Kimet shrugged, feeling very awkward.
Zarja rose up and paced about the room. Kimet watched, her gut growling, her head aching. But she waited, though right then she could not have said why.
Finally Zarja looked up. “What do you think . . . Kimet? Are you going to shout out that window?”
Kimet sighed, wishing she’d walked out of this chamber and left the Princess behind. Of course she could leave now. There was no one to stop her. She knew the back ways. She could turn her back on the Princess, slink down the servant halls, and pretend nothing had ever happened. Act surprised when she saw the other pages and someone mentioned the statues. Let life return to normal.
Except it wasn’t going to return to normal. For bad or good, everything had changed. She still did not know how. The Master Wizard could be busy making statues of all the nobles, or all the stewards. It was even conceivable he would make a statue of a page who had dared to hide a Princess.
Meanwhile right in front of her were those eyes, not angry or arrogant. The Princess had asked her a question, because she wanted, perhaps for the first time, to hear what a page might say.
Not just a page. She had used her name.
“No,” she said. “I won’t.”
Silence. Zarja said slowly, “I was going to ask what you were going to demand, but it doesn’t look like I have anything to give you. Does it?”
Kimet touched the tapestry. “This is what I want. What I always wanted.”
Another long silence. From outside a faint cry, “She’s not in the wood!”
“Queens,” Zarja said in a low voice, “in all our royal records are expected to risk others’ lives. But not in the songs, the Master Wizard said once, and I laughed at him about peasant songs.”
Kimet waited, her fingers smoothing the tapestry. Whatever else was going on, at least it seemed she would be safe. She would get what she wanted.
Zarja jumped up, and gazed down at the figures in the tapestry in their old-fashioned clothes. “Lives. I never thought it might be my own. But it should be, shouldn’t it, if I am the Queen, even for one day?”
She got to her feet, marched to the door, and yanked it open, then glanced over her shoulder.
For the last time the two stared at one another. Princess Zarja shook out her skirts, smoothed her hair with trembling fingers, then gave an odd, crackling laugh that betrayed far more pain than humor. The sun in the window shone full on her red nose, her puffy eyes, her dust-spattered dressing gown, and disarrayed hair. “I believe—if he gives me the chance to speak—I’ll ask him to put me in the stable with the Master Cook’s son. Maybe I’ll learn what I wouldn’t learn in the royal rooms.”
Kimet had always admired the Princess’s clothes, her possessions, the ease of her life. Now for the first time, she admired the girl inside them.
Yes, things had changed. For bad or good Kimet did not know, nor could she predict. The Wizard might turn them both into statues, or he might listen, but Kimet had decided her own first step in this new life, and it seemed right and true.
“If he does, I’ll come and help you,” she promised.
And she held out her hand.
Zarja took it.
Together they walked down the stairs.
Curing the Bozos
“Here comes the nerd!”
“This ought to be really cool . . . Not!”
The whispers were just loud enough for every kid in the class to hear.
I fumed, my ears burning as my little brother walked up the row, his skinny shoulders hunched and his glasses sliding down his nose.
The teacher beamed at him. “I’ve been looking forward to your report, Fredric.” Of course she had. The teachers always did, ever since they skipped him two years into my grade. But they never seemed to realize that the more they talked about Fred’s brains, the more some of the other kids picked on him.
Fred gave the teacher a pained look, then cleared his throat. “My research report,” he said, “is on UFOs.”
“Yeah, because he’s an alien!” Jason M. snickered.
“Class,” the teacher said, frowning around. “Each one of us deserves the same consideration.”
Watching Jason for approval, Ashley G. made snoring noises, and of course her best pals giggled obediently. Fred’s shoulders hitched up another notch, and I was so mad my ears not only burned, they itched.
But Fred adjusted his glasses, then started. “My observations were made over a period of three weeks,” he said. “I made three sightings, each time at about eleven p.m. The first one was an accident. I got up at eleven to get a drink of water, and when I looked out my window, I saw was a roundish disk of light moving in the eastern part of the sky—”
“Yeah, just like a frisbee,” Jason whispered behind his hand.
