Who Needs Magic? Read Online Free Page B

constantly,waving her hands as she chatters on in enthusiastic bursts, as if this is the most exciting conversation she’s ever had in her life. It’s not really a conversation, though, so much as Ariella talking and me listening. Despite about five more pleas to “tell me everything,” Ariella Patterson is the one doing most of the telling.
    She moved here from Phoenix two years ago and lives in a house near the beach with her mother and grandmother (both of whom are f.g.s) and her dad, her little sister, Justine, and her dog, Razzle (who aren’t). In addition to collecting “things with wings” and chopsticks, she’s also got two bookshelves that are crammed with (1) fairy tales from around the world, (2) all of her picture books from when she was little, and (3) scrapbooks she’s made of every vacation she and her family have ever been on. She loves big, warm slippers and musicals, and her favorite book of all time is
The Secret Garden
. She thinks jigsaw puzzles keep the f.g. mind sharp, that having a dog helps with empathy, and that making up cookie recipes is good for practicing improvisation, which an f.g. often needs on the job. It’s like she’s been bottling up all this information for years, waiting for somebody to tell it to. I can relate to that, but it feels more like she’s been practicing for a cover story in
People
than confiding in a fellow f.g. Meanwhile, I haven’t had a chance to ask her the questions I
really
want answers to.
    “It’s so amazing that we found each other. How didyou guess? Oh, right—the boot! I didn’t know we could do small wishes for each other, did you? But why not, really?” Her spoon makes a little loop on the way to her mouth, and I know somewhere behind me an iPod battery has been recharged or a ripped shopping bag mended. “My grandma met a couple of us when she was younger and lived in France. We thought maybe they were all European. It makes sense, right? The Grimm brothers were from Germany and Hans Christian Andersen was Danish. Is your mom European? Although, according to my fairy-tale books, there are fairy godmothers all over, they’re just called different things. It would be so cool to meet one in South America or Africa, don’t you think? There must be lots more of us we don’t know about. I looked online once, but I didn’t find anything.” She stops suddenly and stares at me. “What’s wrong? You haven’t said anything. You’re not in shock, are you?” She snaps her fingers in front of my face.
    I grab her snapping hand and push it down and away. “I’m waiting for a pause so I can ‘tell you
everything
.’ ” I’m sorry the second I say it, because I no longer want to smoke her with one of my signature clouds of sarcasm, even if she was asking for it. Plus, I started it—I followed
her
, after all.
    She doesn’t seem offended, though. She smiles and scoops up the last bite of her melted strawberry-vanilla swirl. “Hey, I’m excited, right? Aren’t you? I
do
wantto hear everything.” She sets down the empty bowl and opens her handbag. “Candy stick? I have lots.” She tilts the purse toward me, displaying a dazzling bouquet of sugary sticks in every color.
    “So I see.” I grab a red-and-white peppermint one, to go with my mint chocolate chip ice cream.
    “Who was your first?” Ariella asks, immediately shifting back up to verbal warp speed. “Mine was my cousin Lucy. She had this puppy she loved. He was so cute, some kind of doodle. You know—one of those mixes, like jacka-doodle or maybe yorkadoodle. But he was a rescue and was scared of her. My powers were super-limited then, so all I could do was make Lucy smell like a steak bone. It worked, though! After that it was easy. How many have you done? I’m aiming for a hundred big wishes granted by the time I turn fifteen. February seventh. Oh!” She slaps her hand over her mouth for a second. “I’m doing it again! You go.”
    “A
hundred
? How many have you done