A Fairy's Guide to Disaster Read online

  “You shouldn’t have grabbed me,” said Gerald. “I’m telling my mother.”

  “Go ahead and tell her, Stink Fairy.” I waved for him to come over. “Come on. I’ve got to bandage that big head of yours.”

  “You’re an idiot,” he said.

  “I’m an idiot?”

  I stomped towards him, spreading my wings out to their full span. My tips touched the ceiling and the bottoms trailed on the ground. The whole room became awash in my purple and green luminescence. I was about to reach for Gerald’s arm again to drag him to the kitchen for a bandage when he said, “Somebody’s running this way.”

  It had to be Iris and it had to be bad, because Iris never ever ran. I turned in time to see my little sister bounce off the doorframe of the storeroom. She got to her feet and squeezed through the narrow storeroom door, panting and brushing the wrinkles out of her sparkly blue dress that matched her wings.

  “Matilda, you’ll never believe what I saw,” Iris said.

  Gerald brushed past me and stood in front of Iris with his arms crossed. “What did you see, big and stupid?”

  Iris sucked in her lips. “I’m not stupid.”

  “And you’re not that big either,” I said, even though Iris was way bigger than I had been at her age. She might turn out to be larger than our father, who was nearly as tall as the dime Mom propped up on the parlor wall for decoration. “You shouldn’t talk, Gerald. You’re not even a real Whipplethorn.”

  “I am, too,” said Gerald.

  “No, you’re not,” I said. “You can tell by your wings. They don’t shine at all.”

  “Yes, they do, idiot.”

  “No, they don’t. Look how muddy and dull they are.” I pulled out one of his wings. “Real Whipplethorns have luminescent wings.”

  “That doesn’t make you better,” said Gerald, pulling his wing away from me.

  “It makes me a Whipplethorn.”

  “Humans,” yelled Iris.

  We turned to stare at her. She clapped her dimpled hands and grinned.

  “I saw humans,” she said, her grin growing larger.

  “Where?” Gerald and I said together.

  “Right out in the great hall. You could hear them if you stopped fighting.”

  I held my breath and listened. Maybe I heard something, deep tones from outside the mantel. I never would’ve noticed if Iris hadn’t pointed it out.

  “Are they loud?” I asked.

  Iris hesitated. “They’re not that loud.”

  Gerald sneered at her. “Are you kidding? They’re humans. It’s like they’re bellowing out there.” Then Gerald’s face went another shade of pale. “They’re talking about tools.”

  I pulled out the list and scanned the thing from top to bottom. Nothing. Humans weren’t on the list. And why would they be? It was like humans had forgotten Whipplethorn Manor existed at all. Of course, I’d seen humans before, but never in the house. Sometimes Dad would find some hiking on trails in the national park nearby, and we would go to look at them. If I was very good, Dad would let me fly right up to them and look up their nostrils. No Whipplethorn fairy had been seen in six generations and I wanted to be the one to break our cold streak. So I tried everything I could think of to get their attention, including pulling ear hairs and biting noses, but they never noticed tiny wood fairies. Dad said I had to want it very badly to make it happen. He’d never been able to do it. I couldn’t imagine wanting a human to see me any more than I already did.

  Iris and I ran to the storeroom windows and leaned out. Three human men in faded overalls were walking around and pointing at things. Once I was in the window, I could just barely make out what they were saying.

  “What do you think, Sal?” asked the tallest.

  “Gold mine. It’s a flipping gold mine,” said Sal.

  The third one pulled a notebook out of his pocket and began writing things down. “You got that right.”

  My sister and I glanced at each other. “Do you think they’re moving in?” asked Iris.

  “No.” I’d spent a lot of time imagining humans living in Whipplethorn. Three men with rough hands and pit stains didn’t match my fantasies at all.

  “What are they doing here then?” Iris leaned over the window sill to get a closer look. “Do you think they could see me? Can I go out?”

  I pulled Iris back. “Better not. Mom wouldn’t like it.”

  She turned around with a petulant frown on her face. I was about to chastise her when I spotted Gerald backing out of the room.

  “Don’t you want to see?” Iris asked him.

