The Tiara on the Terrace (24 page)

Grace turned to me with a wince. If Trista were safe, she'd have been with us—or at least watching.

“He'd be pleased as punch, if his twin is anything to go by,” Elise chimed in as the outdoor screens filled with the towering animatronic figure of Willard Ridley atop the float, sporting a root beer mug in one hand and waving with the other. He looked a little
too
jolly, like my Grandpa Young after a night of playing cards at the VFW.

As our float rolled to a stop in front of the first set of bleachers, the Court began their ‘wiping the window' waves to the crowd. Grace nudged me, and I pulled my lips back into the best smile I could manage. I squinted as I waved, scanning the crowd ahead for Trista.

“Now, the engineers say anyone can drive this float. It's that easy,” Mr. Diaz exclaimed.

“So we've pulled someone from the crowd to launch this beauty in style,” Ms. Hoffman asked. “And
style
is the key word here. Please welcome the most stylish lady of them all, our own special adviser to the Queen and her Court, Ms. Lauren Sparrow!”

The Court hooted and hollered behind us as Ms. Sparrow's face splashed across the screens. The engineer standing near Mr. Diaz handed her the remote control.

Grace and I traded a look. My stomach heaved. Lauren Sparrow was last person who should have the honor of launching Trista's brilliant invention.

“Now, given what I've heard about some of the driving around the Festival lately, we were worried about handing this task off,” Mr. Diaz joked. The crowd murmured and looked horrified by his tasteless joke. “But you seem to be doing a great job, Lauren.”

Ms. Sparrow grinned bashfully. Her eyes were redder and puffier than I'd ever seen them. Allergy medicine was no match for the pollen of five jillion fresh flowers, clearly.

The marching band in front of us burst into “Under the Sea” and my heart leaped to my throat. Our float rolled into action again. The Court stood at attention.

“The Royal Court, Ladies and Gentleman!” Mr. Diaz exclaimed when we reached the main grandstand. The audience roared. The band blasted. We all waved. I tried to spot my family in the stands but couldn't find them among the endless blur of pink and brown faces in the stands. Danica, Denise, Grace, and I picked up the giant palm leaves on the float and turned to fan the Court with them, pretending to be their real servants. Their royal eyes glistened with tears as they waved, faces tilted to the crowd in amazement.

“Serving the Court this year are royal pages, Danica and Denise Delgado, and Luna Vista's town heroes, Sophie Young, Grace Yang, and Trista Bottoms,” Mr. Diaz continued. “The Winter Sun would not be shining today if it
weren't for the work of these girls and Luna Vista's finest. Let's hear it for them!”

The crowd applauded, but a murmur rippled through the bleachers as people lifted their heads, looking for Trista.

I shot Grace a helpless look.
Wave,
she mouthed as she dropped her palm leaf and did just that, her elbow hinging back and forth like a pendulum as her hand swept daintily through the air. No sooner did our marching band finish their version of “Under the Sea” than the speakers ahead of us squealed with feedback. The crowd cringed and reached for their ears.

“Uh-oh, there seems to be some technical trouble with the music on the Luna Vista Root Beer float,” Mr. Diaz's voice floated through our earpieces. “Can you do something about it with that whosie-whatsit, Lauren?” The camera zoomed in on her as she shrugged. Grace flashed me a puzzled look.

“What's that?” Ms. Hoffman cupped her ear. “You're in the clear, Lauren,” she joked. “The engineer tells me the music can't be operated from the remote control.”

“But who's going to stop that racket?” Mr. Diaz asked.

The crowd groaned as the ad jingles stuttered from the float in deafening bursts. When feedback shrieked a second time, and the halting spurts of music restarted, it hit me.
The music was blaring in a pattern. I waited for a pause, then counted. Four blasts, three blasts.
Silence.
Three blasts, four blasts.
Silence.
Then, again: four blasts, three blasts.

It was a Polybius code.

I didn't have to decipher it to know it spelled disaster.

