The Life and Crimes of Bernetta Wallflower Read online

  “Look at your card,” Bernetta told him as she shuffled.

  He looked.

  “And show it to your friends. Okay, now put it back in the deck.”

  When the card had been returned to the stack, Bernetta handed the entire deck to Patrick. “You can shuffle it as many times as you want,” she told him.

  Now came the tricky part. Bernetta had practiced, of course. But dazzling your little brother while he sat on the couch picking the lint from between his toes suddenly seemed a lot easier than performing in front of a tableful of strangers at a dinner club.

  She stood up a little straighter and composed herself. “All right,” she told Gabe. “I need you to hold my hand.” And then she realized what she’d just said. To a boy. Why, oh, why hadn’t she picked the table with the senior citizens?

  But Gabe didn’t even flinch. He stuck his arm straight out and smiled at her.

  Bernetta gulped. Why was he smiling at her? Boys never smiled at her.

  “Um, okay, thanks,” she said. She grabbed hold of his hand then and squeezed tight, ignoring the snickers around her. “Okay. I need you to concentrate on your card. Think about the card you picked, and I’ll be able to figure out which one it is, telepathically.” She recited the words as though it were someone else saying them, Bernetta the Great, perhaps, instead of plain old frizzy-haired Bernetta Wallflower. “You have to hold on as tight as you can,” she said, “or the telepathic link becomes fuzzy.”

  Gabe looked directly at her as she spoke, without blinking at all, and Bernetta did her best not to lose focus. His eyes were a very lovely shade of brown, she noticed. Not blah brown like most people’s, but deeper. Like chocolate. Hershey bar chocolate, maybe.

  Next to her, Patrick lost his grip on the cards. Three spilled out onto the table, and Bernetta lost her concentration for a split second. Patrick tucked the cards back into the deck. “Can I stop shuffling now?” he asked.

  Bernetta shook her head no and tried to focus again. She had a trick to perform. And magic was all about presentation. So she squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and took in a deep breath of air. Then she opened her eyes slowly—right one first, then the left—and turned to Patrick.

  “You can stop now,” she told him. Then she let go of Gabe’s hand, although she could still feel its weight in her own. “I have telepathically assessed which card you selected,” she announced, taking back the deck.

  The whole table watched as she riffled through the deck, and Bernetta could feel the tension as they waited. She hesitated over a few cards before finally pulling out the six of diamonds. She smiled triumphantly. “Was this your card?” she asked Gabe.

  He shook his head and frowned. He looked disappointed. “Well, not exactly, but—”

  Patrick laughed. “You kidding? It’s not even close.” He began to make an airplane out of his napkin. “That was lame,” he said.

  “Wait,” Bernetta said frantically, her forehead wrinkling as she searched the deck again. “I swear that’s never happened before.” She pulled out another card. “Here. Here it is. I found it. King of spades.”

  Patrick rolled his eyes. “Uh, no,” he said. “Not it either.”

  Bernetta showed them yet another card. “This one?” she asked.

  Patrick tossed his napkin at her. “Go away!” he shouted. “Your trick stinks!”

  “But I—”

  Gabe shrugged his shoulders. “It’s okay,” he said. “Really.” He handed her back the rubber ball. “You can try it again if you want.”

  “Maybe magic’s just not your thing,” Patrick added with a smirk. “Nice dress, though.”

  As she slipped the cards back into the box, Bernetta gave a hefty sigh. “I should probably get ready for the big show anyway,” she said. She looked back into Gabe’s chocolate brown eyes then. “Do you know what time it is?”

  “Yeah,” Gabe said, lifting his arm to inspect his watch. “It’s—hey!”

  “What?” Patrick said. “What’s wrong?”

  “My watch! It’s gone!”

  “What do you mean, gone?” Bernetta asked. “Are you sure you—” She stopped as she lifted her wrist above the table. “Well, what’s this? This definitely isn’t mine.”

