Val's mom let the girls sleep in the next morning. She was sure they'd stayed up late talking, as usual, and she didn't want to deal with tired, grouchy girls. It was pouring rain, so she decided to leave Leroy out of his pen. That would also save her from having to go back out to the barn after dark and running into her ugly little friend again.
It was after nine o’clock before she heard any noise coming from the girls upstairs. She let them unwind for a while, then called them down for breakfast.
After getting her morning kiss, Val noticed Leroy out in the pasture.
“You didn’t lock him up today.”
“I felt bad he was in for so long yesterday.”
Val grinned. “You didn’t want to run into that possum again.”
Sam laughed. “It sure was ugly.”
Val immediately caught the fact that she almost gave them away. She widened her eyes at Sam.
Samantha nodded in understanding and quickly recovered from her goof. “I mean, I know how ugly they are. I’d be scared, too. Don’t pick on your mom, Val.”
Val's mom seemed to miss Sam’s slip of the tongue. “Did you guys sleep good last night, or were you up late talking again?”
“We slept fine,” was the answer she received from them both.
She laughed at how, more often than not, the girls often said the same thing at the same time.
“It was raining earlier and it looks like more to come. Sorry, but we won’t be going on the four wheelers today.”
“That’s okay,” Val said. “We’ll find stuff to do inside.”
“I’m sure of that.” Val’s mom smiled as she placed their plates of bacon and eggs in front of them.
After breakfast, the girls went back upstairs and peered out Val’s window toward the barn. They strained to see it through the heavy rain, even though they knew there wasn’t a chance to catch sight of the possum from there.
After giving up and turning away from the window, they busied themselves with activities. First on the agenda was the special game they’d invented. It involved a game board with its checkers and chess pieces, monopoly money, a deck of cards, a pair of dice, and rules that their parents never could understand.
“King me,” Samantha said proudly, placing her checker piece at the far corner.
“You have to give up your knight first,” Val said.
“Nu-uh. You lost your hat when my rook took your bishop.”
“Darn. Did you have four pink one-hundreds?”
“Five,” Sam said.
“Two pair?”
“You know I had a full house.”
Val sighed and gave in. “Okay. I guess so.” She placed a chess pawn on the checker piece and proclaimed “flim-flam!” before rolling the dice. “Yes! Double sixes.”
Sam crossed her arms. “You always get those. Not fair.”
“You want to take a break and play with clay before I take your queen?”
“Seems like a good place to escape the torture.”
The movie Sleeping Beauty played while they worked with Val’s modeling clay. Val created a fire-breathing dragon, complete with small white pieces for teeth, while Sam made the most peaceful, sleeping kitty-cat that she could, snuggling on a blanket.
Val pretended that her dragon was trying to eat the cat. Sam laughed, pushing her away. “Stop it, you meanie.”
Next, Valerie flew it to the window sill with a, “Roar.” She looked out toward the barn again. “Come on, night. Hurry up.”
Val’s mom called up the stairs. “You guys wanna go to the ice rink after lunch?”
Sam was nodding when Val tuned to her. “That’ll be fun. I haven’t gone in forever. I did pack my skates. My mom said to just in case.”
Val hollered back downstairs. “Sounds like fun, Mom. Can we go to the mall afterward since we’ll be there?”
“Sure. We’ll go to the pizza buffet for dinner before we head home. That ought to kill this rainy day. Sound okay?”
“Of course!” they both shouted. Although they rarely agreed on the same food, a buffet at the local pizza place pleased them both. Sam loved her cheese pizza. Val could take it or leave it, but she was always up for a chicken leg…or four.
Val’s mom stopped at a local drug store for a few things on the way home. The girls found themselves in the make-up aisle. Valerie picked up a foundation and applied some to the back of her hand.
“I need a lighter one, Sam.”
“There is nothing lighter, Val,” she said with a laugh.
Val’s mom took the corner. “Uh oh.”
“Uh oh, what?”
“I told you a few friends teased that I was Snow white ‘cause I couldn’t tan. I guess I’m no longer the fairest of them all. Looks like I’ll have to kill you.”
“Ha-ha, Mom. But I’m safe. It was Snow White’s step-mother, not her mother.”
Her mom laughed. “I guess you’re right. You’re safe. For now.” She walked away with, “Muuuaaaaahhhh.”
“You and dad are such freaks. I wonder how I’m so normal.”
She popped her head back around the aisle. “Who ever said you were normal?”
Sam laughed again. “She has you there, Val.”
When they arrived home several hours later, it was finally getting dark. Val added her half of the newest “Best Friend” keychain to her collection. No trip to a store together was complete without buying another one.
