, and Miri rolled through it, out onto the dusty floor of an attic, praying that she had not been heard. An instant later, Molly was beside her, breathing heavily. She laid an unnecessary hand over Miri’s mouth, and together they lay on the floor, listening to the furious muttering in the next room. “Someday, Molly, someday I’m gonna make you sorry—see if I don’t!” There was a pause filled with the sound of the doll carriage being knocked over. “Dang kid! I know she’s somewhere around here laughing and thinking she’s real cute.” Now the boy stomped into the closet and shoved the heavy coats and dresses back and forth. Only a few inches away, in the attic, Miri tried with all her might to be motionless. Think frozen, she told herself. Think dead—no, that’s what we’ll be if he finds us. Don’t think dead. Think frozen. Ice. Glaciers. The muttering went on and on, as though the boy had forgotten that he was talking. “Don’t lift a finger. Does whatever she has a mind to. Who does the work around here? Not her, that’s for sure. Ma and Sis and me, that’s who, while she sucks up to Gran.” There was a snort, as if the word
Gran
was particularly infuriating. “Who’s been taking care of the crazy old bat all these years? Ma and Sis and me, that’s who. But now we’re just mud under her feet. Mud!” There was a thump as the boy pounded his fist against a sturdy portion of wall and then a yelp of surprise at the pain he had caused himself. Miri, glancing toward Molly, saw a smile cross her face.

“Runt!” the boy mumbled. “Runt!” Despite his threats, he seemed to have given up on the project of finding Molly, for his voice faded and was replaced by the sound of heavy boots clumping down the narrow stairs. Lying side by side, the two girls let out a breath of relief.

“Was that Horst?” whispered Miri.

Molly nodded.

“He sounds awful.”

“You ought to see him,” said Molly darkly. “He looks worse than he sounds.”

“What would he have done if he’d caught you?” asked Miri, worried.

Molly thought. “Mostly he just takes me to his ma and she whups me with her silver hairbrush, but I don’t know—he’s getting meaner. I make sure he doesn’t catch me.”

Miri looked toward the hinged door that led into the bench in the closet. “What if he finds out about that?”

Molly was unconcerned. “Oh, he won’t. The one good thing about Horst is he’s not so smart. He doesn’t even know that the seat part lifts.”

Miri wasn’t going to admit that she hadn’t known it herself. “I wonder who thought of making a door inside,” she said.

“I did,” said Molly simply.

Miri was impressed. This was a girl who got things done. “How’d you know how?”

Molly shrugged. “I didn’t know how. But I needed a getaway, so I just borrowed Horst’s saw and some hinges and stuff. It wasn’t hard.”

Miri looked around the dusty attic. Light slanted in through a faraway vent, and she could see a few boxes flung into corners. There was a wire dressmaker’s dummy lying on the floor. She looked like she was taking a nap. Miri asked, “Why is he so mean to you?”

“He hates me,” Molly said calmly, as if it were a regular thing to be hated.

“But why?”

“We can get up now,” said Molly, raising herself and brushing off her wrinkled dress. “They all hate me. It’s because Grandma May loved my mama and she loves me. Mama had the gift, see, and Aunt Flo never did, so of course she’s jealous. And I’ve got it, too, probably.”

Miri was tired of being confused. She sat up and said, “Okay, what’s the gift?”

Molly looked at her suspiciously. “The
gift,
” she said, as though Miri were hard of hearing. “I think you’re just pretending not to know. The gift of
magic
. Grandma’s part fairy, and so was my mama. And so am I. Probably. That’s how come we could call you up.”

Miri teetered on the brink of belief. After all, if she could get sucked through an eyeglass lens to 1935, there was no reason why Molly couldn’t be a fairy. A little thrill shivered through her—there was no reason why she couldn’t be a fairy herself! Maybe that’s why she had never stopped pretending! Just for a second, she allowed herself to feel wings—silvery wings—on her back, but a furtive poke revealed only the usual bones and skin. If she were a fairy, she admitted, she probably would have noticed it before now. And, fairy or not, she had some questions. “Okay. The gift is magic. Okay. Got that. Why does that make Horst hate you?”

