10

Looking back now, I suppose I should have stopped, cooled off, and thought things through. But like Paula-Jean said, I was impulsive by nature. And I was angry. And hurt. And I had a little green book of magic spells just itching to be used. Put it all together and it was a pretty lethal combination. So, to tell you the truth, things could have ended up a whole lot worse than they did.

I dropped my backpack in the hall, ran up to my room, threw myself on my bed, and bawled into my pillow until I was practically dehydrated. I don’t know if I was angrier at Hollis or Paula-Jean. Tough to say. All I know is that I felt like the world was a grey, moth-eaten blanket that had just flopped on top of my head.

I was so consumed with anger and hurt that I didn’t even think about the book until Cyrus came prancing into my room carrying, of all things, the slightly chewed, very goobery dwarf winterberry euonymus branch. He placed it at my feet like it was some kind of mystic message. I bolted up straight in my bed. An evil grin lit my tear-stained face. Oh, I was going to get even with Hollis for stealing my best friend and making my life miserable, all right. I was going to make her pay.

I swiped the remaining tears from my eyes and sprang from my bed. I stomped past Cyrus and rummaged through my sock drawer, locating my little book in the spot where I’d hidden it. I stared at the cover for a few seconds delighting in the idea of how much power I was holding in my all too eager hands. Then I gently turned the pages, one by one, until I found exactly what I was looking for.

Binding Hex

By the light of the waxing moon, hold a piece of cord. Tie seven knots and pull them tight while chanting three times:

Shut the mouth,

Seal the eyes,

Clasp the limbs,

Tie the ties

Block the ears,

Twist the toe,

Hold the heart,

Bind my foe.

No longer canst thou cause me harm,

By notion, word or deed,

Until thought, word or deed with kindness be done,

With knots, I shall bind thee.

That night, I lay in bed counting the minutes until midnight. The witching hour had worked for me so far, so I figured, why mess with a good thing? Luckily, the moon was once again on my side — it was waxing its little way into the night sky.

I’d pulled a lace off my old running shoe and was twisting it round and round my finger under my covers. At the stroke of midnight I began the curse, making sure to tie each knot carefully and chant the words as best I could remember them. When I was done, I held the lace up to my face. A sliver of moonlight snuck through the blinds setting all seven knots aglow.

“There. That ought to do it.” I stifled a giggle. “Hollis Van Horn, consider yourself officially hexed!”

Cyrus nudged open my bedroom door. He lumbered his old, overweight body toward me, but before he lay down beside my bed, he poked my shoulder with his wet snout. He let out a low gurgle. I don’t know if it was my guilty conscience, but it really sounded like he was telling me off.

“But she deserves it, Cyrus,” I whined. “She went too far. She stole Paula-Jean from me. Paula-Jean!”

Cyrus grunted, and then instead of sinking to his usual spot beside me, he turned and waddled back out of my room. I imagined him shaking his little head, tsk, tsk, tsk, as he left.

“Dumb dog,” I hissed. I flipped over and yanked the covers over my head. Hollis Van Horn brought this on herself, I rationalized. She totally asked for it.

I must have slept soundly, because the next thing I knew, it was morning. I rubbed my eyes and stretched, swung my legs around the side of the bed, and sat up. I yawned deeply. I ruffled through my sheets and covers, but for some strange reason I couldn’t locate my knotted shoelace. I pulled the covers completely off my bed and shook them violently. Nothing.

Huh, I thought. That’s weird. Maybe it was the fact that I’d slept soundly for the first time in several days, but I felt refreshed, almost lighthearted. It didn’t seem to matter that I’d lost my shoelace. I shrugged, figuring it would turn up. And no biggie if it didn’t.

That morning, I totally expected Paula-Jean to be waiting for me at the corner. When I saw that she wasn’t there, I dragged my feet, walking as slowly as I possibly could while still maintaining forward motion. I figured she must be late and since I didn’t want to be caught actually standing around waiting for her, I went super slow, even stopping several times to scrutinize an anthill, reorganize my backpack, and fix the ponytail restraining my frizzy mop. When I reached the corner, I looked up and down the street. No Paula-Jean. Refusing to believe she’d gone on without me — an utterly absurd idea — I decided she must be sick or something. I actually began to worry about her — poor thing, must have pneumonia or worse — so imagine my shock when I stepped into the schoolyard and saw Paula-Jean not only standing there, but hanging around with the gargoyles! I was so focused on Paula-Jean and her complete and absolute betrayal that I failed to notice that Hollis was nowhere to be found. I glared at Paula-Jean as I clumped past her, and though I’m sure she must have seen me out of the corner of her eye, she didn’t even have the decency to look at me and give me the satisfaction of allowing my scowl to bother her. What nerve!

