Zally's Book (2 page)

While there were no customers for a few minutes, Abuelita watched the shop and I took the trash out. When I opened the door to go back in, I heard a pitiful meow in the alley. Looking around, I saw a plump gray cat with white paws come out from behind the trash cans. It ran right to me and started rubbing against my ankles, purring as if I were its only friend in the world. I picked it up and noticed immediately that the cat was not plump from being well fed. She was pregnant.

“¡Pobrecita!
I bet you could use a soft bed and some good food,” I said. I carried the mommy-to-be into the bakery. With a smile, Abuelita made a shooing motion.

I took our newest stray home, fed her, settled her with Papá and J.J., and was back at Alma de Chocolate in twenty minutes. After washing my hands carefully, I started on a new flyer to post in the window.

The bakery closes at five on Saturdays, and my older brothers, Ed (short for Eduardo) and Antonio (“don't call me Tony”), were there to close down. Abuelita wanted to take the leftovers to a family shelter. My best friends, Malia and Cody, were out of town for the weekend, so I went with her. As an extra treat for the kids, I brought along three kittens.

When we arrived at the shelter, the director, Mr.
Duchet, and two of the older kids helped us carry everything inside. It's funny, but the way those kids lit up, you'd have thought it was Christmas. Not just because of the food, either. They loved the
champurradas, conchas
, and chocolate
empanadas
, of course, but they were excited to see Abuelita.

Mr. Duchet, a tall man with wiry black hair, came to stand beside me. “An intriguing woman, your grandmother. It's magical how she fills a room with warmth.”

I smiled. “It's like this everywhere she goes. That's one reason I love to come with her.”

“What's in there?” The director pointed to my Little Red Riding Hood basket. I lifted the lid and showed him the three sleepy kittens inside.

“It's all right, isn't it?” I asked.

He smiled. “I think you've got a bit of your grandmother's gift in you.”

I walked over to Abuelita and handed sleepy kittens to three of the kids to gasps of excitement. After being passed around and petted, the kittens began to explore, climbing onto kids' shoulders, nosing around, and scampering across the floor. The calico kitten pounced on a shoestring and started pulling it. It was no surprise to me that when our visit was over, Mr. Duchet whispered to Abuelita and me, “Is there any
chance we can adopt these furry angels?”

Abuelita grinned.

I nodded at the director. “I think my mother will approve.”

That evening, Ed and Antonio went out with friends after dinner, and Papá worked on the quarterly taxes for the bakery. J.J., who is eight, was bored, so I offered to play a game of Go Fish with him. I pulled my long hair into a ponytail and changed into a soft pink-and-white striped tee and black leggings. Then I got the playing cards and coaxed the pregnant cat out into the living room to lie beside the coffee table while we played.

Abuelita sat next to us in a rocking chair, reading, as usual. She didn't even look up from her book when J.J. and I pretended to fight about whether he had stolen all the queens from my hand. I shook my finger at him, he poked me, I poked him back, and the argument turned into a tickle fight.

Once J.J. was in bed, I sent e-mails to friends from the family computer in the living room. Then I went to my room to read. Because our family is large—at least larger than most of my friends' families—my room is tiny. But it's mine, all mine. I don't have to share with anyone.

One whole wall is bookshelves from floor to ceiling. We had to get creative to fit furniture into such a small room, so I have a six-foot-high loft bed. In the open area beneath it is my desk. The pedestals that hold my bed up are also bookshelves, one of which is crammed full of atlases and books about cartography, exploration, mapmaking in ancient times, and geography. By the ladder at the end of the bed, a big floor pillow snuggles into the corner of the room, with a light above it.

I was curled up on the pillow, reading
Alanna
by Tamora Pierce, when Abuelita came in carrying two cups of cocoa. I put my book down and moved the desk chair over beside the pillow, and then we both took a mug of the steaming liquid and drank. Abuelita says she based her special recipe for hot cocoa—which she calls
chocolatl
—on an ancient Mayan recipe.

I took a long sip of the spicy cocoa. For some reason,
chocolatl
reminded me of the stories about a fairyland called Aventurine that Abuelita and Mamá have told me since I was a young girl. They only told these fairy tales to me, not to my brothers, and sharing stories and
chocolatl
among the three women of the family had always been a special time.

“Do you know that there is magic in the cacao?” Abuelita asked.

I smiled. After all, I'm a little old for fairy stories now. But I just said, “Mmm, it's delicious.”

“Delicious and
magic
,” Abuelita insisted. Even though our whole family speaks Spanish, she likes to practice her English with us grandchildren (and we have to practice Spanish with her). “Our ancestors, the Maya, and their ancestors before them have known the secrets of the cacao for thousands of years.”

“Thousands?” I asked, not quite believing her.

She gave an emphatic nod. “Yes. The people who dig up the old things, the—
¿Cuáles son sus nombres?
What are they named?”

“Archaeologists?” I suggested.

Abuelita nodded again. “Yes. Archaeologists. They find the old, very old, pots with just some little of cacao at the bottom. Also, the cacao beans were
muy valioso
, very valuable. The Maya gave them for presents or used them as money. Sometimes it was a gift when the child reaches a certain age.”

It sounded like a strange present to me. I had plenty of friends who had had parties to celebrate growing up, like my friend from school Rachael. She'd had a bat mitzvah. I celebrated my First Communion when I was nine, and Alicia, who lives in the apartment upstairs, had a
quinceañera
when she turned fifteen. But I'd never heard of anybody getting cacao
beans as a gift for one of those occasions.

“How old did you have to be for that?” I asked curiously.

Abuelita studied me for a moment with her shining dark eyes.
“Que son mayores de edad
. You are old enough.”

