“Nah.” He flashed a smile. “I’m here spying on you.”
I threw my apple core away and opened the fridge for more food. I needed to eat now because when dinnertime came, I was telling my dad I wasn’t hungry and spending the evening in my room. I pulled out last night’s enchiladas and took a plate from the cupboard.
Hudson strolled over and leaned against the counter. “So why were those guys in your bedroom Friday night?”
I dished some enchiladas on my plate and didn’t answer.
“You’re the only lead in the case,” he said. “If I tell my dad they were over here, the police will bring you in for questioning. Why don’t you make it easier on everybody and tell me what you know.”
I put the enchiladas in the microwave and punched in a minute. “Is there some reason you feel the need to be supercop and crack this case?”
“You mean besides the fact that I was robbed at sword-point?”
“You’re not even on the police payroll, and I bet you’re working harder than the rest of them.”
He shook his head. “It’s only a matter of time before one of those thugs kills someone. Trust me—everybody down at the station is working overtime.”
I watched my plate slowly rotating in the microwave. “I’m doing what I can.” I had already called for Chrissy several times today.
“Didn’t you learn anything from dating Bo?” Hudson asked. “He pounded your locker today and he would have pounded you too if I hadn’t showed up. And I don’t care how handsome that Robin guy is. He hurts people. How can you protect him?” He held up a hand in frustration. “How can you be involved with someone like that?”
“I’m not involved with him.” I meant I wasn’t romantically involved. Which was the truth. One kiss while he was holding me up didn’t make us a couple. But apparently the denial counted as a lie. Before I could say another sentence, I caught sight of tiny lights fountaining around my head like a garland of sparklers.
Hudson’s mouth dropped open as he stared at me. “How did you do that?”
I put my hand to my head, then jerked it away with an “Ouch!” The sparklers were not only bright but also hot. This was bad. Nothing was burning my head yet, but that could happen next. Was I supposed to stop, drop, and roll, like I was on fire?
Then again, there is only one thing more freakish than having your head unexpectedly ignite with magic sparklers, and that is dropping to your kitchen floor and trying to roll them off your head. I couldn’t do that in front of Hudson, and besides, smothering the flames probably wouldn’t work to extinguish magic fire.
But how did I get rid of them? I hurried to the bathroom in a walk that was somewhere between a panicked scurry and a don’t-fan-the-flames glide.
In the mirror, I saw a wreath of fireworks surrounding my head. Worse yet, a message lit up like wording on a scoreboard: She’s lying! The disclaimer tromped brightly across my forehead. She’s a blasted liar! She’s lying! She’s lying!
“Well, this is wonderful,” I said.
Hudson came up behind me. I saw him in the mirror’s reflection studying the lights. “Where did that come from?”
I tried to bat the thing off and only succeeded in burning my fingers. What had Chrissy said about the lights? Were they permanent? I couldn’t go to school like this.
“You’re a ‘blasted liar’?” Hudson asked, reading the words.
My fingers stung from touching the sparkler hat, so I turned on the sink and ran them under the cold water. I should have used oven mitts.
Hudson was still staring at me.
“Okay,” I said, “maybe I am involved with Robin, but not romantically.”
As soon as I finished the sentence, the lights vanished. So the way to get rid of fireworks was to tell the truth. I let out a breath of relief and ran one hand through my hair, checking to see if the fireworks had scorched it. Thankfully, unlike my fingers, my hair was undamaged.
Hudson leaned up against the door frame, his eyebrows furrowed. “So …,” he said. “That was the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen.”
The cold water wasn’t helping enough. My fingers still throbbed. I walked past Hudson, went to the kitchen, and pulled ice cubes from the freezer. Hudson followed me. While I put the ice cubes in a plastic bag, he said, “I guess I can understand why you don’t like talking to the police. The fireworks would be distracting during an interrogation, wouldn’t they?”
I put my fingertips onto the bag of ice cubes. “If a fairy asks you to sign a magical contract, think twice about it. That’s all I’m saying.”
“A fairy,” Hudson repeated. He didn’t believe me. I could tell he was coming up with other excuses for what he’d seen on my head. He probably thought it was some gag Nick had worked up with his computer-geek friends.