  “That’s my watch!” Gabe cried.

  Mouths dropped open as Bernetta displayed the watch that was strapped securely to her wrist.

  “How did you—” the boys began. “But how could—”

  Bernetta merely shrugged as she handed back the watch. Then she leaned in close to Gabe. “I think,” she told him, almost in a whisper, “that you just might find a jack of diamonds hidden inside one of those bread rolls.” She pointed to the basket. “That was your card, wasn’t it?”

  And as the boys dove into the breadbasket to find the card, Bernetta spun around on her heel.

  A dazzling presentation indeed, she thought.

  2

  SUSPENSION: an illusion in which a person or object appears to float without any visible support

  Bernetta’s father was standing directly behind her, his arms folded across his chest.

  “Um,” Bernetta began. She was suddenly feeling just a smidgen less dazzling. “Hey.”

  Her father tilted his head to a sharp angle. “Didn’t I ground you for all eternity?” he asked.

  Bernetta thought about that. “No,” she said after a moment. “Mom grounded me for all eternity. You grounded me until my tonsils grew back and decided to pay their own medical bills. And I think I feel them coming in.”

  The corners of her father’s mouth twitched into an almost smile, but he didn’t seem to be giving in without a fight. “Is that so?” he said seriously. “Say ‘ah.’”

  Bernetta opened her mouth as wide as she could, and her father took a good look.

  “One of them’s come back,” he told her, and then he cleared his throat. “But I’m pretty sure the other one will take the whole rest of the summer.”

  Bernetta closed her mouth and heaved a hefty sigh. “But I’m innocent, Dad. I swear I am. I had nothing to do with that cheating ring. I’ve told you that so many times I’ve lost count.”

  Fifty-seven. That was how many times Bernetta had proclaimed her innocence. Fifty-seven times in two days. Bernetta never forgot a number. Maybe fifty-eight would do it. “I didn’t do anything wrong, Dad. Don’t you believe me?”

  Bernetta’s father tugged at his bow tie. “Oh, Bernie. I . . .” He trailed off, and his eyes had that frown in them that had been there since yesterday. Bernetta hated seeing those sad eyes when usually they sparkled like fireworks. It made her despise Ashley Johansson even more.

  “I can’t give up the club,” Bernetta said softly. “I love it here.”

  He smiled at that and tugged lightly on the long frizz of orange-blond hair that she tied back into a braid every morning, in an attempt to bring some sort of order to the tangles. “All right,” he said at last. “You can help me out tonight. Since you’re all dressed up and everything. Just for tonight, though, got it? After that we’ll need to discuss it with your mother.”

  Bernetta gave him an all-around hug. “Thank you!”

  “Come on, then,” he said with a laugh. “We have people to mystify.”

  As they climbed the steps, lights dimming around them, the audience began to hush in anticipation for the big show, and Bernetta’s father leaned in close and whispered in her ear, “That was some trick you pulled off back there, Bernie. I’m impressed.”

  Even in the dark Bernetta could see that sparkle in his eye.

  For the first time in a very miserable two days, things were beginning to look up.

  All through the first act of her father’s show, Bernetta was so excited, she could hardly stay focused. Not that being a magician’s assistant took a whole lot of concentration. Mostly it was timing, being in the right place
at the right moment, and standing onstage in a sparkly pink dress. A good distraction is what she really was. But now that her dad knew what she could do, maybe he’d insist she have more responsibility, let her do her own tricks. Maybe he’d even start paying her.

  As she handed her father the empty birdcage and he produced a tiny yellow canary to thunderous applause, Bernetta couldn’t help thinking about Ashley Johansson. Had it really been Ashley who framed her? Her best friend in the world? Bernetta knew it had to have been Ashley; no one else could have done it. But still, Bernetta was clinging to the hope that Ashley was somehow just as innocent as she was.

  It was a very tiny piece of hope.