Of course several boys laughed like maniacs.
“Class,” the teacher said. “Continue, Fred. This is most interesting.”
“So I’ve stayed up until eleven every night since. My second observation was made exactly one week later. This time I didn’t turn on my bedroom light, and I had my camera ready. The UFO dropped through the clouds. It must have been about a hundred feet wide, maybe bigger, and it had green running lights—”
“Just like a blimp,” Ashley muttered, and again came some laughs, though I could tell some of the kids were interested in spite of themselves.
“I snapped a picture, but the flash might have alerted it, and the UFO rose into the clouds and vanished before I could get another shot,” Fred said. “It’s smeared because the flash holds the aperture open longer, and my hand jiggled,” he added apologetically, and held up a blown-up photo. “I cleaned it up best I could.”
Not much of anything could be seen in it, which caused the class to laugh again.
“I think I see what might be your running lights in this corner,” the teacher said kindly, touching the photo.
Unfortunately, that part of the photo looked just like the street lamps around the corner from our apartment, and the class obviously thought so, too, because there were more snickers this time.
I bunched my hair over my ears, feeling like they’d be steaming any minute.
“And my last sighting was a week ago,” Fred said. “It was too foggy to get a photo, but I saw the outline of the ship, and the lights. It stayed in the sky exactly two minutes and fourteen seconds, then moved up and to the east. “
“And you were mysteriously hypnotized so you couldn’t call 911,” Kyler P. sneered.
This time the class roared.
Fred dropped his report on his desk, and shoved his glasses back up his nose. “Why would I call 911?” he retorted. “All they’d do is make noise with their sirens and loudspeakers—”
“And arrest you for prank calls,” Demi F. said prissily.
“That will do, class,” the teacher said. “Thank you, Fredric. That was quite interesting. Now, let’s hear from Jason M.”
Jason got up and bored on about basketball statistics, and most of the boys ooohed like it was a Presidential report straight from the White House.
Then it was time for recess. Fred followed the boys out.
Marissa and Kelly, my two best friends, were waiting at the door for me. “Want to grab a volleyball court?” Kelly asked.
“Not just yet,” I said. “I want to make sure Fred is okay.”
Marissa squinted toward the field as we walked down the hall. “I don’t see the boys,” she said. “Anyway, I thought Fred’s report was kind of cute. Did he make all that up?”
“Not Fred,” I said. “Whatever he saw, he believes it was the real deal.”
“Did you see it, too?” Marissa asked.
I shook my head. “None of us knew what he was working on. He told Uncle David and Aunt Pearl that it was a surprise, that he was conducting an investigation completely on his own.”
Kelly nodded. “Your aunt would like that, her nephew following in her footsteps. But why UFOs?”
 
; “Uh oh,” Marissa breathed, and I swung around to look.
Jason and three of his buds, plus Ashley and two girls known for being mean, had backed Fred up against the fence. I went straight over.
“ . . . teacher’s pet,” Jason was saying. “You didn’t even do a real report. Just made it up.”
“I did not!” Fred yelled, his voice squeaking.
“You did too, geek. Go on, admit it,” Jason said, shoving Fred in the arm.
Since Jason is six inches taller than anyone in the class and a lot heavier as well, it didn’t take much to make Fred stagger back. Jason’s friends laughed nastily, and then Jason saw me.
“So, here comes big sister to protect the little creep,” he whined. “I suppose you saw Freddie-frog-eyes’ alien spaceships, Lisa?”
“If he says he saw ’em, he saw ’em,” I said. “Now back off.”
“Oooh, she’s sooo-ooo tough,” Jason said, hands on hips. “Gonna get some leather boots and a motorcycle?”
“Right after school,” I said. “Want to help me pick them out?”
By then more kids had gathered, and several of them laughed.
