Bras & Broomsticks (27 page)

Yes! We have not been outed. Shows how psychic I am. “Sorry, Mom. I’ll try to remember to call.” Tammy must have been surprised. We’ve barely spoken since I had to cancel our after-school get-together. We’re not ignoring each other—we say hello and good-bye—but we’ve been sitting with other people in class.

Mom crouches down to wipe up the spilled ash, then wags her finger at me. “No, you
will
call, or you won’t be in the show.”

I swallow hard. Too much is riding on the show to not be allowed to be in it now. “If you bought me a cell phone, then you’d be able to call me.”

“There is no reason for a fourteen-year-old to have a cell phone. But if you want one so badly, save up.”

“There is a reason, if you don’t know where I am,” I say, and slip off my coat. “I bet Dad would buy me one.”

She turns around and marches into the kitchen. “So ask him. Let’s talk about something else.”

“Maybe I will,” I say, following her.

She gives the bubbling pot on the stove a stir. “Miri mentioned that you’re taking her to the peace rally this Saturday. That’s nice of you. Can you pass me the olive oil?”

Peace rally? Oh, right. I lift myself onto the white counter so I can reach into the cupboard. I hand my mom the bottle. Then I stay seated where I am and swing my feet. I forgot about my sister’s bargain.

And to think Miri was giving me grief about ditching her today, when I already generously agreed to take her to this peace rally. Outside. In the cold. That’s a pretty sisterly thing to do. Unless I happen to have fashion show practice at that time. Uh-oh. “What time am I going to this peace rally with Miri?” I ask, slightly panicked.

My mom shrugs. “Sometime in the afternoon. I’m going to the office while you’re there. We’re swamped with summer honeymoon planning. I’m sorry I’ve been at work so late, but the good news is, we’ve done some great business. Did I tell you I was nominated as one of
New York Magazine
’s best travel agents?”

“That’s cool, Mom,” I say, a little distracted. Saturday morning is rehearsal for the freshman dance, the one Melissa is choreographing. And Saturday evening is the all-girl rehearsal. Which means no problem for the peace rally, but no possible time for a date with Raf. I’m hoping he’ll be at Mick’s on Friday. Apparently Mick’s parents are going out of town. Again. And I should see plenty of Raf in the next three weeks, since we have dance rehearsals scheduled every day after school and every lunch period. As well as Saturdays and Sundays. There’s no way I’ll be able to go to Long Island in two weeks. Miri’s going to freak.

Next week we have our designer fittings! I am so excited for my Izzy Simpson dress! And to get my hair and makeup done at Bella Salon in Soho. I guess they’re hoping all JFK’s wannabe girls will book them for prom. The JFK administration lets us take a half day to prepare for the show. I’ve never had my makeup done. Maybe I won’t wash my face before Spring Fling. Speaking of which, what am I wearing to Spring Fling? And how am I going to pay for it? I can’t ask my mother to buy me something when she doesn’t know I’m going. Maybe I can borrow the Izzy Simpson dress. I can’t wait to wear it onstage in front of the entire school!

“Hello? Rachel?” my mother asks while stirring the pasta. “I seemed to have lost you over there. Everything okay?”

“What?”

She reaches for the strainer and then carries the pot to the sink. “Excited for the big day?”

Am I ever. My fifteen minutes of fame. “I think it’ll be a lot of fun. You’re coming, right?” I forgot to ask her if she wants any extra tickets. Everyone in the show gets six reserved seats right up front. I promised three to my dad (although I’m hoping STB and Prissy will be history by then), and there will be one for my mom, one for Miri, and I guess one for Tammy if we ever make up.

My mom drops the strainer, and the pasta spills all over the sink. “Am I coming? To your father’s wedding? No, honey, I think I’ll sit that one out.” She picks up the noodles. Her fingers are shaking.

My cheeks feel hot, and it’s not from the stove. “I thought you meant the fashion show.”

She presses her fists against her stomach and laughs. Her eyes squint into slivers. “Oh, of course I’m coming to your show. How much are tickets?”

“Ten bucks apiece,” I say, staring at my hands. They’re my dad’s hands. Long fingers, barely-there cuticles, fat thumbs. “All money goes to the senior prom. But you’re guaranteed good seats.”

Weird how she won’t be at the wedding. If there is a wedding, I mean. How do you live with a man for fifteen years, have his children, and then not be invited to the most important day in his life? The second most important day, if you count the day he married you.

“We’ll be there,” my mom says, shoulders relaxed now that we’re no longer talking about the wedding. I’m not dying to discuss it with her either, but if my ex-husband were getting married, I would want to know all the gory details.

Unless the gory details hurt.

I remember when my dad broke the news. It was a Friday night in August. Jewel and I had spent the afternoon in Central Park, working on our tans for the fast-approaching first day of high school (the same tan that I later accidentally exfoliated off with the Dead Sea mud mask). Miri and I took the six o’clock train to Port Washington, and when they picked us up, we went straight to Al Dente, a fancy Italian restaurant.

I didn’t notice the rock until halfway through my Caesar salad. STB (we christened her later that night) was wearing a glittering diamond the size of an apple. I nearly choked on an anchovy. I’m not a fan of them on a good day.

I stared in horror. “Is that . . . ?”

My dad squeezed STB’s bare shoulder (she was wearing a white silk strapless top with her black pants) and announced, “Jennifer and I have decided to get married.”

I almost barfed the croutons across the linen tablecloth.

Miri’s eyes filled with tears. My father assumed they were tears of happiness and said, “Look how excited the girls are!” And then his glass of red wine spilled all over STB’s top, which thankfully killed the Hallmark moment for them.