  Gerald didn’t answer, but he stopped moving. His eyes darted from one of us to the other.

  “Maybe he’s too smart to be interested in humans,” I said.

  Gerald remained silent. A feat I’d never before experienced. Gerald always talked, whether anyone wanted to listen or not.

  “What’s wrong with you?” I stepped closer to Gerald, eyeing him with interest.

  Iris tapped my shoulder. “Look.”

  We crowded into the window again. The three humans were standing in front of our mantel, rubbing their giant hands together and filling the mantel with their odd stink, a combination of sweat and pungent soap.

  “May as well start here as anywhere,” said the tall one. “You got it, Sal.”

  “You bet,” said Sal as he slapped a long, thin piece of metal in his palm.

  Iris leaned forward again. “What’s that?”

  “I don’t know,” I said as I felt my blood run cold. I’d read about that happening in books, but the description always seemed silly and melodramatic until it happened to me. It was like taking a bath in ice cold fear. Something was about to go terribly wrong.

  The humans went to the sides of the mantel, out of our sight. There was a dull thump and the mantel shook. Iris’s eyes went wide and she reached for me. A cracking noise rang out and the mantel jerked forward, throwing us into the window frame. Iris slid onto the sill, her torso hanging over the edge. I dropped the list and grabbed Iris’s right wing, jerking her back in. There was another crack and the mantel twisted. Grains of wheat and barley flew everywhere, knocking us off our feet. Dad’s woodworking tools clattered onto the floor. Their sharp edges menaced us as we screamed and clung together. Another jerk. Iris and I were thrown against the outside wall again. Another body width and we would’ve fallen out the window.

  I grabbed a wall bracket, securely bolted to the wall supporting Dad’s shelves. I held onto it with my right hand and looped my left arm around Iris’s waist. We lay there for a second on the wall that was now a floor and screamed while the dust floated down. Before it had a chance to settle, the mantel flipped upright and we were back on the real floor with me still clinging to the shelf. Then the mantel jerked again and we began to slide toward the door to the hall. Another’s screaming reached me through Iris’s hysteria.

  I looked past Iris’s head and saw Gerald, bloody and bruised, sliding across the floor to the open doorway to the hall. The list fluttered past him, useless. Then my woodworking book glanced off his forehead, and his shriek went to a higher pitch. His fingernails gouged into the floor and his mouth was stretched open wider than I’d ever seen it.

  “Matilda!” he screamed.

  “Gerald!” I wanted to reach out to him, I really did, but I couldn’t let go of Iris and letting go of the shelf wasn’t an option either. We’d all fall. A sudden jerk of the mantel and I found myself dangling from the shelf with Iris’s arms tight around my neck. I looked down in time to see Gerald disappear through the doorway, still screaming my name.

  CHAPTER 2

  I lost my grip on the bracket and Iris and I landed next to the doorway Gerald had fallen through. The wall kept jumping and bumping. That’s when I realized our mantel was being carried off. Sometimes it jumped so much we’d float in the air for a second before slamming against the wall again. I looked for something to hang on to, but found nothing. Worse, the shelves I’d clung to before were now over our heads, and didn’t look secure at all. They were dangerously close to falling on top of us. Every time the mantel jerked or bounced, the shelves shook and bolts pulled a little further out of their holes.

  The mantel creaked and we bounced into the air again. The shelves groaned. The bolts were holding by a thread. Iris stopped screaming. Her mouth formed an O that kept getting larger. I didn’t know if Gerald was still screaming. I hadn’t heard him since he went through the door to the hall. The mantel did another terrific bounce, slamming my teeth together.

  “We’ve got to move,” I said. “The shelves are coming down.”

  Iris clung to me and cried, “No.”

  “We have to. We’ll get squashed.” I dragged Iris toward the door and Iris started screaming again.

  The mantel bounced and we flew into air again, landing on the door frame. I leaned over and looked down, through the two doors, across the hall into our parents’ bedroom. It took me a second, but I spotted Gerald wedged between the bed and the bureau. I couldn’t see his face, and he wasn’t moving.

