Chapter 3.
Going from Cinderella at the ball to Rapunzel in the tower was no fun. But what choice did I have? I couldn't put my plan to be crowned cool in motion until school started. Needless to say, I didn't practice my witchcraft like my mother told me to—just because she told me to and expected me to be happy about it. Of course, like all unfair things, my stubbornness came back to bite me two days into my new life as the Rapunzel of Salem.
For some reason, my new school (Agatha's Day School for witches, of all the silly names) wasn't impressed with my 4.0 GPA, my cheerleading, or my active after-school schedule. They, it seemed, wanted to test me.
"Why do I need to be tested? Didn't they get my transcripts? How different is this school from Beverly Hills High?"
"All new students have to be tested. It's a very exclusive private school, Prudence. I had to pull strings to get you admitted." Mom seemed to think I should thank her for that. "Besides, last I looked at the course catalog, Beverly Hills High had absolutely no magic on the curriculum."
Mom was very calm, probably being "sympathetic" to my moving pains again. Which only made me want to scream. Her parents should have named her Pain in the ass instead of Patience. Which she probably knew, since she deliberately waited to tell me about the scheduled testing until it was time to go. No time to find the equivalent of a magic SAT prep course.
"Well, that's great. You and Dad have convinced me I shouldn't use my magic and now I have to learn how to do it in school? There goes my straight-A, honor-roll status."
Mom actually looked conflicted. But then she shrugged. I hate it when she shrugs. It never means anything good.
'We'll see how you do in the testing before we start tuning up the harps, shall we?"
The look on her face dialed my worry meter up to over-load. It said, maybe I wasn't going to do so well on this test. Me. The girl who had aced every test since preschool. You'd think it would have occurred to me that a magic school would have magic on the curriculum. Duh.
I repeated faintly, "We'll see how—"
"Prudence. I don't know if she meant it as my name, or as a caution for my behavior, because as she spoke, Mom touched my shoulder and we were no longer in the kitchen. I blinked and swallowed to clear my ears, which felt like I'd just hit high altitude onboard a jet plane. Somehow we'd landed in a small, white-walled room that smelled like frosted-over fireplace ashes. There was a white desk that could have been carved from a glacier. It had a faint mist rising from it. Behind the desk there was a very old, fragile-looking, white-haired woman wearing a white robe with about a million folds in it—a bit like what you'd picture an angel might wear if it came to earth to visit.
The lady in the white robe didn't look like an angel, though. She was so wrinkled, it was hard to tell, but I don't think she'd ever been beautiful, even back in the stone ages, when she was young. And even the most ethically challenged nip-and-tucker in Hollywood would have run screaming from her sagging skin.
"Right on time. Good." The woman unrolled a parchment scroll and dipped a white-feather-tipped pen in a well of white ink with a hand that was as wrinkled as her face.
"Name?"
Mom nudged me. "Prudence Stewart." The place didn't look like any testing center I'd ever seen. Where were the desks? The test booklets? The clocks that ticked away the time as slowly as the seconds just before the school bell rang? There was only the old lady, who, for all I knew, was Methuselah's mother—and she didn't look like she'd been happy since Methuselah was born. "Age?"
"Sixteen."
She frowned at me, but her words were meant for Mom. "You waited until she sixteen, did you? This can't be good. And she's a mixed blood. I can't approve what you've done. I don't wonder that it has led to problems."
Great. She was not only unhappy, she mega-prejudiced. Mom had warned me, but I hadn't believed her. In this day and age I thought that people who still hung on to outdated prejudices would at least keep them to themselves.
But, no, apparently witch world wasn't as advanced as Beverly Hills, where your blood didn't matter as long as your wallet was well-stocked with credit cards. Although Mom says that's a prejudice of another color—mainly green, I guess.
"My daughter has a lot of raw talent. But she hasn't been schooled—"
"Neglected her, don't try to sugarcoat it. Do you think I was born yesterday?" She cackled at that, which made her sound as if she hadn't been born but had hatched out of molten earth at the beginning of time. "Lucky you didn't have worse happen than the boy playing a few harmless pranks."
"I—"
"Adolescence is a dangerous time for witches. I shouldn't have to tell you that." This time she did look at Mom with a glance that suggested my normally uberperfect mother had gum stuck to the bottom of her shoe. "All the trouble you got up to in your youth."
It felt a little weird to see Mom treated like she was about six years old. Not to mention hearing the witch stuff discussed out loud. Most of the time we talked about it in whispers, if we talked about it at all—and never outside the family.
I didn't always think my mom was right, but still, I didn't like anyone else saying so. The old lady thought my mom neglected me because she didn't teach me a few spells? What's the big deal, anyway? So I'm a witch. I have powers. I'm still just a regular person. I'm not just mortal.