Jason glared. “Look, everyone else had to do real work, and your teacher’s pet baby brother gets away with fairy tales, just cause he skips grades.”
“Fred does his work, and the teacher knows it,” I said. “So just put your nose back in your own business.”
Jason knew he was wrong, but of course he just had to push it, because half the class was watching. “Maybe it’s time to see if you’re as tough as you talk,” Jason snarled, punching my arm.
Or he tried to, anyway. I sidestepped easily, and put my hand on his wrist. Using his own muscle and force, I pulled him off-balance so he fell sprawling in the dust where he’d tried to make Fred fall minutes ago.
“So you like rough stuff?” he yelled.
“I hate it,” I said. “But nobody pushes me around. Or my family. Or my friends. Okay?” I made my voice even on the last word, and held out a hand to pull him up.
He ignored it, scrambling to his feet and glaring over his shoulder at me as he walked away. The crowd of kids broke up.
“Come on, let’s play some volleyball,” I said to Kelly and Marissa.
o0o
On the bus home after school, Fred was quiet and gloomy.
When we settled into our bus seats, I said, over usual howls and screeches, “You okay?”
We both ducked some flying gym socks.
“I guess,” he said. And then, quickly, “No one believes me. Not even the teacher. I got a B, and a comment ‘wonderful imagination’. And I had field notes, and everything.” He looked up at me, his brown eyes huge behind his glasses. “Do you believe me, Lisa?”
“It might have been some kind of mistake,” I said.
“A mistake?” He looked really upset. “You think I faked it, too?”
“Oh, I believe you saw something,” I said. “But maybe it was a blimp, or some kind of secret military test, or something. You gotta remember that I wasn’t there,” I said. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”
“I really wanted to get proof, and on my own,” he said. “Like Aunt Pearl. I mean, no one else in the family seems to believe in life on other planets like I do, so when I saw the ship . . .”
“So what about your proof?” I asked.
“Well, the things I tried obviously didn’t work, but the report was due today, so I did the best I could. But I’m not giving up,” he said quickly. “Promise you won’t laugh?”
“Promise,” I said.
“I’ve set up a radio receiver on as wide a band as I can get,” he said, grinning. “And the vidcam. So far the visits have all been on Fridays, so they should come tonight. Want to stay up with me and watch?”
“Sure,” I said. “Sounds cool.”
He blurted, “Thanks for sticking up for me today.”
“No problem. I know you’d do the same for me.”
“Except I never have,” he said, his round face earnest. “It’s always you protecting me, either here at school, or at the playground, or on the street.” He stuck out a skinny arm, frowning at it. “I don’t think I could protect a kitten,” he finished morosely. “I wish you’d show me what you learned at that foster home. Then I could smash that Jason a good one.”
“Maybe some day,” I said.
“They taught you cool stuff.” He made a fist. “All I ever learned was how to read before kindergarten. I feel like I’m an alien,” he burst out.
I laughed. “I think we all do. I know I did when Pearl and David first adopted me, and the kids at school made fun of my red hair.”
“I don’t think it’s weird.” Fred looked critically at me. “I think it’s nice,” he added, with his shy smile. “In fact, I liked it when you came. And it was a lot redder then.”
I grinned back at him. “Sometimes I think I’ll dye it green,” I said, which made him grin. “You could, too, and I bet Pearl and David would love to do theirs as well. Then we could really be an alien family.”
Fred laughed, his real laugh, and I knew he was all right again.
Then he surprised me, asking shyly, “Uncle David and Aunt Pearl said I shouldn’t ask, unless you wanted to talk about it. But I keep wondering. What was it like? Your foster home?”
Before they brought me home, Pearl and David told me about Fred. Though I was the oldest, Fred had been their kid first. His mom, Aunt Pearl’s sister, and his dad had been volcanologists, and they’d been filming a volcano when it erupted and killed them. So Fred came to live with them, and he was so unhappy they decided to adopt him a brother or sister close to his age, or in his grade, whichever happened first.
