Write Before Your Eyes
Read Write Before Your Eyes Online
Authors: Lisa Williams Kline
For Chris Woodworth and John Bonk
If you have ever had magic powers descend
on you suddenly out of the blue…
You have to know just how much magic you have,
and what the rules are for using it.
—Edward Eager
Half Magic
CHAPTER
ONE
One afternoon in mid-September Gracie climbed to the fork in the oak tree behind her family’s apartment and opened her new royal blue suede journal. The soft suede changed color slightly when she rubbed her fingers over it. The pages were old and crackly, water-stained, and the lines were thin, college-ruled, like something an adult would write on.
Now. What to write? That day, in English, Ms. Campanella had quoted a famous poet who said, “There’s a dead squirrel in every good poem.” When she asked what that meant, Dylan, always the first to raise his hand, said he thought it meant there was no good without evil, no life without death, no beauty without ugliness. Now, as the leaves around her whispered in the breeze, Gracie wrote:
A squirrel landed on the branch beside Gracie and boldly looked her in the eye.
No more than a second later, when Gracie lifted her pen to write another sentence, she felt the chill passing darkness of a cloud. A yellow leaf on the branch beside her trembled. She glanced over and a mangy-looking squirrel crouched there, flicking its tail. It cocked its head and snared Gracie with its beady little eye.
Gracie’s heart thudded. The squirrel leaped away. Gracie stared at the branch, which was still vibrating slightly, and then at what she’d written.
Gracie chewed on her pen. Okay, the squirrel had been kind of weird. Probably a total coincidence. She wrote the next thing that popped into her head:
An acorn fell to the ground.
She held her breath. Hollow
clunk
s,
splat
s, and
bonk
s sounded, something small hurtling through the leaves and branches. She craned her neck and looked down. An acorn lay at the foot of the trunk.
Whoa.
Could it be…?
She sat up straight, her senses suddenly feeling sharper. In third grade she’d hoped that maybe in some old house, she’d walk through a wardrobe full of fur coats into the crystalline snow of Narnia. In fifth grade she’d looked for Platform 9
3
/
4
whenever she went to a train station. And even as recently as two summers ago at the beach, she’d tried using telepathy to call dolphins like Vicky in Madeleine L’Engle’s
A Ring of Endless Light.
(It hadn’t worked.)
Life was life. Making a peanut butter sandwich every day, going to school, doing homework, loading the dishwasher, listening to everyone argue. Take it or leave it, like it or lump it, this was Gracie’s dull and ordinary eighth-grade life.
But it hadn’t been easy, giving up on magic. Now she felt a small thrill of excitement. Could it be? Was she dreaming?
She drummed her pen on the page. If she really wanted to test it, why hadn’t she written something outrageous, like
A fuchsia elephant appeared on the horizon
? She took a deep breath and wrote:
A fuschia
Then she stopped. Was that how you spelled it?
“Gracie! Dinner! Come set the table!” Dad yelled out the back door.
Gracie, who normally would have waited a minute or two before responding—just to assert her own free will—slammed shut the blue suede notebook. If she wrote one more thing right now and it didn’t happen, she knew she’d be devastated.
She’d wait until after dinner. This could be amazing. Was it possible that what she thought was happening was really happening? She had to tell Dylan about this. She stuffed the journal into her back jeans pocket and slid to the ground so fast the bark stung her palms.
“This is family dinner,” Mom announced as Dad put the taco sauce and grated cheese on the table. Jen and Alex didn’t look up. “I’ve set my new BlackBerry on vibrate and I need everyone else to turn off their electronic devices.”
“But Mom, I’m waiting for—”
“No buts, Jen.”
“But I’m about to beat level four—”
“Alex, I said off!”
“There is a possibility I’ll get a call from that headhunter,” Dad said as he spooned meat into his taco shell. An image of a murderous-looking native stalking the jungle with shrunken heads hanging from his belt flashed in Gracie’s imagination, even though she knew the headhunter was a woman helping Dad find a job.