Methuselah's mom turned to her frown back on me and searched my face like she was looking for zits that were about to pop out—or had heard what I was thinking, which I had a feeling would be a truly terrible thing. She leaned forward. "What's your Talent?" Her words were as sharp as icicles.
You know the expression "tongue-tied"? Well, I was. The old lady's glare said, "Answer wrong and you'll be sorry." And I didn't have a clue what she was even asking, never mind what the right answer was.
"She hasn't manifested one." Mom Interrupted nervously, drawing the crank's attention once again.
I wanted to sigh with relief. Until I realized that she knew what the old lady was talking about. And she hadn't mentioned it to me. The anger that started boiling up in me evaporated with one thought: Was I . . . no. She would have said. I would have known.
Wouldn't I?
"Hasn't . . . ? At sixteen?" The mist rising from the desk got thicker, almost as if the desk were melting under the heat of the old lady's displeasure.
"I can zap things from here to there. Make some things appear. What other powers are there?" Did she want to know if I could disappear? And should I tell her I could—when I was really, really, scared? Like when I was six and a pit bull jumped over the fence and ran after me? Somehow I didn't think that would impress her.
Methuselah's mom frowned—at Mom, not me. "Please, Patience, Don't waste my time. Put her in mortal school." She waved her hand, and in the blink of an eye and a pop of my eardrums, we were home. The New England sage and taupe Mom had decorated our new living room in seemed almost dark after the white glare of the testing room.
My Knees were shaking a little, but I tried to block out the thought that there was something wrong with me by thinking of the positives of failing my test before I'd even started it. "So I have to go to mortal school?"
Mortal school would mean I could still use my powers Covertly to "help" Maintain my Reputation, just as I had done at home. I'd still have to make friends and find a way to get on the squad. But since I was allowed to use my powers here—
Mom chewed on her bottom lip like it was a sour starburst. "Of course Not! You're going to Agatha's Day School for Witches, East Branch. I just forgot How touchy Agatha can be." She smiled at me with all confidence in the world—misplaced, in my opinion. "Let's try for lucky number two."
And before I could object, we were back in front of Methuselah's mom, also known as Agatha. No doubt the same Agatha whose name was on the school. Lucky me.
Me: Whatever U do Don't let ur dad break the custody agreement if ur mom ever wants to move u 2 another school! Testing makes u feel like ur 5 again.
MADDIE: But U R so smart!
ME: Not here
MADDIE: No way!
ME: Way!
MADDIE: XXOOOXOXOXOXXOO. . . gtg Coach is giving me the stink eye.
I felt a pang of disappointment as I snapped my cell phone shut. I'd hope for some real lament time with Maddie. But the only thing shorter then her were Cheezie's skirts.
The time difference really blew. It was after dinner for me, and I was back in my turret tower doing the Rapunzel pining. Not that Maddie was a prince, but she was my best friend. My best friend whose day ran three hours earlier than mine, putting her smack in the middle of post-school cheerleading practice and unavailable to lament with me. She had promised to set her alarm early enough to wake up and wish me luck on my first day school, at least. If I had a first day of school.
Even worse than the time-delay friendship was the distraction that had pulled her away from listening to me whine: cheerleading. No such distraction for me.
I had dared to ask Agatha if the school had a cheerleading (it does, thank the stars, or I don't know how I'd lock in my cool). But, as a new student, I'd still have to wait for regular tryouts after the school year had begun. I hadn't had to do that since I made the middle school team in sixth grade. So it made for a little change in my plans to take Agatha's by storm, natch. Luckily, I can think on my feet.
I suppose it was best that Maddie hadn't been able to text too long. I might have slipped and complained about being a stranger in witch land. Then Mom would have had to go wipe Maddie's memory again, which would not have made Mom happy. Not that I'm very happy with her, either, after our frostfully delightful session with Methuselah's mom. I would rather have had an anesthesia-free booty lift by the Butcher of Beverly Hills than have had to suffer through the frostbite that came from letting myself be "tested" by Agatha.
Mom had seemed perfectly calm, though, when we popped back in to face the old woman. In the same voice she used to stop Dad from blowing a gasket when witchcraft got out of hand in our house, she said to Agatha, "Test her before you make any decisions, please. After all, we did make the appointment."
Agatha might have said no. I was certainly hoping she would.
But Mom was firm and convincing, unfortunately, when she added, "She has had powers since she was just a baby, Agatha, but I've discouraged her from using them, so no doubt she's a little behind."
"A little?" Agatha apparently had lived long enough that she'd worn out any sense of obligation to be polite. "She has a mortal father. She may not even be a true witch."