  “Come on, Iris,” I said as the shelves wavered above us.

  “No,” yelled Iris. “I want Mom.”

  “Mom isn’t here. I’m in charge. Now I’ll hang onto the door frame and you climb down me,” I said.

  “I’ll fly,” said Iris.

  “There’s no room to spread your wings. Just do what I say. The shelves are going to drop.”

  I swung myself over the edge of the door frame and held on, digging my fingernails into the wood as Iris shimmied down my back. At last she let go and landed on the hallway wall, then scooted out of the way. I dropped down just as the shelves broke free and crashed into the wall above. Bits of wood and debris fell through the doorway into our parents’ bedroom, but Gerald didn’t respond.

  “I’m glad we moved,” said Iris between gulping sobs.

  “Me, too,” I said.

  The mantel stopped moving and I put my hand over Iris’s mouth to stifle her cries and tried to hear if the humans were talking. If they were, I couldn’t make out a word. The mantel lurched upward, driving us against the wall and then dropped. I held on to Iris as we flew into the air for a moment and then back down.

  “You have to stop crying, Iris. I can’t hear anything. Are they talking? What are they doing with us?” I squeezed her and took my hand off her mouth.

  “Something about crown molding and flooring,” said Iris, voice still quaking. “I think they’re walking away.”

  Iris buried her face in my neck and hugged me. I rubbed my sister’s back and looked around the dim hall that used to be tastefully decorated. A few windows in the bedrooms must’ve remained open. Slits of light came through the doors, highlighting the debris. Particles of dust hung in the air and shone multi-colored, taunting me with their beauty amid the destruction. Broken furniture, clothing, plates, and cups littered the hall. All the mushrooms we used for illumination were damaged and fading. I didn’t see my favorite, Barbara, anywhere. Then I remembered we weren’t alone.

  “Gerald,” I called out.

  “He’s awake,” said Iris. “He wants to know where we are.”

  “We’re in the hall above you.” I let go of Iris and patted her shoulders. “It’s okay. I’m going to get Gerald.”

  Iris nodded, stuck two fingers in her mouth and began sucking them like she did when she was two. I struggled to my feet on legs that felt loose and wobbly like the bones had been removed. My head swam a little when I stood up.

  “I’m coming, Gerald,” I said, not at all sure if I could get to him and afraid of what I might discover when I did.

  I walked with mincing, painful steps to the door of my parents’ bedroom and looked down. Gerald lay below me to the right, pushing at the bureau and muttering. I squatted, held onto the door frame, and swung myself down into the bedroom. I dropped, hitting the side rail of my parents’ bed and bonking my head on one of the bedposts. I was glad nobody was there to see me falling all over the place except Gerald and I didn’t care what he thought of me.

  When I straightened up, rubbing my head and cursing under my breath, the sight of Mom’s special place stopped me cold. Everything was ruined. From the delicately carved furniture my father made, to the Venetian glass mirror Mom prized. There were spots of wet where her perfume bottles had struck the wall and left their contents. The smell of Mom’s scents brought tears to my eyes. What would Mom and Dad say? I knew it couldn’t possibly be my fault. Mom didn’t even put humans on the list, but still I suspected my hearing didn’t help the situation any.

  “Matilda?” Gerald’s voice broke into my thoughts. For once, his face didn’t hold a resentful expression, only frightened and pained. Blood coated his left cheek and an angry bruise bloomed below that. His wings were crumpled and a bit frayed, but since wings healed quickly, I wasn’t too worried about them. Gerald’s arm, which hung from his shoulder at an odd angle, was a much bigger concern. I was the worst babysitter ever. It couldn’t have been any worse if I’d set him on fire.

  “Is the bureau on you?” I asked.

  “No. I think I’m just stuck between it and the bed.”

  I pushed the bed away from Gerald and it collapsed. I slipped and fell to the floor, banging my knees and ripping holes in my black tights. Gerald shifted his weight and cried out when his arm touched the bureau.

  “Don’t get up yet.” I rubbed my knees. “I have to think.”

  The woodworking book flew past my head and landed at my feet. I looked up to see Iris waving in the doorway to get my attention. “Matilda, I hear something.”