M
y fake smile fell. I counted the blasts again as the music erupted once more into the same, clear halting pattern. There was no doubt about it. It was an SOS
.

“She's in there!” I screamed to Grace. “Trista's inside the Root Beer float!”

Grace's face twisted in shock, then she whirled toward the small TV monitor in front of us. Lauren Sparrow's image filled the tiny screen as she gripped the remote control and waved it at the camera playfully.

“Better keep your eyes on the road, Lauren!” Mr. Diaz yukked it up. “You've got a whole marching band ahead of you.”

I squinted down the sloping hill of the parade route. The paved road curved gently to the left at the bottom, not far
from the jagged cliffs jutting above the ocean. Panic bolted through me as I realized what Lauren Sparrow might have in store.

“The bluffs!” I shrieked. “The floats have to turn before the bluffs, Grace! What if . . .” I pictured the Root Beer float rolling straight past the turn, plowing through the dusty lookout point, and tumbling right over the cliff's edge.

Grace grimaced. “I know!” she shouted back as The Royal Court shot us nasty looks between their waving and smiling. The crowd beamed and cheered cluelessly as a skywriter dotted the perfect blue sky above them with a
HAPPY WINTER SUN FESTIVAL!
greeting.

Lauren Sparrow couldn't be that crazy. Could she?

I looked toward the bluffs again. They looked red in the noon sun. Crazy or not, we couldn't risk it. I whirled around to Grace and reached out my hand, palm down. “On three. Ready?” She nodded and slapped hers on top of mine. “Break!” I shouted. We flung up our arms and dashed to opposite sides of the float, dodging Danica and Denise as they stared at us in horror.

I grabbed one of the dolphin's fins and leaned over the side of the float. The asphalt below rolled by in a blur. We weren't moving fast. Just a few miles an hour. But the cut of my dress made it impossible to jump.

The float rocked, and I turned to see Grace leap over the side, her dress billowing behind her like a parachute. I glanced back at the announcer's booth and my heart stopped.

Lauren Sparrow was gone.

Mr. Diaz and Ms. Hoffman were grinning, flipping through their notes to comment on the next entry.

Did she still have the remote?

I wasn't about to wait to find out. I leaned over, hiked up my dress, and stuffed its ends into my pantyhose, Grace-style. At least I wasn't wearing Wonder Woman
underwear. The top folds of the dress bloused back around me like a puffy miniskirt, thankfully. I sucked in a deep breath, then sprang off the float through one of the ocean “waves” of white flowers, bending my knees to cushion the short drop.

Then, I ran. I ran past Neptune's silvery trident pointing ahead. I ran past the marching band, the saxophone players looking at me out of the corner of their eyes as their cheeks puffed like fish. I know I must have run past my family in the bleachers, too. I cringed thinking about how I must've looked—dress half shoved in my stockings, ruining the whole Festival.

In my earpiece, I heard Mr. Diaz and Ms. Hoffman,
papers rustling,
uh
ing and
ahem
ing as they scrambled to say something. “Was this planned?” Mr. Diaz asked, his voice muffled, obviously thinking that he'd safely covered his microphone.

My lungs bursting, I strained to pick up my pace. Ahead of me the blue-and-white-striped uniform of the band's leader marching was a hazy blur through my wind-stung eyes. His baton thrust upward as he kept time. I thought of the staffs we'd been practicing with in tai chi class, and a plan sprang into my muddled head. The baton was only half the length of our staffs. Still, my idea could work. If only I could get my hands on it in time . . .

Just then something soft caught my legs and sent me sprawling to the asphalt with a sharp sting. I winced and pushed myself onto all fours, only to find myself staring into a wild-eyed grin. Pookums. He panted back at me, thrilled, his tiny tiara off-kilter.

“Go back! Back to Kendra!” I stood up and pointed, but he just danced around in his sparkly blue vest and yipped. The Root Beer float barreled on ahead of us, the wide blue ocean looming in the background behind it. I spotted Grace on the other side of the marching band, sprinting, chin high as she held her dress at her waist.