  Maybe, Bernetta thought as she crouched inside the trunk with the breakaway bottom, maybe Ashley wasn’t to blame for any of it and was still her true-blue best friend. Bernetta hadn’t been able to talk to Ashley since being called into the principal’s office halfway through her life science final yesterday afternoon, but she still had hope that once she did talk to Ashley, things would be all cleared up.

  An itty-bitty fraction of a particle of hope.

  Bernetta remained stock-still, mind churning, as her father demonstrated to the audience that the trunk truly was empty.

  Still, Bernetta thought, it was hard to ignore all those times Ashley hadn’t been the best friend in the world. What about when Bernetta had accidentally whacked herself in the face with a tennis racket during PE and Ashley had snickered along with everyone else? And what about the time Ashley told Bernetta she was a moron for not knowing who the Paisley Skunks were? Not to mention the day that—

  A roar of laughter from the audience snapped Bernetta back to her senses.

  In front of the trunk, her father was pacing with heavy steps. “Well, I do hope I haven’t lost my lovely assistant for good!” he said. The audience laughed again. “Let’s try that one more time, shall we?”

  Bernetta had missed her cue! She bit her bottom lip as her father pointed his wand into the trunk and tapped its edge with three staccato raps.

  She leaped out of the trunk, arms spread wide. The stage lights danced off her sequined dress as the audience erupted into applause. Her father grinned too. “I told you all she wasn’t lost forever!” he announced. But when he turned around, he shot her a puzzled glance.

  Bernetta blinked twice, hoping he’d understand she was sorry.

  Keep your mind on the show, she told herself as they headed for her father’s last illusion.

  From the audience, Herbert Wallflower’s grand finale was always an impressive bit of magic. From backstage, though, it was really more of a team effort, a clock with dozens of cogs and gears that all had to work together at the right time to pull off the show-stopping effect.

  The lights went up on the stage, revealing a large golden birdcage set against a black curtain backdrop. Herbert Wallflower led his daughter over to the birdcage, where a member of the audience would come to padlock her inside and check that it was tightly sealed. A thick gold chain was lowered from the ceiling and attached to the top of the birdcage, and then the cage, with Bernetta inside it, was hoisted up into the air, while dramatic music swelled all around them.

  What the audience didn’t know was that the birdcage was nothing more than a dozen flimsy pieces of gold-painted wood. While Bernetta appeared to be standing in a dangling trap, holding on to the bars for dear life, she was really supported by a sturdy platform that extended well beyond the black curtain behind her and functioned as a sort of elevator, rising as the birdcage did. When Bernetta’s father pointed his wand at the cage and announced that he would turn his lovely assistant into a bird, there was an incredible puff of smoke, and Bernetta would shriek in mock terror and hit a button that released the pieces of the makeshift birdcage onto the stage floor below in a broken heap. At the same time, the platform would shift and whisk Bernetta back behind the black curtain. By the time the smoke had cleared, the platform, and Bernetta, had disappeared from view. When the audience looked back at her father, they would see that he was holding in his hand a small, delicate birdcage with a real live canary inside. Her father would set the bird free, and it would fly above the heads of the diners for a few moments, until it finally settled on the shoulder of one audience member in the back. A closer inspection—and a spotlight—would reveal that this person was none other than Bernetta herself, safely returned from the beyond.

  But as Bernetta stood in the cage waiting for some mother of three from the audience to padlock her inside, she couldn’t keep her brain from going back to the day before, when she’d been called into the principal’s office. They’d been so sure that she’d set up that cheating ring. So sure. They hadn’t even listened when she’d told them she’d been framed. They wouldn’t even let her go back to her life science exam! They’d just dismissed her from the office and sent her home with a preliminary suspension—and the possibility of a permanent expulsion.

  They wouldn’t really expel her, would they? She hadn’t even done anything! And her mom worked at the school as Mount Olive’s resident psychologist. That had to count for something, right?

  Right?

