As time passed, Sasha grew used to the way adults at school furrowed their eyebrows and other kids pulled faces when Toddy refused to speak. It was highly unlikely that Toddy’s teacher, Mrs. Flint, knew anything about magic, so it was no surprise Toddy wouldn’t talk to her.
Toddy would often slip out of his own classroom when no one was looking and tiptoe into Sasha’s. He loved the big windows there, the colorful posters on the walls, and the scrubby turtle in the tank next to the sink.
It would take only moments for Mrs. Flint to come wheezing into Sasha’s classroom, her hand pressed over her heart, trying to catch her breath. She’d lift her finger and point at Toddy with narrowed, beady eyes.
“I know you understand what I’m saying, young man,” she’d say. “You get outta that seat now and get back to your own classroom.”
Toddy would turn to Sasha and grasp her hand, folding his fingers in hers. Sasha would squeeze Toddy’s hand back and glare at Mrs. Flint.
“Toddy doesn’t want to go with you. He needs a smarter teacher.”
Mrs. Flint was not the kind of woman who liked being talked back to. Her own children, though they were full-grown adults, never attempted that death-defying deed. The other teachers let her have her own way. And even Mr. Rottenhammer, the school principal, avoided Mrs. Flint at all costs.
“That boy don’t speak, you little troublemaker. Don’t you go making up stories. Know what that makes you? A liar. Nobody likes liars. Nobody. Know what liars deserve? A walloping on their behind. If I could do it, I would.”
But Sasha was the one person at that school who never seemed to have her feathers ruffled by Mrs. Flint. Nobody knew exactly how Sasha stayed so calm, despite Mrs. Flint’s thunderstorm face, but she did. The general consensus was that Sasha was too stupid to know that Mrs. Flint was angry at her.
“Making up stories doesn’t make me a liar,” Sasha always said, still holding tight to her brother. She thought of Mr. Ticklefar and his wild tales and how happy they made everyone at the Cirque. “It makes me a storyteller.”
“How dare you speak to me that way?” Mrs. Flint’s voice always rose louder and higher with every word she spoke. Her cheeks would turn pink, then red, then nearly purple, and her chest would plump out as though she were hiding a goose under her shirt. “Like you’re better than what you are . . . one of those sparkly freaks. I’ve a mind to call your mother and have her pick you both up, only she never takes anything I say to heart. Pompous! That’s what you all are.” Before Mrs. Flint could grasp Toddy at the elbow with her red nails and drag him kicking and screaming away, Sasha always pressed a gentle kiss to his cheek.
“I’ll see you after school,” she’d promise.
Sasha would squint at Mrs. Flint’s retreating form. Why couldn’t the woman see that Toddy was full of magic? He was special. And Sasha, as everyone on this side of the island liked to remind her, was nothing.