“We’ll have to wait for a bit for my mom to go to bed before we go back out. Wanna read some more of that story, Sam?”
“Sure!” Sam said, running to get it.
After an hour, Val’s mom came upstairs for kisses goodnight. The girls quickly hid the stolen story from view before she made the turn into Val's room. Sometimes that creak in the stairs came in handy. “I don’t want you princesses up too late talking again tonight.”
“We won’t,” they both answered, almost too quickly.
They waited another hour before getting ready to go outside. The rain had finally stopped after dinner, but it was still cool out, so they grabbed their jackets again.
Samantha giggled as she closed the door, careful not to let the lock click. “Another clean getaway.”
Otter was happily running around ahead of them again. This was a treat for her to be out on an adventure for a second night in a row. She waited for them to catch up to her at the barn door. Once in, she wasted no time sniffing around.
The girls moved cautiously as they inspected the barn with the flashlights, careful not to miss an inch. They didn’t want to come across the possum by accident and scare it, or worse, have it scare them. The kittens received just a quick a quick dose this time.
“Sorry, gang,” Val explained. “We’re on a mission.”
Back on task, Val shined her flashlight at the tack room door and found Otter sitting there. The dog might have run to the door because that’s what she did the night before, but Val was almost certain they’d find the possum in the same place. Together, they walked to the tack room door and opened it. Otter walked over to the tarp again, sat down, and looked up at them.
“You were right, Val,” said Samantha. “She sure is a creature of hab—” She stopped talking before she could even get out the word “habit.” Her gaze was fixed on the tail sticking out from under the tarp once again. Valerie caught the fact that Sam was staring at something. She followed Sam’s gaze in time to see the tail getting smaller and smaller.
“It’s trying to hide from us behind the tarp, but we have it now. It has nowhere to go,” Valerie exclaimed. Samantha went over to drop down the board again. She gently pulled it away from the wall, but there was nothing there.
“What the heck!” they said at the same time.
“There is no way it got out! We didn’t find any cracks that it could fit through back there last night. Wait! Be careful, Samantha. Maybe it’s curled up in the tarp that’s bunched on the ground.”
Samantha leaned the board back before she carefully lifted
the tarp up. There was no sign of the possum, but Val made another discovery. As her flashlight hit the area under the tarp, the light reflected back at her. The tarp covered an old mirror, not a board.
“I don’t know how it got away. This is crazy.” Sam’s attention went to where the flashlight was shining. “Why would you guys have a mirror out in the barn, Val?”
“I forgot about that.” Val pulled the tarp completely off. “We found it in here when we moved. The barn was filled with lots of old junk. My mom and I spent a whole day cleaning it out. We had a huge bonfire to get rid of all the rotting wood, and hauled everything else to the dump. She left that in here; it was too heavy for us to carry. My dad is supposed to bring it in the house and hang it. I guess it’s one of those jobs that keeps getting put off or forgotten.”
“It sure is pretty.”
Their flashlights moved along the old ironwork as they admired the frame, then the beams of light went to the mirrored glass.
“It must really be old,” Val said. “The images aren’t sharp at all.”
As they returned their attention to the center, they discovered an image of a scene of trees in it, rather than the dull gray cement walls of the tack room that it should have been reflecting. Together they turned around, looking at the wall, then back at the mirror again.
“That’s really weird, Val.”
“Not as weird as that.” Valerie pointed to the center. A small gray body with a large bald tail had come into focus. “Is that the reflection of our possum?”
They both turned to look behind them, expecting to see the possum there. When it wasn’t, they returned their attention to the mirror.
“If that’s the possum, it’s further away than the size of this tack room, Sam.” Together, the girls turned back to the wall, then looked up as if searching for a projector.
Sam laughed. “You were thinking the same as I was.”
“My dad’s not home, otherwise I would have thought he was playing a joke on us.”
Turning back to the mirror, they froze in amazement as the images of a forest became clearer.
“This is not just a mirror,” Samantha whispered as she put her hand on the glass to touch it. To their surprise, it passed through as if nothing were there. All they could see was the end of her arm and what appeared to be the forest. She pulled her arm back in a hurry, worried that her hand would no longer be there. Sam carefully inspected the back of her hand, flipped it over and studied her palm, then wiggled her fingers. The two of them stared from Samantha’s hand back to the mirror with their mouths as wide open as their eyes.
“That so did not just happen!” Samantha put her hand back through again. She stopped when they saw the possum walking away, getting smaller and smaller.
“A magic mirror!” Valerie shouted. “No way! I have been waiting my whole life for something exciting to happen to me!” Without another minute of hesitation, Val squeezed her body through the narrow frame, leaving Samantha sitting there with her mouth wide open.
Chapter 5