The Wish

  “Can I see your dress?” BeeBee asked me. She was sitting at Ardis’s dressing table, wearing a slip, a towel draped around her shoulders.

  I took the dress out of its garment bag.

  “Cool,” Nina said. “Points.”

  It was something to get a compliment from Nina.

  “Where are your dresses?” I asked.

  They were hanging in Ardis’s closet. I recognized Ardis’s because she’d told me it was an African print. It only had one strap.

  “How does the strap work?” I asked.

  “You’ll see,” Ardis said.

  “I love that strap,” BeeBee said.

  BeeBee’s dress was apricot color, silk, with a vee neck. Nina’s was beige lace over a pale-blue satiny sheath. “A hundred doilies died to make this,” she said, touching the lace.

  “Okay, guys,” BeeBee said. “I’m ready for you.”

  “BeeBee’s unbelievable,” Ardis told me. “We should have before and after pictures.”

  BeeBee put shadows across Nina’s cheeks and rubbed them in. Suddenly Nina had high cheekbones, and her broad face looked exotic, almost beautiful. Then BeeBee combed Nina’s hair all on one side, hiding half of the left side of her face.

  “Thanks,” Nina said, staring at herself in the mirror. “I would have killed to look like this, and now I look like this.”

  Then it was Ardis’s turn, and BeeBee shook her head. “You don’t need me.”

  “My nose.”

  “Your nose fits your face.” She brushed blush onto Ardis’s cheeks. “A little mascara and you’re done.”

  I was next.

  “Your eyes are gorgeous,” BeeBee said, applying eye shadow.

  “They’re brown,” I said.

  “She knows they’re brown,” Nina said, pulling the sheath part of her dress over her head. “You think a blind person is doing your makeup?”

  “Brown’s a good warm color,” BeeBee said. “And half the world wants lashes like yours.”

  BeeBee did my hair too. She pulled it tight to the top of my head, and then left the ends flopping. It looked like something out of a magazine, and she showed me how to do it, so I could wear it that way whenever I wanted, which would be always. Putting my hair up didn’t turn me into a swan, but I wasn’t a no-neck owl anymore either. Ardis lent me a wooden comb with inlaid mother-of-pearl, which made my hair look dressy as well as fabulous.

  BeeBee didn’t spend half as much time on herself as she spent on us. “Only plastic surgery would work for me.” She put the cover back on her lipstick. “Add a forehead. Add a chin.” She sounded perfectly cheerful.

  Ardis saw my expression. “Don’t worry. BeeBee likes the way she looks.”

  “If you’re pretty,” BeeBee said, taking her dress off its hanger, “your self-portraits aren’t interesting.”

  In an astonishing act of generosity, Maud had let me wear the pearls she got from Grandma for Christmas. I fastened them around my neck, over my old locket.

  Nina was struggling with her zipper. “I wanted to lose five pounds for Grad Night, but I gained six.”

  “Points off,” I said, feeling daring, “for putting yourself down.” I hadn’t teased any of them before.

  “Wilma got you,” BeeBee said. She was the first one dressed. “How do I look?”

  “Do you have a necklace?” Ardis asked.

  BeeBee looked at herself in Ardis’s huge oval mirror. “It needs something, right?”

  “Let me see what I have.” Ardis took a jewelry box out of the top drawer of her bureau.

  We all looked. Everything was big and heavy. Big jewelry was right for Ardis, but BeeBee needed something delicate.

  “I looked okay when I tried it on at home,” she said. “Some artist I am. I should have noticed.”

  My locket might look good. I didn’t need it because of Maud’s pearls. But maybe it was too plain. “You can wear this if you want to.” I fumbled at the clasp. “It’s just an ordinary heart. . . .”

  BeeBee fastened the chain around her neck. It worked. It was simple, like her dress.

  “That’s it,” Ardis said. “It’s perfect.”

  “And if you get lonely for my dog or my mom, you can look inside.”

  BeeBee laughed. “Thanks, Wilma. I’m glad you’re—”

  The doorbell rang. The sound was muffled by the acres of carpet between the door and Ardis’s bedroom.