It was only when Mrs. Martin was calling out attendance that I noticed for the first time that Hollis’s seat was empty.

“Has anyone seen Hollis this morning?” asked Mrs. Martin.

I almost laughed out loud when her friends all chimed in.

“Nope,” said Tiffany.

“Not me,” said Tenisha.

“I think she’s sick,” said Cheyenne.

Okay. I know this sounds cruel, but I was happy about it. I really was. I’d cursed Hollis and here she was away from school, sick. A plethora of vile images flitted through my brain, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t relishing every single one. I imagined Hollis sneezing and coughing — her nose as purple and swollen as a rutabaga. Then I pictured her itching and aching, crying out in desperate agony. Maybe her beautiful blond hair had turned granny-grey. Or maybe her pretty little feet had gone all warty and hobbit-like. Or maybe she was covered in green blotches or crusty scabs. I let my imagination run maliciously wild.

I felt so great that I hardly even minded when I had to move to sit beside Jason Jenkins to work on our health project. I almost thanked him when he handed me the thousand-page textbook titled The History and Health Hazards of the Tobacco Industry From the 1500s to the Present Day that he wanted me to read for research. It was like I was a pink balloon, floating high in the air, and nothing could drag me down.

Nothing, that is, except Paula-Jean. She sure popped my balloon and sent me plummeting back to reality when Mrs. Walker offered her the opportunity to join another group and she went and picked Tenisha Brown instead of me! Tenisha of all people! Tenisha was Hollis’s best friend! I gritted my teeth and counted to seven thousand. I wouldn’t let Paula-Jean get to me. No way. I was going to enjoy my Hollis-free day even if it was the last thing I did.

That afternoon was Fall Fun Day. There were tons of great events like Catch the Cucumber, Dodging Doughnuts, and Chuck the Chicken. My favourite events, of course, were the races. I was the fastest girl in my grade, so I was always guaranteed a ribbon or two.

It bothered me that I was on my own and that Paula-Jean was suddenly all BFF with Tenisha and Tiffany and Cheyenne, but when it came to the races, it didn’t matter. I was going to clean house.

I stood at the starting line of the hundred-metre. The sky was a perfect shade of powder-blue. Though the air was crisp, the afternoon sunshine gave an illusion of warmth. I took a deep breath and the musky scent of fall leaves and damp earth filled my nostrils.

“Runners, take your mark,” announced Mrs. Walker, who was marshalling the races. “Get set. GO!” She fired a fake pistol into the air and before the sound had time to travel from the gun to my ears, I was halfway across the field, my little legs scurrying toward the finish line like my feet were on fire.

Then it happened.

All of a sudden, I felt myself going down. My feet stuck together like they were caught in a net. My hands flew forward to brace myself for the fall. I hit the ground hard and skidded to a halt, my hands and cheek sliding across the grass and dirt. I looked up just as the other girls flew past me and when the last one was gone, my feet broke apart as though someone had just cut the invisible wire attaching them.

Though I was devastated at not winning the ribbon, I tried to make light of the incident, chalking it up to a weird cramping of the foot or perhaps some obstacle in my path. But when the exact same thing happened during the two-hundred-metre and the four-hundred-metre, I decided that something was definitely wrong.

I gave up on racing and tried catching the cucumber, but my fingers seized up at the last second and the darn vegetable smacked me on the shin. Next I lined up to chuck the rubber chicken. Feeling fairly confident, I wound up for the throw, but somehow the chicken slipped through my fingers, flying backward out of my grasp, and striking the principal, Mr. Liew, right in the face. Everyone burst into fits of laughter. Everyone except Mr. Liew and me, that is. I couldn’t control my own body and it was starting to make me a bit nervous.

Aside from the fact that I didn’t get one single ribbon, I was also suddenly the laughingstock of the whole school. When Paula-Jean passed me to pick up a rubber chicken, I wondered whether she would make some kind of snide comment, but she didn’t. Without so much as a sideways glance, she just chucked her chicken at the bucket. I purposely stepped right in her path while she was heading to the back of the line and caught her eye for a fraction of a second before she sidestepped me. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but I thought I saw something resembling regret there — or was it pity? Either way, I opened my mouth to say something to her, but my tongue twisted up and all that came out was, “Blah.”

Paula-Jean kept walking as though she hadn’t heard.