“Look,” I told him, “I’ll take care of Robin Hood and the Merry Men. Really. Just tell your dad not to shoot any of them before I can work things out. Okay?”
The front door opened and Nick called, “I’m back.” He walked into the kitchen holding a bunch of PVC pipes and a sack full of stuff. “I’m going to have one souped-up potato launcher for my project.”
I didn’t say anything about my fingers or about how Nick had left Hudson in the house to make sure I didn’t sneak out.
Nick set his sack down on the table and turned to Hudson. “Hey, thanks for your help …” He glanced at me. “… With my homework. I think I can take it from here.”
“Sure.” Hudson glanced at me too and I knew he didn’t want to leave yet, not when he hadn’t gotten more information from me, but he picked up his books and slipped them into his backpack. “I’d better get home.”
Nick walked him to the door and out of my sight. Still, Hudson called to me, “See you later, Tansy!”
Yeah, I bet he would. He’d be tailing me as much as possible from now on. “Good-bye!” I called back.
When Nick walked back into the kitchen, I fixed him with a glare. “You left Hudson here to guard me?”
Nick busied himself picking up his books from the table so he didn’t have to look at me. “Mom and Dad asked me to keep an eye on you. I didn’t want to break my promise to them.” He grabbed his sack, and slipped the handles onto his wrist. “Now I’m going to my room to finish my homework. See? I’m not guarding you.” He left before I could say anything else. A moment later, I heard his bedroom door close. I sank down on the kitchen chair and checked my fingers. Tiny white scorched spots had formed on their tips.
“I should have gone with the frogs,” I said.
A lyrical voice behind me chimed, “As the saying goes, if you play with fire, you end up with blisters.”
I turned around and saw Chrissy.
Chapter 7
This time Chrissy wore a lavender-colored spandex top with a flowing white tutu. Her pink hair was piled up on her head in a bun and held in place with diamond-studded pins. She looked like a ballerina who’d wandered away from The Nutcracker.
“Chrissy,” I breathed out in relief. “Where have you been?”
She walked toward me and minty-smelling bits of glitter swirled around her. “I’ve been busy. I told you I was looking for a new job.” She glanced at her watch. “I only have a few minutes before I start my tooth fairy shift, but I thought I would pop in and see if you were ready for your next wish.”
I stood up, not sure where to start. Now that she was here, the words tumbled out of my mouth in a nearly incoherent jumble. “The police are out looking for Robin Hood. They think he’s going to end up killing someone, and I’m afraid they’re right. He won’t listen to me, and I kept calling for you, but you never came—I thought you said you were going to watch over me.”
“I don’t need to watch over you the entire time.” She pulled a crisp white scroll from a lacy purse and held it up for me to see. “Look, I have the Tansy Sparknotes.” She unrolled the scroll far enough for me to read: Tansy Elisabeth Miller Harris: Context, Plot Overview, Analysis of Major Char
acters, Themes, Motifs, and Symbols.
I gaped at it. My life was not only in print, but in Sparknotes. “That is just wrong.”
Chrissy scanned the scroll. “Saturday you cleaned, snuck out of your house, and—oh wow—total make-out session with Robin Hood in Walgreens.” She put a hand to her chest. “That’s so swoon-worthy.”
“No, it wasn’t. He was robbing the place at the time.”
She let out a wistful sigh. “A highwayman-and-the-lady sort of romance. Those are some of my favorite stories.” Smiling, she rerolled the scroll. “So it’s going well then?”
I blinked at her in disbelief. “No, Robin Hood is out of control. He keeps holding up stores and stealing things.”
Chrissy tilted her head questioningly, as though I weren’t making sense. “What did you expect him to do when you wished for him to come here?”
“I didn’t mean to wish him here. And I wanted his advice, not his rampages.” My fingers started throbbing again. I shoved them back onto the bag of ice. “I thought he was supposed to do good things and help people. In books he was always the hero.”
Chrissy slipped the Tansy Sparknotes back into her purse. “Well, you can’t believe everything you read. After all, by definition, fiction writers lie for a living.”