“Blessing,” said Mom. They bowed their heads. “Dearlord, thankyoufortheseandallourmanyblessingsamen.”
“Amen,” said the rest of them.
Mom continued without missing a beat, “Last time that headhunter called, Steve, you blew off the interview.”
“It interfered with Alex’s soccer game, and I’d committed to be the announcer. When we talk to the kids about commitments, we have to keep our own.” Dad glared at Mom, then began to stuff way too much lettuce into his taco. The shell broke and bits of meat, cheese, and runny red taco sauce spilled all over his hand and plate.
“I bet you a million dollars they could have found someone else to announce that game.” Mom took a deep breath and bit into her taco.
The blue suede journal was still in Gracie’s back pocket. Her fingers itched to write
Mom put her hand on top of Dad’s and said, “These are the best tacos you’ve ever made, honey.” Dad smiled at her and said, “Thanks, dear. You look lovely tonight.”
Would it work? Just thinking about the possibility, she felt her heart pound a few times. She started thinking about all the things she could write. She could write Dad a job. She could write her family out of this apartment and back into their old house. She could write away all the world’s problems. Maybe she could even write something to help Dr. Gaston, her middle school principal, who, most shockingly, had been fired today.
“Elbows, Alex,” Mom said in a monotone.
Without removing his eyes from his taco, Alex slid his elbows over the edge of the table.
“Pam, the headhunter will call again,” Dad said. “There’ll be something else, I know it.” He patted Mom’s hand. “Things are going to be fine.”
Mom snatched her hand away. “You could have been developing leads, instead of spending your time
volunteering.
”
Dad winked at Gracie, but a muscle in his neck twitched. Dad had always wanted to be a sports announcer, not a textile sales rep. Mom had told Dad about a million times to grow up, that every red-blooded American male wanted to be a sports announcer. “I bounced back last year. I’ll do it again,” Dad said at last.
“I’ll believe it when I see it,” Mom said.
“Pam, do you really want to discuss this now?”
Gracie couldn’t take another fight at dinner. Swiftly, she pulled out the journal and, holding it just under the table, scribbled:
Mom’s BlackBerry rang.
She closed the journal and held it tightly on her lap, not breathing. Two seconds later, Mom’s BlackBerry, sitting on the counter behind her, began to play a tinny version of Pachelbel’s Canon.
Gracie bit her lip, gripping the journal.
“I thought you set it on vibrate,” Jen said.
“I thought I did too!” Mom said, going to the counter. “I’m never going to learn how to use this thing.” She handed it to Jen. “How do I answer it?”
Jen rolled her eyes at Gracie and Alex, then punched one button and handed it back to Mom.
Gracie had to tell Dylan about this. It was unbelievable. All this time they’d been sure magic didn’t exist, and here it was. A journal that controlled the future!
“Pamela Rawley,” Mom answered, then listened. “Hey, Bill. Did they go for it?” She listened again, then made a fist like Tiger Woods. “Yes!” She rushed into the apartment’s living room, which they’d made into a computer room, and slammed the French doors. She raked her fingers through her spiky frosted hair, grabbed a pen, and started punching her calculator and scrawling numbers.
“I thought nobody was supposed to talk on the phone at dinner,” said Alex.
“Your mother was waiting to hear back on a client proposal,” said Dad. “So, Jen, how was your day?”
Jen shrugged, her mouth full of taco. “Fine.”
“Excellent,” said Dad. “Anything interesting happen?”
“Nope.”
“Well, actually,” said Gracie, “our principal got fired.”
Dad glanced at Gracie. “Dr. Gaston? Only a month into the school year? Why?”
“No clue.” Jen peeked into her pocket at her phone.
It had been freaky hearing “Clueless” Chet Wilson, the vice principal of Chesterville Middle, make the announcements this afternoon. Gracie’s English class had watched in silence out the window of Ms. Campanella’s second-story classroom as Dr. Gaston, with his owl-like glasses and absentminded-professor demeanor, was escorted out the front door of the school by two cops.
“I think it was because—” Gracie started.
