The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell (7 page)

Their grandmother hugged both of them so tight they thought they’d pop. “Look at you two!” she said. “You both look like you’ve grown a foot since the last time I saw you!”

Their grandmother was a petite woman with long, graying brown hair that was pulled back in a tight braid. She had the warmest smile and the kindest eyes in the world, which wrinkled pleasantly when she smiled, just like the twins’ dad’s eyes had. She was cheerful and energetic, and exactly what the twins needed.

She always wore bright dresses and her signature shoes with white laces and brown heels. She was never more than a few feet away from her large, green travel bag and blue purse. And although their grandfather had died many years before, she always wore her wedding ring.

“We had no idea you were coming!” Conner said.

“It wouldn’t be a surprise if you knew I was coming,” Grandma said.

“What are you doing here, Grandma?” Alex asked.

“Your mom called and asked me to stay with you while she went to work,” Grandma told them. “I couldn’t let you spend your birthday alone, could I? Thank goodness I was in the country!”

Their grandmother was retired and spent most of the
year traveling around the world with other retired friends. They traveled to mostly third-world countries and read to sick children in hospitals and taught other children of the communities to read and write.

“Come help me with the groceries,” Grandma told the twins. She opened her trunk, and the twins began unloading bags and bags filled with food into the house. It was enough food to last them for weeks.

Mrs. Bailey was sitting at the kitchen table going through another stack of mail with bright red warning labels on them. She quickly pushed them to the side when the twins and their grandmother paraded into the kitchen with the groceries.

“What’s all this?” Mrs. Bailey asked.

“Hello, dear!” Grandma said to her. “I’m planning on cooking the twins a huge birthday dinner and wasn’t sure what you had in the house, so I went to the store and picked up a couple things.”

Their grandmother always had a talent for sugarcoating the truth.

“You didn’t have to go to all this trouble,” Mrs. Bailey said, shaking her head, unprepared for the kind gesture.

“It wasn’t any trouble at all,” Grandma said with a small but reassuring smile. “Alex, Conner, how about you go get your birthday presents from the front seat of my car, and I’ll catch up with your mom for a second? But don’t open them until tonight!”

They happily did as she asked.
Presents
was a word that had been absent from their vocabulary for a long time.

“See, I told you!” Alex said to Conner on their way to their grandmother’s car. “Optimism always pays off!”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah…” Conner said.

Half a dozen wrapped presents with bright bows, each marked to one of them, were waiting in the front seat of the car.

The twins returned inside with their gifts. Their grandmother and mother were still having a conversation that they most likely weren’t supposed to hear.

“Things are still tough,” Mrs. Bailey said. “Even after selling the bookstore, the house foreclosed, and we still have some debt and things unpaid from the funeral. But we’re making it somehow. In a few more months we’ll be back on our feet.”

Grandma took Mrs. Bailey’s hands into her own.

“If you need anything, dear, and I mean anything, you know where to find me,” she said.

“You’ve already helped so much,” Mrs. Bailey told her. “I don’t know where we’d be now if it weren’t for you. I could never ask you for anything else.”

“You’re not asking, I’m offering,” Grandma assured.

The twins knew if they eavesdropped any longer, they’d be caught, so they walked back into the kitchen with their presents.

“Well, I have to go back to work,” Mrs. Bailey said, and kissed both of the twins on the tops of their heads. “Have a
great night, you guys! I’ll see you tomorrow. Save some celebration for me!” She gathered her things and mouthed a meaningful
thank you
to their grandmother on her way out.

Grandma put her things away in the guest bedroom and returned to the kitchen, where she found the stack of bills Mrs. Bailey had put aside. She plopped the mail into her own purse with a smile. And that was that. Grandma loved helping people, especially if it was against their will.

“Let’s get started on dinner, shall we?” Grandma said, clapping her hands.

Alex and Conner sat at the table and visited with their grandmother while she cooked up a storm. She told them all about her recent trips, the difficulties she and her friends experienced getting into and out of places, and all the interesting people she had met along the way.

“I’ve never met a person I didn’t learn something from!” Grandma said. “Even the most monotonous people will surprise you. Remember that.”

She was cooking so many different things, it was impossible to tell which ingredient was going where. Everything she did was so fast, and she used almost every pan and dish they had. With every second that passed, the twins’ stomachs growled louder and louder, and their mouths salivated more and more.

Finally, after a few hours of aroma-teasing torture, they ate. Alex and Conner had become so accustomed to frozen dinners and takeout, they had forgotten how good food could taste.

There were plates of mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese, oven-roasted chicken with carrots and peas, and freshly baked rolls. Their kitchen table looked like the cover of a cookbook.

Just when they thought they couldn’t possibly eat any more, their grandmother pulled a huge birthday cake out of the oven. The twins were amazed; they hadn’t even realized she had been baking one. She sang “Happy Birthday,” and the twins blew out the candles.

“Now, open your presents!” Grandma said. “I’ve been collecting for you all year!”

They opened their boxes and were flooded with knickknacks from all the countries their grandmother had been to.