"She is a true witch, Just a bit . . . Untrained. I'm sure she'll manifest her Talent soon, with the right education. An education I'm certain that only your day school can provide. I have done my research, you know. I found Agatha's East far superior to Delilah's South. I would hate to have to send Prudence there."
Mom sounded unnaturally obsequious. I wouldn't have been surprised to see her bow and scrape, like the people in medieval times had to do. Not that Mom was that old, but Grandmama was, and she sometimes liked to remember the traditions of "the good old days."
"Is that so?" Agatha's narrow eyes got even narrower as she focused them on me. "Catch."
She didn't even twitch a finger and a baseball zoomed toward me, right at my nose. I reached up and caught it. Other girls paid thousands to have a nose like the one I was born with. I wasn't going to risk letting this bitter old hag break it.
"With her hands?" She sounded outraged. And when a bit of spit flew out of her mouth and landed on her desk, a plume of steam flared up with a hiss.
Mom, meek as any good Puritan lass, said, "It wasn't practical to teach her magic in the mortal world."
"Practical. You? A witch who married a mortal and brought up not one but two children without proper education? Sounds like you haven't grown any more sensible than you were at her age." Agatha scorn was even more impressive than my old principal's when he talked to the kids who graffitied "Beverly Hills Tight Ass" on his office door. I have to admit I was glad I wasn't her target.
Mom opened her mouth to protest, although I didn't know what her defense to what was, after all, the bald and the ugly truth, was going to be. Because just then Agatha waved a regal, if skeletally thin, hand. "Leave us."
Mom disappeared before she could even let out a squeak.
"Parents. They always insist their child needs extra help. Do you need help, girl?
That was easy. "No." it didn't matter if it was true, I knew instinctively it was the only acceptable answer. I counted silently to ten, hoping Mom would pop back in and rescue me from this crazy woman. At twelve, it became clear she wasn't going to.
"Good. Maybe you do have more sense than your mother did in her youth."
I tried to wrap my mind around the fact that this lady had known my mom when she was my age. But before I could, she demanded, "Pull a rabbit from your hat."
"What hat?"
The old bat just made a mark on her scroll and said, "Can you materialize anything?"
I tried to visualize a hat. I tried hard, because one thing I've learned is that if you aren't completely clued in to the subject, sometimes attitude and a confident air can get you extra points. And, clearly, I needed all the extra points I could get. After about ten seconds, a Red Sox baseball cap appeared and hovered in the air in front of me.
"Are you a Sox fan?" She actually sounded friendly for a moment.
"My dad is. He's from Boston originally."
"Mortal fools." Okay. Not so friendly. "Pull a rabbit out of the hat, then, child."
I reached into the hat and tried not to look surprised when I felt something squirming under my fingertips. I pulled out a rabbit. Or what was meant to be a rabbit. It turned out to be a hamster. Not my fault, I swear. I had more experience with my brother's hamsters. The last rabbit I'd seen was the one who went to bed in Goodnight Moon.
Agatha didn't seem happy with my explanation, even though I'd smiled my best head-cheerleader smile—the one I'd been practicing all summer and was never going to get to use. Another mark on the scroll, and I was already get tired of the testing. It's never a good sign when you get tired of testing at the beginning.
She looked at me with cold blue eyes. "Do you need extra help?"
"No. I'm fine." I would have said no if she'd sent two hungry lions at me. She had that effect on everyone, I suspected.
"Good." And we were off again.
All I can say is that the test is exhausting. When things weren't flying at my face, orders were flying out of Agatha's mouth. She wasn't just the meanest witch I'd ever met, she was also the headmistress of a school that wanted students who could fly, materialize huge objects with the lift of a finger, and play and orchestra of instruments with just a few lifts of the eyebrows and a twitch of the nose. I, needless to say, was definitely not one of those students. Although I'm proud to say that smile did not slip once, not even when the violin bow squeaked across the strings and tangled in my hair.
Somewhere during the hell that was my entrance exam to Agatha's Day School for Witches, she let slip she had been born during the days of Genghis Khan. And she was the one in charge of running a school for young witches. Not a surprise at all—if you were looking to turn out heart-less dictators and megalomaniacs.
Somewhere in between not flying and drawing ungodly sounds from a clarinet and a flute without touching them, I realized witch school was going to be even less fun that I'd thought it would be. Agatha assured me, with a sadistic smile, that the only way to remain on the cheerleading squad—if I made it—Would be to maintain passing grades in all my classes.
For the first time since I'd joined my preschool class with a lunch box and a drive to be potty trained, I would have tried to fail a test—if I knew what I was being tested on. As it was, I just hoped I'd last long enough to see the end of Agatha and frozen wasteland of a testing room.