“But …”
Chrissy’s wings fluttered in agitation. She looked like a teacher whose students had failed a quiz. “You need to learn how to analyze men better. For example, you might have noticed that in England people often drop the ‘g’ when saying ‘ing,’ so if someone’s name is Robbing Hood, well, you don’t meet many hoods that are upstanding citizens, now do you?”
“Robbing Hood? ‘Hood,’ as in, he’s a robbing hoodlum?” I sat back down on the chair with a thump. “I used a wish to bring a bunch of hoodlums to the city?”
Chrissy gave me a tolerant smile. “Here’s a piece of free advice—you probably don’t want to use a wish to hang out with Little Red Riding Hood. She’s not as innocent as the story makes her sound.”
“My wish was a mistake,” I said weakly. “You have to send them back.”
Chrissy smoothed out her skirt, and more minty-smelling glitter tumbled to the floor. “I can’t. Remember, all wishes are permanent and binding. You can’t undo them just because they didn’t make you happy. Magic is sort of like a cell phone contract that way.” She glanced at her watch, then back at me. “However, since I’m the caring type of fairy godmother who diligently looks after my charges, and since I still have five minutes left before my shift, I’ll have a talk with Robin Hood for you.”
She took her wand from her purse, waved it in the direction of my backyard, and Robin Hood and the Merry Men appeared there. They had obviously been sitting somewhere eating, because most of them held food in their hands. Potato chip bags and cereal boxes fell to the ground as the men realized what had happened. Several of them let out shouts and all of them jumped to their feet. Chrissy snapped her fingers and instantly she and I stood outside on my patio in front of them.
I looked around nervously. My parents were due home from work any minute and they wouldn’t be thrilled to find Rock Canyon’s most wanted hanging out in our backyard. And what if Hudson was still close by somewhere and he heard men yelling? It had only been a couple of minutes since he left my house.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” Chrissy chimed. “I want to have a few words with you.”
Half of the men drew their swords and watched us apprehensively, but Robin Hood sauntered up to us with a smile. His hat sat on his head at a crooked angle, which somehow made him look carefree and dashing. He even looked cleaner than he had last time. They all did. I wondered if they’d bathed in somebody’s pool.
Robin Hood winked at me. “Maid Tansy, how nice to see you again. And who would this goddess of loveliness be?”
Chrissy laughed, a sound like bells ringing. “You, sir, are a rake, but a charming one. I am Tansy’s fairy godmother, Chrysanthemum Everstar.”
He bowed from the waist. “And I am your humble servant.”
Chrissy smiled at him then regarded the Merry Men. She didn’t seem concerned that so many gripped their swords. “Tansy is rather distressed at your current occupation. She expected you to be less outlaw and more social worker. Is there any chance you’ll reconsider your careers and try something more people-friendly? Perhaps you could put on shows at Disneyland, or …” She tapped her wand, thinking. “I hear electrical engineers are in demand.”
Several of the Merry Men showed their reaction to her suggestion by spitting on the ground. Which made me glad Chrissy had zapped them into the backyard instead of the house.
Robin Hood bowed again. “I fear I’m set in my ways. When a man is a master of his craft, he doesn’t apprentice for another.”
Chrissy turned to me and shrugged her slender shoulders. “Well, I did my best. It looks like they want to stay bandits.” Her gaze went to her watch. “And now I really have to go or I’ll be late. But don’t worry. I’ll have Clover check in on you later. That is if I can pull him away from his poker games.” She wrinkled her nose. “Really, as if he hasn’t already lost enough money. You would think he’d find a support group for that or something.”
A couple of the Merry Men ran to our cinder-block fence, jumped up, and hauled themselves up so they could survey the area. “Robin,” the first called, “the street lies straight ahead.”
“Or,” the second man added, “we can see what bounty lies in yonder house.”
“Don’t!” I said to Robin Hood. “You can’t break into my neighbors’ homes.”