  “Dad will get it, but we better hurry,” Ardis said. She put on big gold hoop earrings.

  I stepped into my dress, zipped up the back and stood in front of the mirror.

  I was pretty! I never was before, at least not that I could see. But now I was. Whatever BeeBee had done to my eyes, they were huge, and—I don’t know—appealing. And in this dress—unlike in my Claverford uniform—I had a visible waist and breasts and hips, all of them proportioned about right. I did not look like a beaver tonight.

  “I guess I’m done,” Nina said.

  “Me too.” Ardis joined me in front of the mirror and held out her arms to Nina and BeeBee. “Come here.”

  The doorbell rang again. We crowded next to Ardis and faced ourselves in the mirror. I looked like I belonged in the reflection with the three other girls.

  “We’re knockouts,” Nina said.

  The doorbell rang again.

  “I wish I’d brought my camera,” BeeBee said.

  “I have one,” Ardis said.

  “You can’t take the picture,” Nina said. “You have to be in it.”

  “I’ll get Shanara.”

  While we waited, the doorbell rang one more time. The four of them had arrived. BeeBee made a final adjustment to Nina’s hair. “Try not to move your head too much.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  Shanara was about nine years old. “You need me, so now I’m allowed in here,” she said. “Where’s the camera?”

  Ardis gave it to her, and we assembled in front of the mirror again. Shanara stood next to it.

  “Smile.”

  We already were. She snapped.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  The four boys stood up when we came into the living room. They had been sitting on the couch, in a row like eggs on a refrigerator door. Ardis’s father stood across from them, leaning on the back of a chair.

  Jared was wearing a gray suit, a maroon shirt, and a yellow tie. The tie was just like him—surprising in a nice way. He smiled at me. I smiled back, glad he was the one I was going with.

  Carlos whistled. His eyes traveled across all of us but lingered an extra second on me.

  “I believe Mrs. Lundy has laid some food out in the dining room,” Mr. Lundy said.

  We ate quickly. Nobody said much. Five minutes ago we were having fun getting ready, and now—nothing.

  “What do you think Mr. Winby will wear?” Ardis said finally.

  The teachers and Mr. Winby always came to Grad Night in costume.

  “A lion suit,” Jared said. “My brother says he does it every year. He has an authority complex.”

  “I hear Ms. Hannah’s coming as Ophelia,” BeeBee said.

  They started talking about what costumes some teachers would wear and what others should wear. I watched Jared. He was laughing at something Ardis’s boyfriend, Russ, had said. Jared was the friendliest-looking of the boys, the nicest, the kindest, the best kisser, I’d bet, the most fun, everything.

  My last night. I was going to have a fabulous time. With Jared. With all of them.

  In the elevator down from Ardis’s apartment, I stood between Jared and Carlos. Jared moved closer to me. So did Carlos. This might be the last time Carlos would have anything to do with me. I wouldn’t miss him much.

  It was warm out. Russ and Ardis were dancing as they walked. Liam was laughing at something Nina had whispered to him. BeeBee and Carlos bumped their hips into each other as they walked, making them zigzag across the sidewalk.

  Jared and I held hands. I felt shy.

  “I may be better a
t zoos than dances,” Jared said.

  He was feeling the same way as me. That made me more comfortable. “Could Twentieth Street be a kissing zone?” I asked.

  “It is,” he said, grinning. “I saw a sign.”

  He kissed me. Somebody whistled. Somebody clapped. Nina said, “Points. Many points.” BeeBee said, “Keep it up. No breathing.”

  When he let me go, I said, “Everybody has to kiss on Twentieth Street.”

  Liam kissed Nina on the lips—but quickly. Ardis and Russ got into it, though. I stamped my feet and clapped till my palms tingled.

  “Come on, lover.” BeeBee threw her arms around Carlos. They kissed. BeeBee’s eyes were closed. But Carlos’s were open. Over her shoulder, he looked at me.

  “I hate that guy,” Jared muttered.

