Who Needs Magic? Read Online Free

because I promised Nancy, I have to join the five-mile-long Nutri-Fizzy Bar line, which winds past the surf shop, the organic chocolate boutique, Brennan’s bookstore
and
the custom-designed kids’ furniture emporium. I should’ve brought a book. I could run inside Brennan’s and get one. I think Gina’s working today, so I could use her manager’s discount. But then I’d end up even farther back in the Nutri-Fizzy line.
    “Nutso-Fizzy” is more like it. I don’t get what the thrilling appeal is of combining carbonated water with disgusting flavored powder mixes. But I’ve stopped being surprised by the weird behavior of the bleached-brained locals in this part of the country. I only hope I don’t suffer the same mental sun damage. I should’ve brought a book and a
hat
.
    A few days go by as I inch forward in line. Why did I even come out here in the first place? I already know what Tinker Bell is—a bossy, irritating, angel-collecting brat—and
nothing else
. I was looking at the wrong boot back at the store, that’s all. There was another pair, unsliced, and I got the two pairs mixed up. This is obviously the explanation, because it’s too much of a coincidence for my suspicions to be right. And whoever heard of an f.g. who actually looks the part? Look at me. Look at
Dad
. Maybe I can tell Nancy that they ran out of the fizzy part of the Fizzy. I’ll wait until the current fountain song (something about seagulls and star beams) is over, and if I’m not any closer, I’ll leave. Through the spouts of waltzing water, I can see a group of kids dancing on the mini-lawn on the other side of the fountain. A little girl trips on the sash from her dress, which has come untied, and it rips off. She grabs the sash off the ground and presses it onto the dress, as if it might repair itself. Her eyes go wide in pre-tantrum warm-up as she presses harder and harder without success.
    I reach down toward my boot to unzip the chopsticksleeve—just as the little girl’s eyes go even wider with delight when the sash
does
repair itself. The girl smiles, pleased, not at all surprised by this tiny miracle, and she goes back to dancing. None of her friends are fazed either, but then, magic is nothing special if you’re young enough to still believe it’s a part of daily life. I, however, feel my breath catch, and then I glimpse a slash of a pink skirt disappear behind a vendor cart selling Crocs accessories. I dart out of the Fizzy Bar line, making the thousands behind me thrilled to move up a micro-inch, and race after her. Now that I’ve seen her, I’m able to keep her in my sight, despite the gaggles of camera-snapping tourist couples, app-playing boys and stroller-pushing nannies that get in my way. Tinker Bell holds a green candy stick now, and she points it this way and that as she strides along. Around her, falling sunglasses make slow-motion soft landings, pacifiers are restored—clean—to babies’ mouths before their mommies see, and melting ice cream cones re-freeze mid-drip. Small wishes granted all around, and they happen so fast, I’ve only just spotted the last before she does the next. There’s no effort either. No sense that she’s concentrating, willing her energy through the candy stick. To anyone passing by, it looks like she’s licking the candy and then pausing briefly and then licking again. No one would ever suspect her.
    Except another f.g.
    Tink interrupts her wish-granting marathon to check the time on the big clock that hangs over Taylor & Taylor’sfor Men. She holds the lime stick in her mouth, pressed against the inside of her cheek like a lollipop, and reaches into her pink vinyl purse to lift out her phone (pink, of course). She glances at the cell’s screen and then takes a seat on an empty bench nearby. Behind her, a spray-tanned male model seems to stare down from an ad for sunglasses that’s posted on one of the stand-alone pillars that line the mall’s weaving walkway.