We’d all liked each other right away. He almost never talks about his former life,
Pearl had said, “We think it best if you let him bring it up if he wants to.” They’d obviously said the same to him.
“I was in several, actually,” I said. “The best one was the one where I got to study martial arts. They had a bunch of foster kids. All we seemed to talk about was getting a family, and what kind of family we’d pick if we could. I got exactly what I hoped for,” I added, and Fred smiled happily.
I waited for him to talk about his old life, but he just sighed, and settled back in the seat. “We do have an alien family,” he said, sounding content.
“You mean you and me, because we’re orphans?”
“And David draws cartoons all night, and Pearl chases bad guys.” He sighed. “Or maybe Jason and his gang are the aliens. I don’t know. I just don’t fit in at school.”
“Do you really want to fit in with them?” I asked. “I mean, wouldn’t you rather they learn to be your kind of normal, than you dumb down and act like them?”
The bus lurched to a stop, and we grabbed our stuff and got out.
“Yeah. But that’ll happen when pigs fly out of my nose,” Fred grumped, settling his books with one hand and his glasses with the other. “I think I’ll go to the library before dinner, and see if the books on astrophysics that I requested are in yet.”
“Okay,” I said, leading the way to the apartment. “I guess I’ll just get started on my homework. And tonight, we’ll listen for aliens.”
Fred seemed pretty cheerful again as we went inside. David had a snack in the oven. As he got out the oven mitts, I thought about how wrong Jason and the rest were about Fred, who was trying to teach himself calculus and reading every book on space physics that he could find.
How normal is being mean? I wondered. Before I’d come into this family I’d assumed that mean kids were only in fosterage because of terrible things that had happened to their families. Until I got to this nice school in this nice neighborhood, and discovered the Jasons and Ashleys, who had nice parents and nice homes and nice things. And yet they were still mean.
As Uncle David served hot chocolate and fresh brownies, and cracked jokes to cheer Fred up, I wondered how normal this behavior was. If it wasn’t it
should be, I thought.
o0o
“So how’d that mysterious report go?” Aunt Pearl asked at dinner.
“Okay,” Fred said. “My problem was, I didn’t convince anyone.” He said determinedly, “I’m still tracking my proof, and when I have my info, I’ll show it to you.”
Aunt Pearl grinned back. “That’s what a good detective does,” she said, looking pleased. Fred beamed.
He didn’t say anything more though, and at bed time, he just went into his room like usual.
Pearl went to sleep even earlier than we did, as she had to be up early the next morning. David shut himself into his study and put on his headphones, which meant he was out of this world.
Still, I waited until ten-thirty, then got out of bed and went to Fred’s room without turning on any lights.
The moonlight was clear and strong. Fred sat on his bed in his PJs, his glasses winking as he adjusted something that had faintly glowing dials.
“Hi,” I whispered. “All ready?”
“I’m just testing my vid setup,” he said. “Want to see?”
I nodded, and he flicked on his little flashlight and shined it proudly over the wires and components that he’d rigged to his computer, a really old radio, and an old cellphone with an electronics kit.
“. . . so I’m testing for radio waves on the shortwave, EM, and I hope this spy set really does check infrared. It said it would when I ordered it off the Internet, but it was kinda cheap,” Fred said doubtfully. “Anyway, they must use some kind of radio waves if they are sending communications at all,” he was saying. “And they must be, don’t you think? I mean, why else would one ship just appear like that, and hang around? They have to be communicating with someone.”
“Makes sense to me,” I said, sitting on the other end of his bed.
He had his window wide open, and cold air drifted in. Despite being so skinny, Fred didn’t seem to notice, but I’m sensitive to chilly wind, and my feet and fingers and ears were cold. I pulled my hair close to my face to keep my ears from hurting, and tucked my feet under me.
“There,” Fred said, moving to the window. “I know the vidcam is working.” He pointed to his computer terminal. This time I won’t mess up.”