“Dad,” Jen interrupted, “since Mom’s on the phone, can I answer Tyler’s text message?”
Dad rubbed his thumbs in small circles on his temples. “Listen, kids, remember, the cell phones belong to my company. They’re going to cut off the service by the end of the month.”
“No way!” Alex blurted out.
“Way.” Dad cleared his throat. “Gracie, were you starting to say something?”
Gracie had fixed herself a taco, but it was untouched on her plate. “It was just about Dr. Gaston. Someone said he stole money from the school. They made him resign.” Gracie liked Dr. Gaston. He’d promised to start a literary magazine this year, which Gracie and Dylan wanted to work on. Gracie could already tell that “Clueless” Chet wouldn’t give two cents for a literary magazine.
“That’s terrible,” said Dad. “He seemed so dedicated to—Alex, what are you doing?” With his forehead on the table, Alex had turned his phone to mute while he played a game. “Maybe you’d like to turn the game off and tell us about your day.”
“Oh, it was great!” Alex looked up with a sudden grin. “There was a fight in the cafeteria.”
“Who was fighting?” Dad asked.
“Two girls.”
“What about?”
“Who knows? It was awesome. One of them, like, tackled the other one and she slid across the entire lunch table with french fries stuck to her back.”
“Thank God I only have one more year of public education,” said Jen, delicately licking taco sauce from her pinkie.
“So far this week we’ve had a fight every day,” said Alex. “I mean, it makes you excited to go to school just so you won’t miss one.”
“Well, I’m glad school inspires you, son,” Dad said with a sigh. “Gracie, how was your day?”
“Oh, fine.” Gracie thought for a split second about mentioning the journal, but then imagined Jen making a sarcastic remark and Alex hooting with laughter. She said instead, “I got an A on my essay on
Lord of the Flies.
”
“God, I loathed that book,” said Jen.
“Is that the one about the hobbit?” Dad asked, glancing at Mom talking through the glass doors, then at his watch.
“That’s Lord of the Rings,” said Gracie.
“Alex!” Dad yelled. “I told you to stop playing that game!”
Alex’s head popped up. “Since Mom’s talking, I don’t see why I can’t do this. I mean, she made the rule and then she broke it herself.”
“Mom is
working.
” Dad looked at his watch and stood up. He spread his hands in defeat. “All of you, do the dishes and then go do your homework.” He shuffled into the family room, collapsed in his La-Z-Boy, and fired a shot at the TV with the remote.
Jen jumped up, flipping open her cell phone. “Your turn to do the dishes, Gracie. I did them last night.”
“You did not!” Alex said, laughing. “You weren’t even home for dinner last night. I did the dishes!”
“Whatever.” Jen ran upstairs.
While Gracie slammed the dishes into the dishwasher, she composed imaginary entries to try in her blue journal.
Jen’s cell phone turned into a rotten banana. Alex’s finger got permanently stuck in his nose.
She was halfway through the dishes when the phone rang. She didn’t answer. It was always for Jen. But a minute later she heard Jen yelling from upstairs. “Gracie! Phone!”
“Stop shouting!” Dad shouted.
“Hello?” The receiver nearly slipped from Gracie’s wet hand.
“Hey, Gracie, want to go for a walk before it gets dark?” It was Dylan. The whole room got brighter for a second, and the magic of the journal pressed more tightly against Gracie’s chest, wanting to get out. She couldn’t wait to tell Dylan. He wouldn’t laugh.
“I’ll meet you at the weeping willow in five minutes.” Gracie tossed the last few dishes into the dishwasher without rinsing them. She wiped her hands on the back of her shorts and jammed her feet into her flip-flops. “I’m going for a walk with Dylan,” she told Dad, her hand on the doorknob. “I’ll be back by dark.” She didn’t wait for his answer.
Just as she was closing the door behind her, she heard the office door squeak open and Mom’s voice saying, “Hey, where is everybody?” Gracie sprinted across the yard and ducked behind a butterfly bush.
She heard Mom call, “Gracie! Where are you going?”
She didn’t stop. Later, she’d say she hadn’t heard.