In response to my words, several more of the Merry Men scaled the fence. A couple ran toward the street, and a few dropped into my neighbor’s backyard. Robin Hood took my hand and kissed it. “Next time we meet, I would fain linger and refresh my memory about your wishes. As for the present, my men have places to explore.” He let go of my hand with a smirk, then strode toward the fence. “Wait up, lads,” he called. “I’ll lead the way.”
I turned to Chrissy, pleading. “You’ve got to stop them.”
Chrissy casually replaced her wand in her purse. “Well, I bet you’re glad now that your father installed that alarm system in your house.”
Before I could answer, a green puff of smoke appeared in the flower box. Clover materialized, brushing off his green suit. “I’m here,” he announced, “and ready to assist you with your magical needs, so you can’t tell the UMA I’ve been slacking off.” He glanced over at me. “The lass isn’t crying anymore. Things must be going well.”
I stared back at him, a wordless protest on my lips. Apparently, he didn’t notice the large group of bandits climbing the fence in my backyard. Scary men with swords roaming around your lawn never equaled “things are going well.”
Clover straightened his hat. “So then, I’ll be in the pub if you need me.”
“Wait!” I said. I couldn’t let them go. Who knew how long it would be before they checked on me again.
Both paused and looked at me.
“Yes?” Chrissy asked.
I could only think of one thing I could do to fix the Robin Hood problem. Magic had brought them here, so magic had to take them back.
And maybe that was what my fairy godmother was trying to teach me—that I had to take responsibility for my actions instead of waiting for someone else to change things for me. Still, it was hard to force myself to say the words. “I want to make my next wish.”
Chrissy pulled her wand back out of her purse. “All right. What is it?”
“I want you to send Robin Hood and his men back to the Middle Ages where they belong.”
Instead of being proud of me for sacrificing my second wish, Chrissy let out a huff. “Well, that’s a waste of perfectly good magic. Honestly, you ought to make up your mind before you wish for things, but fine, if that’s what you want.” She turned to Clover. “Assistant, round up Robin Hood and the Merry Men and send them back to Sherwood Forest.”
&n
bsp; “Me?” he asked indignantly. “That’s fairy work.”
“I’m late for my shift,” she said. “And it’s about time you actually assisted, so I’m granting you the magic you’ll need.” She flicked her wand at him, and a short, stubby wand appeared in his hand. A circle on the top of the wand flashed the number thirteen. “You have thirteen men to find,” Chrissy told him, and the next moment, she vanished, leaving nothing but a trail of minty glitter falling to the ground.
Clover let out a sound that was half grumble, half growl, and disappeared too. The Merry Men, however, still circled my yard and climbed the fence.
“Weren’t you supposed to …,” I started, but as I said the words, a Merry Man vanished. One moment he was climbing the fence; the next, a puff of green smoke appeared in his place. A scraggly man straddling the fence was the next to go, then one who was poking through my parents’ shed. Robin Hood noticed the men disappear. His head spun to face me and he took several steps in my direction. “What mischief is this?”
“I’m sending you home,” I said.
His blue eyes bore into mine. “You knew I didn’t wish for that to happen.”
“But I wished it. It was a mistake to bring you here.”
He stepped closer to me, his hands out in a plea. “I didn’t mean to scorn you, Maid Tansy. I beseech you, don’t let your disappointment lead you to rash ways.” He took hold of my hand and pulled me into an embrace.
His arms wrapped around me, gently surrounding me. I didn’t want his affections. What if my dad had come home and happened to look out the sliding glass door while this was happening? Was it possible to be grounded past my graduation date? And yet I didn’t try to push Robin Hood away. I already knew how strong he was and besides, Clover was nearby.
Robin Hood leaned toward me, his lips lowering toward mine, then the next moment, he disappeared. The yard was silent and empty. Well, empty except for the discarded chip bags and cereal boxes. I walked around the lawn, picking them up.
I should have been relieved that Robin Hood was gone, and mostly I was, but another part of me felt achingly sad. I had hoped Robin Hood would turn into the hero I’d read about when I was younger. I had wanted it so badly. But maybe heroes were all works of fiction. Maybe in real life, nobody was that noble or self-sacrificing. It was another good reason not to read novels—they set you up for disappointment. Life had enough of that on its own.