“Um, thank you?” I replied, a bit confused. As far as I knew, there were no ancient coming-of-age traditions in our family. Maybe she hadn't understood my question.

Just then, Abuelita pulled a small object from a pocket in her apron and held it up. It looked like some kind of fruit, about the size of a papaya, with a yellowish brown rind. “This is the cacao pod,” she said. “A small one, yes, but
muy viejo
, very old. It is
especial
—in our family many generations. It is for you now,
nieta
.”

I accepted the pod carefully. “Thanks,” I said.

“Your mother and I are already the
hadas madrinas—
fairy godmothers. You will need this to become one as well,” Abuelita said.

That stopped me in the middle of a gulp of
chocolatl
. I sputtered and
coughed. “Fairy godmothers? Real ones, like in
Cinderella
, you mean?”

Abuelita explained that the magical abilities of fairy godmothers are passed down from mother to daughter, from one generation to the next. Then she said that fairy godmothers aren't just for people, but for all parts of the earth. I didn't really believe it. I mean, it felt weird talking about magic as if it were real! But as my grandmother spoke, I realized that she and Mamá talked about magic all the time. Finally Abuelita said that I, Zally Guevara, am the heir to the Inocentes Lineage. Each girl in a line of fairy godmothers is born with gifts, and through magic, those gifts can be developed into skills that the fairy godmother can use to help the world for the rest of her life.

“You're trying to tell me that I can do
magic?”
I asked.

“To some people it is magic,” Abuelita said cautiously. “The women of the Inocentes Lineage have a special gift for helping innocents—children and animals. You will learn more in Aventurine.”

I just stared at her. My lips made the word “Oh,” but I didn't say anything as things clicked into place—the way people's faces lit up when they saw Abuelita, the way Mamá helped build schools, the way my
family attracted animals. And I'd always liked kids and animals, and they seem so comfortable with me. So that was a gift, huh? Okay, maybe I didn't
completely
believe in Aventurine, but I could accept that the women in our family had an amazing talent.

“Where is Aventurine? Can you show me on a map?”

“You will find it, but not with a map. Aventurine has never been mapped,” Abuelita said.

“It should be,” I said. “With a map, you can never get lost.”

Abuelita clucked. “That is like saying if you have a good recipe, you are a good cook. In truth, to use a map properly, you must know where you are. But there is knowledge that comes from the heart. Even for you”—she touched her hand to her chest—“
el corazon es su mapa
. And you must keep the cacao pod,” she said. “It is important.”

I had more questions, but I wasn't sure I was ready to ask them. Wouldn't that be admitting that it was all real—fairy godmothers and magical lands? It wasn't that I didn't
want
it to be true, but I needed time to think. I stared down at the cacao pod in my hand. “Okay. I'll keep it safe and always keep it near me. Look,” I said, getting up and slipping the pod into my favorite bag, a Maya-patterned one that hung
from my ladder. Abuelita seemed to like that.

“Good.” She walked to the door of my room and then turned. “Drink the rest of your
chocolatl
. It will help you rest well. Tomorrow morning you can sleep a little late, I think.”

Something woke me up, but it wasn't an alarm clock; it was a tickling on my nose. I scratched my nose without opening my eyes and tried to go back to sleep. The light was bright, and I wondered if I had overslept. Then I remembered Abuelita had said that I could stay in bed a bit longer.

There it was again, the ticklish feeling, as if a spiderweb were brushing against my face. The thought of a spiderweb gave me a chill, because I'm really afraid of spiders. I opened one eye, only to discover that the tickling came from a set of long whiskers.

A black and white rabbit sat by my head.

Curiouser and curiouser
, I thought. How had a rabbit gotten up onto my loft bed? I opened my other eye and looked around. I wasn't in my room, or our
apartment, or our building, or—as far as I could tell—even New York City.

I sat up and rubbed my eyes. I was at the edge of a broad grassy meadow. My woven bag from Guatemala was beside me. The grass was a bright spring green, sprinkled with wildflowers. Butterflies fluttered over my head, playing tag with each other. Could I be dreaming?

I picked up my bag and looked inside. The cacao pod was still there. Otherwise, the bag was empty. Putting the strap over one shoulder, I got to my feet and brushed bits of grass from my clothes. I noticed I was barefoot and dressed in the same clothes as when I'd read in my room last night. Had I been too tired to put my pajamas on after drinking
chocolatl
with Abuelita? I couldn't remember.

A few shimmering hummingbirds flitted around the wildflowers and darted off. I turned to look behind me. There, a gurgling stream ran through the center of the meadow. Dozens of willow trees draped their branches along the stream. This place, whatever it was, seemed more natural, more real to me than any place I had ever been—and at the same time, less real.

And suddenly there she was. From between a couple of willows, I saw a lady coming toward me. No, not a lady, a fairy—a real fairy! And not the tiny little
you-can-hit-it-with-a-flyswatter type of fairy, but a fairy taller than me with iridescent blue wings that opened and closed like a butterfly's. Flowers twined through her dewdrop crown. Her hair flowed to her knees, and she wore a beautiful gown of the palest lilac. The scent of lilacs hung about her as well. A cascade of tiny silver bells on her earrings made a tinkling sound when she moved her head. She stopped a few feet away from me and said, “Welcome, Zally.”

That was when I knew it: I was dreaming. Still, I wanted to be polite. So I gave a small curtsy and said, “Thank you … Your Majesty?”

She smiled. “You may call me Queen Patchouli. Come with me.” She waved a dainty hand toward the trees. “We should get started right away. Do you have any questions?”

Questions? I had lots of questions! I blurted, “Why—I'm just asleep, right?”