Chapter 3: Saturday

When I woke up on Saturday and found the blue necklace around my neck, I freaked out and not because I swear I took it off before bed, which had been happening for a couple nights now. I freaked because it was 10 o'clock and Emily would be here any minute now to pick me up.

Even though Emily and I were distancing ourselves, we still kept our tradition of going a couple towns over to the Amherst library every Saturday. Emily lived closest to it so she usually had her dad drive us. Our town library was less than one minute away from my house but Amherst was such a magical town, at least that's what Emily and I thought.

Emily and I were fairy-tale geeks when we were younger. We would look for mermaids at our town's lake and we'd leave cake out for fairies on a full moon. One of our favorite books, The Spiderwick Chronicles took place in Amherst and we used to be convinced that the authors wrote about it because they had had a magical encounter. Now we realized it was because they each lived there. Oops.

I grabbed an aeropostal shirt and a Target sweatshirt to cover it. Lana had convinced me to shop at aero. I spent my birthday money there for my school wardrobe. Of course, Emily told me I was changing myself for Lana whenever I wore the clothes but I liked them! I figured it was just an excuse for her to nag on my friendship with Lana. I sighed as I saw the familiar convertible pull up in my driveway and grabbed my library card. I'd solve this friendship thing later, somehow.

"I want to meet you girls outside the library by 2:30. Allright?" Emil's dad got out of his car after he parked across from the library.

"Yup." We responded in unison and laughed. These were the days.

"Ok. I'll be down the street if you need me."

Emily and I ran across the street and into the library. This is another reason I never asked my parents to bring us here. They'd follow us inside like hounds and make us hold hands as we crossed the street. My parents were very overprotective while Emily's were most trusting and at ease.

Once inside the library we went up a staircase into a room flooded with light. There was a table in the center and a few book cases near the various windows holding art books. Emily and I never saw people up here, which was why it was our spot.

I closed the door while Em reached behind a bookcase in the corner. Emily came to the Amherst Library a lot more often than I did. If she had a good book for me, she'd leave it behind the bookcase.

She took her usual seat at the table and had two books from behind the bookshelf. She placed one on the table, a Spanish "find the picture" book. I sat in my seat next to her and we laughed at the words and worked our way through it. Eventually we got stuck on a page and started talking instead of searching.

"I've been having weird dreams lately. They're all similar."

Emily looked up from the book and sat back.

"What about, this time?" Her mocha eyes stared back at me, unsurprised. I always told her about my dreams.

My hands started playing with my necklace, finding comfort in the blue pearls. "So, my aunt gave me this necklace the other day and that night I had a dream these fairies gave it to me. I woke up and my necklace was on. Every night since, I've had dreams like this only really short." I laughed nervously. "The fairies keep telling me I'm one of them. Plus, I have wings. It's all so realistic and they've been driving me crazy. I haven't had a good night's sleep in forever."

Emily just stared at me and then burst out laughing. "You looked so serious! It's a dream, Immie. It's probably your conscience trying to distract you from school!"

"Ok." I laughed along with her, somewhat forced.

"Talking about fairies, here's the book I was talking about earlier. It was really good. I think you'll like it." She handed me the library's book, Fairy Dust and the Quest for the Egg. Four fairies, including a familiar one-Tinkerbell, were on the cover. I noticed the book was published by Disney so I didn't exactly feel overly giddy about reading it but the title stirred something in my mind and I got a little headache. I tore my eyes away and looked at the picture book.

"What's wrong?" Emily asked.

I pointed at the center of the picture book.

"I found the picture we were looking for."

An hour of roaming the library and taking out Fairy Dust later, we met Emily's dad at the entrance to the library.

"Are you girls' hungry?? We could get some pizza."

"Yes!" Emily shouted.

"Please!" I added. He chuckled and we crossed the street to where we parked. He got some money out of the glove compartment and then we walked to the pizza place. Obviously, the people of Amherst didn't feel like pizza today because the room was barren besides the man at the counter.

"What would you like today?" The man said in a thick polish accent.

"Can I have a slice of cheese and lemonade Snapple?" The man nodded at Emily and took a slice of cheese and stuck it in the oven.

"And you?"

"I'd like a slice of pepperoni and lemonade Snapple too, please." Emily nod I clinked our Snapples together and stuck the straws inside. We talked and laughed together, two good friends in a pizza palace together.