Alex was given copies of her favorite books in other languages:
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
in French,
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
in German, and
Little Women
in Dutch. Conner got a pile of candies and tacky T-shirts that said things like “My crazy Grandma traveled to India and all I got was this lousy T-shirt.”

They both received several figurines of famous structures, like the Eiffel Tower and the Leaning Tower of Pisa and the Taj Mahal.

“It’s crazy to think that places like this actually exist in the world,” Alex said, holding an Eiffel Tower in her hand.

“You would be amazed to know what’s out there just waiting to be discovered,” their grandma said with a smile and a twinkle in her eye.

A day with very low expectations had turned into one of the best birthdays they’d ever had.

As the night grew later, the visit with their grandmother began to come to a bittersweet end. Since their dad had died, they never saw their grandmother for more than a day at a time, and there were always a few months between each visit. She was always so busy with her travels.

“When do you leave?” Alex asked her grandmother.

“Tomorrow,” she said. “As soon as I take you to school.”

The twins’ postures sank a bit.

“What’s the matter?” asked their grandmother, sensing their spirits sink.

“We just wish you could stay longer, Grandma. That’s all,” Conner said.

“We really miss you when you’re gone,” Alex added. “Things are so gloomy here without Dad, but you make everything seem like it’s going to be okay.”

Their grandmother’s constant smile faded slightly, and her gaze drifted off toward the window. She stared blankly into the night sky and took a deep breath.

“Oh, kiddos, if I could spend every day with you, I would,” Grandma said longingly, perhaps more disheartened than she intended to show. “But sometimes life hands us certain responsibilities—not because we want them, but because we were meant to have them—and it’s our duty to see to them. All I can ever think about is how much I miss you two and your dad when I’m away.”

It was hard for Alex and Conner to understand. Did she not want to travel as much as she did?

Their grandmother looked back at them; her eyes were bright with a new idea.

“I almost forgot. I have one more gift for you!” Grandma said, and jumped up and skipped into the next room.

She returned carrying a large, old book with a dark emerald cover titled
The Land of Stories
in gold writing. Alex and Conner knew what the book was as soon as they saw it. If their childhood could be symbolized by an object, it was this book.

“It’s your old storybook!” Alex proclaimed. “I haven’t seen that in years!”

Their grandmother nodded. “It’s very old and has been with our family for a long time,” Grandma told them. “I take it with me everywhere I go and read it to the children in other countries. But now I want you two to have it.”

The twins were shocked by the gesture.

“What?” Conner asked. “We can’t take your book, Grandma. That’s
The Land of Stories
. It’s
your
book. It’s always been so important to you.”

Their grandmother opened the book and flipped through the pages. The entire room filled with its musty-paper aroma.

“That’s very true,” said Grandma. “This book and I have spent a lot of time together over the years, but the best times were when I read it to you. So I’d like to pass it down
to you now. I don’t need it anymore; I have all the stories memorized anyway.”

She handed it to them. Alex hesitated but finally accepted the book from her grandmother. It didn’t feel right to take it. It was like receiving an heirloom from a relative who was still alive.

“Whenever you’re feeling down, on the days you miss your dad the most or when you just wish I were here, all you have to do is open it up and we’ll all be together in spirit, reading along,” Grandma told them. “Now, it’s getting late, and you have school tomorrow. Let’s get ready for bed.”

They did as she asked. Even though they were too old for it, their grandmother insisted on tucking them into their beds like old times.

Alex took
The Land of Stories
with her to bed that night. She gently flipped through the old pages, being careful not to tear them.

Seeing all the colorful illustrations of the places and characters again made her feel like she was reading an old scrapbook of sorts. She loved spending time reading about fairy-tale characters more than anything. They had always felt so real and accessible to her. They were the best friends she had ever had.

“I wish we got to choose which world we lived in,” Alex said, running her fingers over the illustrations. They were so inviting.

In her hands was a world unlike the one she lived in. It
was a world unaltered by political corruption or technology, a world where good things came to good people, and a world she wanted to be a part of with all her being.

Alex imagined what it would be like to be a character in her own fairy tale: the forests she’d run through, the castles she’d live in, and the creatures she’d befriend.

Eventually, Alex’s eyelids began to feel heavy. She closed
The Land of Stories
, placed it on her nightstand, clicked off her lamp, and began to drift off to sleep. She was just about to fade into unconsciousness when she heard a funny noise.

A low humming sound filled her room.

“What in the world?” Alex said to herself, and opened her eyes to see what it was. She saw nothing. “That’s strange,” she said.

She closed her eyes once more and began to drift back to sleep. The humming noise began to buzz through the room again.

Alex sat up and looked around her room and finally found what was making the noise. It was coming from inside
The Land of Stories
on her nightstand and, to her amazement, the pages were unmistakably glowing.

A
lex had been acting strange all week. Conner had noticed right away, because she wasn’t as talkative and upbeat as she usually was. Instead, she was very quiet and looked like she was in a deep state of confusion.