  Grad Night was in the basement of Claverford, in the gym. We heard the band as soon as we opened the door to the stairs. Downstairs, we walked along the corridor. Teachers’ lounge on the left. Coach’s office on the right. Girls’ bathroom on the right. I’d probably never be through here again.

  We followed a stream of kids. The band was loud, but the sound was mixed with kids’ voices, laughing, yelling to each other.

  Mr. Winby in his lion suit prowled through the crowd, roaring and then laughing.

  The air-conditioned air was chilly, although it still smelled of sweat and sneakers. The Grad Night committee had tried to make the gym look like a nightclub. The fluorescent lights were draped with blue cloth that dimmed their glare. Near the long table with soda and pretzels and potato chips were smaller tables covered with blue paper tablecloths. In the middle of each table was a flashlight standing on end, pointing its light at the ceiling.

  Ms. Hannah, as Ophelia in a floor-length dress and carrying a bouquet, stood behind the long table talking to a man with a green face who held a beaker of purple liquid. It was Mr. Pike, as a science experiment gone wrong.

  The band played under one of the basketball hoops. Somehow a ball was suspended in the hoop so it looked like it was going to crash down on the keyboard player’s head, but it never did.

  The last dance I’d been to was the Spring Dance in March. I hadn’t danced once. I don’t know why I went, except I hoped it would be different for a change. It was why I’d gone to every other dance before this, and not one had ever been different.

  Tonight was different.

  I love to dance. I’m not graceful, but I have lots of energy. I hadn’t been dancing for more than a minute before I noticed that kids were imitating me. They were doing The Wilma.

  If only I could bottle tonight and take a sip of it every so often for the rest of my life.

  After the next dance, I had to go to the bathroom. On my way out of the gym, kids kept pulling me in to dance with them, so it took me a song and a half to leave, dancing all the way.

  Somebody was in a stall, crying.

  “Hello? Are you okay?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Go away.”

  “Daphne?”

  “Wilma?”

  I could guess what was wrong. She was being left out. Nobody was dancing with her. Nobody was paying any attention to her. She could have been me a month ago.

  “Do you want to go back in with me?”

  She was quiet for a minute. “Okay.”

  It struck me—suppose it had been a month ago. If I’d gone into the bathroom then and Daphne had been crying, I never would have asked her to go in with me. I wouldn’t have wanted her unpopularity to rub off on me, even though I was unpopular too. But now that I was popular, I wanted to help her. Well, when—and if—the spell ended, I would still be Daphne’s friend if she wanted me to be. I’d learned that much, anyway.

  Daphne came out. Her eyes were red and a bit puffy, but not too bad.

  “You look great,” she told me.

  “You do too.” But she didn’t. Her green dress made her look even more washed-out than usual. And she’d done something to her hair to try to make it less stringy, but it only looked messy. She looked in the mirror and didn’t answer.

  “Ready?” I asked.

  She nodded.

  In the gym, the band was playing a reggae number. Jared was at the food table. He saw me and headed my way. We started dancing, and I pulled Daphne in to join us.

  She could dance! She got totally into the music and flowed, like a snake. Her long hands, her arms, all of her pulsed rhythmically. I should have expected it, from the slinky way she skated. Other kids noticed, looked startled, and started imitating her instead of me.

  So here we were, the three ex-loners—Jared, Daphne, and me—dancing our feet off, the envy of everyone. I grinned at them, and they grinned back.

  If only it could last.

  After another dance, Daphne, Jared, and I took a break and got some food. We sat at one of the little tables.

  “I never heard of a nightclub lit by flashlights,” I said, clicking ours on and off. “They should be candles, but probably Mr. Winby was afraid of fire, so he got flashlights.”

  Ardis and Russ pulled chairs over and joined us. Russ put his hand over the flashlight. His fingers glowed pink-red.

  The band stopped playing, and Mr. Winby took the guitarist’s microphone. “Roar,” he yelled into it. There was feedback, and his roar turned into a screech.

  Liam, Nina, and Carlos dragged chairs to our table. BeeBee sat on the floor, leaning against Carlos’s legs.