We didn't have time for games. I faked out Pookums
and made a break for the bandleader. The little puffball followed, barking and weaving his way through a line of bewildered trumpet players. They tried to step clear, their legs tangling. Seconds later, I heard a jumble of drooping trumpet notes and a crash of cymbals on pavement. I didn't dare look back again. The crowd's puzzled shouts joined the uproar as I zigzagged through the flute section and dashed behind the bandleader. I hesitated only a moment, then hopped onto my tiptoes and snatched his baton midthrust before charging onward like a football player headed for the end zone. The root beer mug towered ahead, right next to the red cherry that I'd nearly fallen off scaffolding to decorate. My skinned knees burned and I could barely breathe, but I was almost there.

“Folks, it looks like we have a little situation to clear up. Not to worry. Everything's under control!” Mr. Diaz practically yelped. Then, in the background, he rasped to someone: “Where'd she go? She didn't take the remote, did she?”

A piercing shriek rang out behind me. I glanced over one shoulder and saw Kendra tearing after Pookums, strands of blond hair from her former updo flapping around her face like wet party streamers. Her cries seemed to only push Pookums faster and farther away, like a leaf
cartwheeling away in a gust of wind.

“Look at these Royals showing off their athletic talents,” Ms. Hoffman chimed in for cover. “An unusual choice for the anniversary year, but it sure is a memorable one.”

The spectators murmured skeptically. A stabbing pain split my side, but I pumped my arms harder and jetted past an acrobat doing handsprings and the fire-twirling clown on stilts. Finally, I approached the float. It was rocking from side to side as someone—it had to be Trista—pounded against the driver compartment hidden behind the cascading scoops of white cotton fake whipped cream on a sundae. The float's Willard Ridley figure toward the back of the float swayed a little with each of the blows, his white grassy beard rattling like maracas.

“Hang on, Trista! We've got this!” I yelled, jogging to keep up with the black seaweed-covered wheels of the float thundering down the route. I hoped she could hear me even if I couldn't see her.

“Next we have the Sheep Family Thrills float?” Ms. Hoffman's hesitant soprano piped up. “Look at the fun those sheep are having on that Ferris wheel! Made of polyurethane foam and covered with onion seed, those cuties took twenty volunteers a solid week to decorate. . . . Er, is someone going to stop those girls?”

My plan was a long shot. I'd have to time my move just right. It was the best hope we had, though. I tightened my grip on the bandleader's baton, made a wish on Grandpa Young's dog tags, then sank low into Needle at Sea Bottom, thrusting the baton into the front right wheel's spokes as smoothly as if it were a tai chi practice staff. A painful jolt ran down my funny bone as the baton twisted. Metal scraped and sparks flew—but the float squealed to a halt. Trista cheered just as Grace joined me, panting, her hair a wind-whipped mess.

The marching band behind us had melted into blue-and-white chaos. A wail of sirens kicked up, followed by the far-off roar of motorcycles. The float's electric engine still whirred, begging to push forward. One slip of the baton and we would. I scanned the route ahead. The lead car and first float had already hung the left onto Vista del Mar, the Palominos clip-clopping after them. Rod and his crew strutted cluelessly onward in their white jumpsuits.

Trista's wide eyes peered out at us through the fluffy carpet of white flowers that camouflaged the driver compartment just above the front wheel. “She bolted me in!” she shouted. “The door's completely jammed.”

“We're coming!” Grace hollered back, then turned to me. “You first,” she said, boosting me up over the wheel hub
and onto the float. She hauled herself up after me, sending clumps of carnations flying. As Trista's eyes bulged even wider, we both madly tore away the flowers hiding her compartment until we'd exposed the metal-grate door underneath. A wrench had been wedged—possibly even hammered—tightly through the steel loop of the door latch.