“Because,” explained Molly, trying to be patient, “Horst—and Aunt Flo and Sissy—think that Grandma’s going to give her money to me when she dies. Everybody says she’s got secret riches, and they’re all in a sweat that she’s gonna tell me where they are. But she’s never said anything to me about riches. And now she’s awful sick.” The shadows crossed her face again. “Seems like she’s just fading away. But now it doesn’t matter if they all hate me, because I’m going back with you. Right?” She smiled happily at Miri.

“Back where?” asked Miri, confused again.

“Back. To your time. Where you came from. I’m ready.”

Miri stared at her. “You want to come home with me? But—but—what are you going to do when you get there? My mom’ll freak out if I suddenly appear with you and say Hi Mom, here’s another kid for you. Trust me, she’ll freak.” Miri spoke rapidly, trying to ignore the misery dropping over Molly’s face. “And besides, you don’t know what it’s like in my time. You’ve got to have papers and things, and they’ll stick you in some foster home, and they’re mostly awful, at least I think they are—” She stopped.

Molly’s gray eyes were swimming with tears, and her fingers were twisting up the fabric of her dress. The dress was too small, Miri saw, and there was a rip in the shoulder and on the worn skirt. Miri saw, too, that Molly’s braids were crooked, the way braids always are if you try to do them by yourself. Molly didn’t have anyone to take care of her, to fix her braids or get her a bigger dress. The thought pushed on Miri’s throat. She looked at the slanting light on the attic wall. I’m no fairy, she thought glumly. I’m more like a goblin. What good is it for magic to be real if you don’t let it happen? No, she suddenly decided, even if it is crazy, even if Mom has a total conniption fit, even if I get into a truly humongous amount of trouble, even if the whole thing’s impossible anyway—I won’t leave Molly behind.

“Okay,” she said.

Molly looked up. “Okay what?”

“Okay, let’s go back. So my mom will freak. So what? She’s freaked before and she’ll freak again.” Miri tried to ignore the part of her brain that said,
Are you out of your mind? Your mom freaks about stuff
like burping at the table, stuff that’s not even close to this!

“Miri,” said Molly, holding up her hand as though she were making a pledge. “You’re not going to regret it, I promise you. This is all the magic I need. You just get me there, and I’ll do the rest. I promise I won’t bother your mama, or anybody else. I’ll get a job, I promise—”

“Okay, well, let’s not worry about it now.” Miri didn’t want to break the news about children not being allowed to work. She opened her fist and looked at the delicate glass that lay in her palm. “I guess we’ll just both have to look through it at the same time.”

Molly nodded. “Maybe we should hold hands, too. For good measure.” They joined hands, and Miri held up the little lens with her free hand. “Wait,” Molly said a little anxiously. “Does it hurt?”

“Not really,” said Miri. “It just feels weird, like you’re sinking. But maybe going in this direction it’ll feel like we’re rising.”

“Gosh. All right. I’m ready,” said Molly firmly, as though saying she was would make it true.

“Me too. Put your head next to mine. There. Okay, now close your eyes and I’ll hold up the glass. Open your eyes on the count of three.”

“One,” they said together. “Two. Three.”

CHAPTER
5

T
HERE WAS NO WHIRLING
, no dizzy sinking into the center of time, no nothing. Miri blinked. It had never occurred to her that it wouldn’t work.

“Maybe the attic just looks the same in your time as it does in 1935,” said Molly hopefully, glancing around the dusty space. “Maybe we did it, and we just don’t know it.”

Miri was doubtful. She hadn’t felt a change, hadn’t felt anything at all. But it was worth a try. “Maybe. Let’s go back into your room and see if the wallpaper’s purple.”