  “What? Is it Mom and Dad?” I asked.

  “No. It’s crying,” said Iris.

  Crying? Who would be crying? Everyone else had gone to the berry harvest.

  “Matilda, pull me up,” said Gerald.

  “Wait,” I said. “Can you hear it?”

  Gerald’s face screwed back into its usual expression of resentful self-righteousness. “You’re supposed to be helping me,” he said.

  “Gerald, do you hear it or not?” I stomped my foot, crushing a bit of glass into a powder.

  “It’s that baby,” he said. “Now help me up.”

  I took his left arm, the uninjured one, and hauled him to his feet. He winced at the pain in his right shoulder. “I think it might be disconnected,” he said.

  “I’ll have to pop it back in,” I said. How to fix a dislocated arm was on the list. I’d read the instructions a dozen times, but the thought of wrenching Gerald’s arm back into its socket made me nauseous.

  Gerald raised his eyebrows. “Has your magic come in yet?”

  “No, it hasn’t. But the instructions were on the list. It is good for something.”

  “No way. You won’t be able to stop the swelling. My dad will do it.”

  “Suit yourself, but it could be hours before your dad comes back. Listen again. Are you sure it’s a baby?”

  “Yes,” Gerald said in a long, bored tone.

  I strained my ears, but I still couldn’t hear a thing. “Iris, do you think it’s the baby, Ezekiel?”

  Iris’s face appeared over the edge of the door frame above us. “I think so. Why’s he crying like that? Where’s his mama?”

  I shrugged. I thought our neighbors in the other leg of the mantel had gone to the berry harvest like everyone else. The Zamoras were new neighbors and I didn’t know them well. They’d moved into the mantel after my grandmother died and I didn’t visit because I didn’t want to see Grandma Vi’s home changed. Plus, they had the new baby, Ezekiel, and didn’t get out much.

  “He’s still crying,” said Iris.

  “Mrs. Zamora will take care of him,” I said.

  “If she’s there,” said Gerald, sitting down on the floor and rubbing his arm. “Maybe she flew off and left him when all this happened.”

  “Shut up, Gerald. She’d never do that,” I said.

  “Then why’s he still crying?”

  “I don’t know. Will you let me think?”

  “Sure. It’ll be fun to watch you try,” said Gerald with a smirk.

  “He’s still crying,” called down Iris. “And he’s getting louder.”

  I threaded my way through the mess to my parents’ windows and peeked out. All I could see was cream-colored metal.

  Gerald came up beside me. “Where are we?”

  “I don’t know, but we have to get out of here now.”

  “No kidding. Your parents’ furniture just about killed me.”

  I pushed at the window, but it wouldn’t open any farther. I might be able to fit through, but Iris never would.

  “Iris, see if you can open the front door,” I said.

  I waited as Iris scurried off and returned. Her round face peered over the edge of the door. “It won’t open. It’s too heavy. I’ll try the other door.” She left and returned a few seconds later. “It’s worse than the front.”

  “We’ll have to wait until the mantel’s upright again to get out,” I said.

  “What about the baby?” asked Iris.

  “What about my arm?” asked Gerald.

  I looked around my parents’ room as if I might find some answers in the mess. My hand went automatically to my jumper pocket, but the list was gone. My first thought was to wait for some adult to come along and fix it. But even if someone did come, how would they get in? I felt Iris and Gerald watching me, waiting for me to decide what to do. And even though I couldn’t hear him, I knew Ezekiel was out there crying, also waiting. But I wasn’t completely on my own. I had Iris for ears and Gerald might prove useful if I needed to annoy someone. The decisions were all mine and I found I didn’t mind so much. It was better than asking permission.

  “All right,” I said. “Iris, I want you to come down here and help me. Just come down the way I did, and I’ll catch you.”

  Gerald snorted and would’ve said something nasty about Iris’s weight no doubt when I stepped on his foot. He yelped in pain and I held up my arms to my not-so-little sister. Iris dropped and just about flattened me. There wasn’t an ounce of breath left in my lungs and a pain cramped my neck that probably wouldn’t go away for days.