  “Listen up, kids. While the band takes a well-deserved break from the evil noise it produces so professionally—”

  Somebody yelled, “Get hip, Mr. Winby.”

  “—our talented faculty will perform a little skit for you.” He bowed and put back the mike.

  Mr. Pike entered the circle of light around the basketball hoop. He carried a pointer, which he tried to stick in his ear. “Maybe this will get the wax out,” he said, rocking back and forth while he spoke. “It’s long enough.”

  It was a perfect imitation of himself, except that he was rocking much faster than usual, and his ordinary ear-picking weapon was a bent paper clip.

  “Pardon me.” Ms. Hannah in her Ophelia outfit joined him. “Wherefore you are as eminent a scientist as the bard was a poet, you will have no trouble inventing . . .”

  Ardis took my hand. Everybody was holding hands, all over the gym.

  More teachers joined the skit, till they were all there. At the end, Mr. Winby said, “Please notice that these talented performers made fun of themselves, not of you, although they were sorely tempted. I think they deserve a round of applause, don’t you?”

  We let go of each other’s hands to clap. Then he had us clap for the Grad Night committee. And then he told us that the band would play three final numbers and Grad Night would end.

  The last dance was a real oldie, “Sixteen Candles,” a slow number. We didn’t do it as couples. All nine of us (I pulled Daphne in) got into a group hug and swayed together.

  I made myself not think about graduation. I was part of a family, and they loved me and cared about me. And if I could, I’d stay here, hugging and being hugged forever.

  I wormed myself as far into the hug as I could to get maximum squeezing. And they hugged me extra hard because I was their favorite. Then the song ended and Grad Night was over. And tears rolled down my face.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  I couldn’t sleep. I didn’t want to sleep. I’d never have another night like tonight. Tomorrow would come, and then Sunday and then Monday morning, and it would almost certainly be finished. I would be finished. And there was nothing I could do about it.

  I’d miss being popular. I’d miss being magically popular, so that every single kid liked me. I’d miss feeling safe to be myself, more myself than I’d ever been when I was worrying what people would think of me. But what I’d miss most were my friends—Jared, Ardis, Daphne, Nina, and BeeBee. They felt like real friends, not magic-spell friends.

  I had to talk to them. But if I talked to them before graduation, it
wouldn’t do any good. They’d say they liked me and they’d like me forever. They’d swear it. And after graduation, they wouldn’t talk to me.

  Well, I’d make them. I couldn’t make them like me after graduation, but at least I should be able to get them to talk to me.

  Monday afternoon would be my only chance, before everyone left for camp or vacation or relatives. I’d get them all together. Except Jared. I’d talk to him alone.

  I called Ardis first.

  “Could you come over to my house Monday afternoon?” I began. “Although you might not want to.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know—you may have other things you need to do . . .” I trailed off.

  “Will Reggie be there?”

  “Sure.”

  “Then I’ll come.”

  “Great! It means a lot to me. Ardis . . .”

  “What?”

  “Do you promise? You’ll come, even if you don’t want to?”

  “What’s going on, Wilma? I said I’d come.”

  “I know. It’s just that there’s something important I have to tell you, only I can’t tell it yet. I’m inviting Ni—”

  “Why can’t you tell now?”

  “Because I can’t. You’ll see.” If the spell didn’t end, I’d make up something to say. “Do you promise?”

  “Yes, I promise.”

  “For sure?”

  “Wilma! When have I ever broken a promise?”

  “You never promised me anything before.”

  “Oh. Well, I never break a promise. I’ll be there.”

  After Ardis, I called everybody else, and they all promised to come, although Nina took points off for making her promise. Now I just had to cross my fingers and toes that the promises would hold.

  I didn’t call Jared. I was going to catch him right after graduation. I had the most hope that he’d go on liking me, but if he didn’t, I wasn’t going to beg him. The others I was willing to beg, but not Jared.

  Monday. Doomsday. I couldn’t eat breakfast. Mom asked if I was sick, but I said I was only nervous.

  Maud said, “It’s just middle school, Wilma. It’s not the Nobel Prize for veterinary medicine.”