  Bernetta had gone to Mount Olive since she was in kindergarten. All the Wallflower children had. They’d even been given full scholarships to attend—kindergarten through twelfth grade—because of their mother’s job. So where would Bernetta go if they expelled her? What would she do? How could she possibly—

  There was a sudden puff of smoke.

  Bernetta gasped in horror as she realized that she hadn’t been paying attention at all, and with that gasp she took in a lungful of smoke. Then, instead of shrieking as she was supposed to, she began to cough. Bernetta clutched her chest and hacked, watching as the smoke dissipated from around her, frantically trying to locate the button with her other hand. But she had only the blink of an eye, and before she knew it, that blink was over. The smoke cleared, and the birdcage was still whole. And Bernetta was still inside it, coughing.

  She looked out into the audience with wide eyes, her hand on her chest. Then she turned to her father, and he was, as planned, holding a tiny yellow canary. She had never seen him look quite so bewildered.

  He turned to the audience. “Well, I—” he said.

  But he never had a chance to continue. Because at that moment another cough lunged its way out of Bernetta’s chest, and as she reached her hand up to cover her mouth, her elbow hit the button, and the cage clattered to the floor in a dozen pieces. And Bernetta, forgetting in her panic that the platform would be slipping out from underneath her, lost her balance and fell eight feet to the stage, landing on her side with a terrifying clunk.

  3

  FALSE DEAL n: an effect whereby a magician appears to deal the top card in a deck, when in fact a card has been dealt from somewhere else entirely

  “Ashley,” Bernetta hissed into the receiver. She pressed a bag of frozen peas against her throbbing ankle and tried to keep her voice low. The last thing she needed was for her parents to hear her from downstairs and know she’d sneaked into Elsa’s room to use the phone. The smart part of her brain was telling her to hang up so she wouldn’t run the risk of getting into even more trouble. But she’d finally gotten Ashley on the phone, and she couldn’t let her go now. “Ashley Johansson!”

  Bernetta could almost hear Ashley yawn on the other end of the line. “Hey, Bernetta. What’s up?” she asked casually.

  “What’s up?” Bernetta repeated. “What’s UP? I’ll tell you what’s—I can’t even—how could you—” Bernetta felt like a fish, flopping around in the air, its mouth gaping open and closed. “You framed me,” was what she meant to say. “You set me up. You got me suspended, possibly even expelled. You made me so upset that I screwed up my dad’s best trick and wound up in the emergency room wearing sequins.” Bernetta had so many angry words inside her, it was as if they were fighting to see which one could get out first, but
somehow all she managed to say was: “You’re my best friend, Ashley.”

  “Aw, that’s sweet, Bernetta. Thanks.”

  “No!” Bernetta hollered, then lowered her voice quickly. “That’s not what I—You were my best friend. At least I thought you were. But then you—you framed me.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You know what I’m talking about. You knew my locker combination. You asked me that one time, and I didn’t even think about it. I just gave it to you. I’m such an idiot.”

  Here’s where Ashley would deny it all. Here’s where she’d say, “Seriously, that wasn’t me. You are my best friend, Bernetta, and you know I’d never do anything like that to you.”

  Instead, what Ashley said was: “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re not that big an idiot.”

  Bernetta’s mouth fell open. It actually fell open, like in the cartoons, when the dog’s mouth unfurls like a carpet and drops to the ground.

  “You would have done the exact same thing to me,” Ashley continued, “if you’d thought of it first. I made a lot of money on that locker scam.”

  “I would not have done that. You’re my friend, Ashley. I thought you were my best friend.”

  “Well then,” Ashley said, and her voice was cold, “I guess you really are an idiot.” And she hung up the phone, before Bernetta could even have the satisfaction of doing it first.

  Bernetta slammed down the phone and pressed the bag of peas hard into her foot to stop the pain. Then she flopped back onto her sister’s bed, her long, frizzy braid draped down the side. What was she going to do now?