“So what’s the commercial for?” I asked Frida in between mouthfuls of pizza. Zoe, Emma, Frida, and I were hanging out at Jessi’s house after the game. She has this really nice screened-in back patio, so we could enjoy the breeze without fighting the bugs for our pizza. Besides, Jessi claims that her new bedroom is too small to fit all of us. She’s an only child, but that’s about to change. Her mom is pregnant and expecting Jessi’s baby brother or sister soon, so she had to give up her bedroom for the nursery.
“It’s a totally fun new app,” Frida said as she pulled her phone from the messenger bag that was slung across her shoulder. “It’s called Flash Fortune, and it predicts your future. It works like this.”
Frida held her phone up so we could all see it. A spinning disk filled with bright colors appeared on the screen, and then it stopped.
CHOOSE A COLOR flashed above it, and Frida tapped on the red portion of the disk. It started spinning again, and Frida was given the choice to pick another color. She did this five more times, and then the disk stopped, grew larger, and flashed the colors Frida had chosen in sequence, slowly at first, then faster and faster. As it did this, it said, “Fortune being calculated.”
“I’m getting dizzy,” Emma said, her eyes wide as she stared at the flashing lights on Frida’s phone.
“It’s almost done,” Frida promised. With that, the lights stopped and the screen went dark before filling with stars. A button popped up that said, Click here for your fortune.
Frida clicked, and she read out loud what it said.
“ ‘A great success awaits you.’ ” Frida squealed. “The commercial—I’m gonna get it! But I knew I would because Devin is coming with me to the audition. Here you go, Devin.” Frida handed me her phone. “Give it a try.”
I started choosing colors like Frida had done.
“Of course Devin would pick Kicks blue first!” Jessi chuckled.
“Now she’s picking white and black!” Emma shrieked. “Soccer ball colors!”
I laughed. “You guys already told me that my brain is really a soccer ball, so why are you surprised?”
I waited as my fortune was calculated, then read it out loud.
“ ‘Soon you will take a trip to a faraway place.’ ” I shook my head. “I don’t think so. My grandparents were just here for a visit. My parents said we’d go back to Connecticut to visit them, but not until next summer.”
“Hey! Maybe you’ll be going to the next Women’s World Cup. It’s in France.” Jessi gasped. “I’ll go with you!”
“That would be awesome, but that’s not exactly soon,” I replied.
Frida shrugged. “You never know, Devin. The stars move in mysterious ways.”
Uh-oh. Would this be Frida’s next obsession? I could just see her walking around with a crystal ball and giant hoop earrings like a fortune-teller, predicting all of our next moves.
“Your turn, Zoe!” Frida grabbed the phone from my hand and passed it to Zoe, who took it reluctantly.
“I don’t believe in this kind of stuff,” Zoe said.
“It’s just for fun,” Jessi said. “Come on, Zo.”
“Fine.” Zoe gave an eye roll as she started her color selection and waited for the results. “ ‘You will make a new friend,’ ” Zoe read from the screen.
“See!” Frida said. “That’s a great fortune to get.”
“Come on.” Zoe sighed. “That could apply to anybody. It’s not very specific.”
“But it’s something nice that could happen,” Emma said. “Why not think the best? Now I want a turn!”
Emma took the app very seriously. “Oh, should I choose purple or pink? Maybe I’ll choose pink first and purple second. But that could change my future!”
“Just go with your gut,” Frida told her. “Don’t overthink it.”
But Emma still took the longest out of everyone picking her colors. Finally, after what seemed like an hour, she got her fortune.
“ ‘You will learn to see things in a new way.’ ” Emma looked up with a disappointed frown on her face. “That’s not much of a fortune. And I put so much time into picking the perfect colors too.”
“What were you hoping to hear?” Zoe asked her.
Emma’s cheeks turned red. “Maybe something about the cute new boy in our history class.”
“Aha!” Jessi said triumphantly. “I knew you were crushing on him.”
Emma blushed even further. “No, I don’t even know him! He does look a lot like Brady McCoy, though.” Brady McCoy was a pop star, and Emma was his number one fan. “I was kind of hoping the fortune would say I would at least talk to him or something, to find out what he’s like.”
“You don’t need a fortune to do that,” Zoe told her. “Just go over and say hi to him one day.”
“Look who’s talking,” Emma shot back. “You are, like, one of the shyest people I know. You should get that it is not that easy to just start up a conversation with some random boy you don’t know.”
“Uh-oh, looks like making that new friend is going to be hard to pull off,” Jessi teased Zoe.
“I guess I’m stuck with you guys.” Zoe grinned at us.
“Looks that way.” I grinned back.
“Gimme, gimme!” Jessi grabbed the phone from Zoe’s hand. “I’m next, and I can’t wait to hear that I’m going to be a member of the US Women’s National Soccer team one day.”
Jessi chose her colors quickly and impatiently tapped her foot while the results were being calculated.
“ ‘Your life will soon be in chaos.’ Oh, great,” Jessi moaned. “Why didn’t I get a good one? Let me try again.”
“Nope!” Frida grabbed her phone from Jessi’s hand. “You’ll confuse the cosmos. One fortune per day at most. You’re better off doing it weekly, or even monthly.”
Jessi arched an eyebrow, showing her disbelief. “Really? There’s a science to this?”
“It goes far beyond science,” Frida pronounced dramatically.
“Anyway, how’s your mom doing?” Emma asked Jessi, changing the subject before Frida could get going.
“She’s tired all the time. She’s lying down now,” Jessi said. Her dad had given us all a ride home from the game and had ordered the pizza for us to share. Usually when we go to Jessi’s house, her mom, Mrs. Dukes, makes yummy and healthy snacks and lunches for us. But I wasn’t complaining. Jessi lived near the Brick Oven, and they had some of the best pizza in the area.
“So, are you ready for your new baby brother or sister?” I asked.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Jessi said. “I helped Emma babysit her cousins last week to get more practice, and that helped.”
“She even changed a diaper all by herself.” Emma slung an arm around Jessi’s shoulder. “I was so proud.”
“Well, it was only a number one,” Jessi said. “I’m not planning on doing those stinky number twos, that’s for sure.”
“Do you think it will be a boy or girl?” Zoe asked her.
“My dad thinks girl, and my mom thinks boy,” Jessi said. “All I know is that it will be a baby, and either way it will be crying and screaming, so what does it matter?”
Frida said, “Maybe that’s what the chaos is going to be!”
“Well, I knew that already!” Jessi laughed. “I didn’t need the Flash Fortune app to tell me that.”
“She’s got a point, Frida,” I agreed.
I knew Frida was taking the app, and all this good luck stuff, very seriously, but I didn’t have much belief in it. I wasn’t going to be taking a trip far away soon. But I guess it was all just for fun. Right?