Hmm. In retrospect, the wine mishap must have been Miri’s subconscious at work, since no one touched his glass. My dad blamed the table’s uneven legs. Way to go, Miri!

When we arrived home on Sunday, we found my mother washing her weekend dishes. As Miri opened her mouth, I tried telepathically to tell her, “Don’t say anything! Don’t tell!” but it didn’t work. She said, “Daddy’s getting married,” and the happy-to-see-us expression vanished from Mom’s face. Her cheeks puffed up as if she were blowing a bubble, and she put down the plate she was holding and slowly crumpled onto the kitchen floor. The water in the sink continued running.

“I’m sorry,” Miri whispered, shocked at the effect of her words. Then my sister started to cry. I didn’t know if it was because of the pain she felt or the pain she had just caused. And then I started to cry. I sat down next to my mom and buried my head in her lap.

I felt her fingers running through my hair. I didn’t want to look up, didn’t want to know if she was crying too. I couldn’t bear it. How could he do that? How could he leave us and marry someone else? How could she let that happen?

Then my sister sat down on the floor and told me that everything would be okay. And the two of them braided my hair until I felt calm.

Except for mentioning a few mandatory details (“Sorry, Mom, I won’t be spending that weekend with you. It’s the you-know-what”), I wasn’t planning on ever talking about the wedding.

“Can you get two plates down?” she asks now.

Another wedding conversation safely avoided. Now all we have to do is avoid the wedding.

I spend the entire next day at school trying to come up with Plan C. When I get home, after an exhausting day of classes and both lunch and after-school fashion show rehearsals, my mom is reading a romance novel and Miri is grunting and counting in Korean behind her closed door.
“Hana!”
Grunt.
“Tul!”
Grunt.
“Set—”

I burst in to find her barefoot and snap kicking at her reflection in the mirror. “We have less than three weeks left.” I’m panicked. Practically hyperventilating. “Why are you wasting time with anything besides the plan?”

“I have other responsibilities, besides the wedding,” she says. “Like Tae Kwon Do? Schoolwork?
Net!
” She snap kicks and grunts one last time before sitting down at her desk. “Don’t you?”

Who has time for responsibilities during a crisis like this? Although now that I think about it, I have a math midterm on Wednesday. And I’m supposed to finish
Huckleberry Finn
for next Wednesday. Which shouldn’t be a problem, because I can normally read a book in a week. I’ll start with fifty pages tonight. And I have a French midterm next Thursday and . . . Stop! Must keep my priorities straight! “What are we going to do?”

“We’ve run out of options,” Miri says. And that’s when I notice what I never, ever thought I’d see in a billion years. “What is that?” I shriek.

“What?”

“That!” I point to her fingers, which are wrapped in Band-Aids. Willingly. “Have you lost your mind?”

She turns bright red and looks down at her notebook. “I don’t want to ruin my nail beds.”

I
know
that’s not the only reason. Too bad she took the truth-spell antidote and is no longer being honest. “Are you getting soft on me? On her? We have not run out of options. Magic is unlimited!”

“Well, I don’t know what else to do,” she says, blinking her long eyelashes repeatedly.

That’s because she’s not even trying. Where is A
²
? I spot it beside her bed, on the floor underneath a sleeping Tigger. On the floor! Is this how you treat an authentic spell book? I tilt it sideways so that the fur ball slides off, and I heave it onto her desk. “Look at the book. It’s right in front of you.” Must think. Wait a sec . . . right in front of you. My heart rate speeds up. “We’re missing the obvious.”

She flips open the book. “What’s the obvious?”

“We need him to stop loving her.”

“We already tried that,” she says slowly, as if I’m in preschool and she’s teaching me the alphabet. “Everything we do makes him like her more.”

“Not everything,” I say, suddenly giddy and light-headed, as if I’m floating in a sea of helium. “What if he falls in love with someone else?”

Miri flicks through the pages. “With whom? He doesn’t know anyone else.”

“Yes, he does.” I raise my eyebrows, and give her my best
hello?
look.

“Our mother?” Miri says, finally understanding.

“Yes, our mother. We make him fall in love with Mom.” We’re both silent, savoring the sweetness of the possibility like melting chocolate ice cream in our mouths.

After a few moments, she looks up at me, excitement creeping into her cheeks. “I . . . but . . . emotion spells aren’t permanent,” she says, her voice creaking. “Especially love spells.”

“It doesn’t matter,” I whisper. “By then, the wedding will be canceled.”

Miri shakes her head slowly. “What about Mom? She’ll be hurt all over again.”

“Don’t you see? It won’t wear off. If he fell in love with her once, he can do it again. He just needs a shove in the right direction. A push to help him realize that he made the biggest mistake in his life by leaving. This is perfect! Not only will we be saving Dad from marrying STB, we’ll be getting him back with Mom. We’ll be killing two birds with one stone.”

“Dad and Mom back together,” Miri says wistfully.

“She’s still in love with him,” I say. My heart is thumping fast and hard, as if I just ran up a hundred flights of stairs.

Miri nods. “I know. She still has that sweatshirt. You know the ratty gray one? The one he—”

“The sweatshirt,” I say. “Perfect! We can use that for the spell! Let’s go get it.”

“She’s reading,” Miri says, jumping from her chair and pacing the room. “Here’s what we’re going to do. I’ll distract her when she’s making dinner. I’ll ask her about the witch trials. She loves talking about that. Do you know that we can trace our roots to Salem? Isn’t that cool? Mom says we still have relatives there, and I can’t wait to meet them. I didn’t even know we had family in Massachusetts. I asked her if that’s where Aunt Sasha lives, but she still wouldn’t talk about—”