Grace and I looked at each other. If Lauren Sparrow was unhinged enough to lock Trista inside a parade float, who knew what else she'd be willing to do.

“Don't worry. We've got this,” I called to Trista, hoping she didn't hear the doubt lurking in my voice. Grace clutched the end of the wrench with both hands and tugged, the cords of her neck straining. It didn't budge.

I should've known it wouldn't be easy. If Trista couldn't get herself out, we didn't have much hope. I wrapped my hands over Grace's, braced my foot against the float, and on the count of three, we both heaved as hard as we could. There was a bone-jarring screech of metal on metal, but the wrench only gave way a tiny bit.

“You need more leverage!” Trista called out.

We reached out to try again when suddenly something clanged and squealed beneath us. Grace toppled into me with a shriek as the float gave a single horrible lurch forward. We grasped at the metal grill of the compartment
door as the float jolted again. Apparently, a baton was no match for a gajillion pounds of flowers, plastic, and chicken wire determined to barrel ahead.

Trista was breathing as heavily as we were.

“You got your inhaler, right?” I called in.

“It's in my cargo jacket,” she answered calmly. “But as long as I don't panic, I'm fine,” she added in a singsong, as if she'd been repeating the words to herself nonstop for the past half-hour. She probably had. “As long as I don't think of these flowers, I'm”—she closed her eyes—“fine,” she finished.

I remembered her telling herself to take her allergy meds that morning, and I prayed she had. An image of her panicking in the refrigerated flower shed flashed before me. We had to get her out. Fast.

Grace and I eyed each other, then both hurried to yank the wrench again. Nothing. The float shuddered under us. Grace's eyes went wide. It wasn't until I heard the crowd gasp behind us that I realized that she wasn't worried about the float rolling ahead. She was staring at something behind my right shoulder. I spun around to look.

I froze. The fire-twirling clown tottered on his stilts alongside the Root Beer float by the rear wheel. High above
the road, concentrating on his spinning wheels of flame, he hadn't noticed that Pookums Pritchard had just darted directly into his path.

Kendra ran close behind. In the meantime her up-do had fully unraveled. Her hair streamed behind her and her dress was torn. “Watch out!” she shrieked to the stilt walker, arms waving.

Startled, the man looked down to find Pookums running crazed circles in front of him, yipping up at his spinning fire sticks. He staggered to avoid the dog, flinging out one arm to regain his balance. Everything would have been fine, were it not for one small detail. His hand had grazed the side of the Root Beer float.

And in that hand was a flaming ring of fire.

There was a
whoosh
and crackle as flames leaped up from the cottony white foam of Willard Ridley's root beer mug. My legs went numb.

Trista cocked her head at us. “Something wrong?” she asked.

In a minute she'd smell the smoke herself. In a minute it might be too late, anyway.

“Not yet,” I said, tugging at the wrench again. Grace looked back at the fire then back to me in panic. The flames
had already raced up Willard Ridley's arm and caught his grass beard. Black smoke spiraled up from his head, clouding the blue sky.

Another grating screech of metal split the air. Grace and I shrieked as this time the float rolled forward and kept rolling, careening around like a bad shopping cart as it slowly gained speed down the hill.

Trista locked eyes with us as we clung to the door. “I should have never fixed the pulse duration,” she said quietly. I had no idea what she meant until I remembered with horror why she'd worked on the Root Beer float that morning in the first place: it hadn't been reaching its full speed. Who knew how fast it could go now.

The sirens wailed louder, closer. They had to reach us soon. Time had slowed down so much it felt like they never would. The rest of the parade dimmed around me, though I knew Brown Suiters had to be rushing toward us to help. The voices of Mr. Diaz and Ms. Hoffman in my ear had fallen silent.

I looked ahead. The last of the “Celebration”-blaring marching band was marching onto Vista del Mar. Nothing was in front of us. Just the road, the bluffs, and the wide, wide blue of the ocean waiting to swallow us.