They crept through the hinged door. It was much more awkward now that they weren’t being chased, and the wooden flap banged down hard on Molly’s knee. She folded her mouth into a line, but she didn’t say anything. They emerged inside the closet and Miri saw at once that it was still 1935. She felt the first touch of panic wrinkling up her scalp. What if she couldn’t get back home?

But Molly had another idea. “Maybe we just need to be in this room. Maybe that’s part of the magic.”

Miri was willing to try it. “Okay. Let’s stand where I was when it happened.” They positioned themselves on the rag rug and closed their eyes. Once again they peeked through the little glass on the count of three. Once again, the room and the year remained unchanged.

Molly saw the look on Miri’s face. “Now, don’t you worry,” she said. “Don’t fuss. Not yet.” She paused and swallowed hard. “You go ahead. Maybe it’s just for you.”

“But you’re the one who needs to get out of here,” Miri argued.

“It’s okay. It’ll do, knowing that there’s magic for real.”

Miri stood holding the little glass. “I want to go, but I don’t want to leave you here,” she said helplessly.

Molly smiled, trying to look as if she didn’t care. “Just go ahead, will you?”

So Miri did. But nothing changed. She lowered the lens from her eye and handed it to Molly. “Try it.” Without a word, Molly did, but it was useless. Her hand dropped to her side. They stared at each other; two eleven-year-old girls in the middle of a faded room in a big house on a country road in the year 1935.

• • •

Molly very kindly lent her a handkerchief. And then a second one, when the first got too soggy to be useful. She patted Miri’s back, too, while she cried. But she didn’t say anything dumb like It’s not that bad or There’s a silver lining to every cloud. Miri was grateful. She was stuck in 1935, and she would probably never see her mom and dad again, and nobody would believe her if she tried to explain what had happened, and she just had to cry. Every time she was about to stop, she would think something like “I’ll never get to wear my purple boots again,” and then she would start sobbing all over again. When she was finally all cried out and her skin was tight with dried tears, she rolled onto her back and looked at the familiar, peculiarly shaped ceiling. Molly, draped over the bed, was looking at the ceiling, too.

Miri tried to remember what she had learned in fifth-grade history. 1935. What was going on in 1935? Was it flappers and the Charleston? No, that’s the twenties, she thought. Uh-oh. The Depression. The thirties were the Great Depression. “Great!” she moaned.

Molly looked at her with interest. It was the first non-sobbing noise she had made in a long time. “What?”

“1935! Right in the middle of the Great Depression! I have to get stuck in the Depression! Sheesh!”

“I never heard anybody call it ‘great’ before,” said Molly.

“Great like big, not like terrific.”

“Oh.”

“Is everybody out of work? Are you poor and hungry?”

Molly laughed. “I’m hungry, but that’s ’cause it’s almost suppertime. I guess we’re poor, but we’re not as poor as some. Not like the Okies anyway. Flo’s got a string of farms up and down the river.”

But now Miri was remembering more. “Oh my God!”

Molly looked shocked. “You took the Lord’s name in vain!”

“Sorry. I just remembered something.”

“What?”

“There’s a big war coming.”

“What? When?” Molly yelped.

“In a few years. Right when we grow up,” said Miri dismally.

“Between us and the Yankees again?” asked Molly.

“What? Oh. No. No, it doesn’t happen here. It’s mostly over in Germany and England and Japan, I think. But it’s really big. What a bummer.”

“What a what?”

“A bummer—a problem,” explained Miri.

“I’m sorry I called you up from the future,” apologized Molly.

“Oh, that’s okay,” said Miri. “I got to meet you, at least.”

There was a silence. Miri lifted her feet in the air and looked at her sandals. She didn’t even have any socks on, she observed. Trapped in 1935 without any socks. Mom wouldn’t be happy about that. Oops. Don’t think about Mom.

Molly, who was still holding the glass lens, dropped it over her right eye and squinted her eyebrow over it as if it were a monocle. “You know,” she said.

After a second, Miri looked over to the bed. “You know what?”

“This glass,” said Molly slowly. There was another silence.

“
What?
” said Miri. “What about it?”