Whatever After #4: Dream On (5 page)

B
rianna!” the king calls. “You’re up! Come see what we got!”

“Don’t say anything to them about what happened, got it?” Brianna whispers to Jonah and me as we follow her to meet her parents.

“How come?” Jonah asks.

“Because they’ll freak out. They’re still really upset about the curse. That’s why they’re so obsessed with buying kitchen stuff. They’re mad at themselves for not having enough plates and not inviting all the fairies. So just don’t say anything. Promise?”

“Promise,” we say as we approach the front door of the palace, where the king and queen are standing.

The queen and king give Bri a big hug. Up close I can see that Bri has her mom’s blond hair and upturned nose, but she has her dad’s dark-blue eyes and pink cheeks.

“We missed you at the yard sale!” the king says in a booming voice. “Are you feeling better?”

Bri nods. “Much. I invited some friends over to keep me company.” She gestures to Jonah and me. “They’re commoners.”

Gee, thanks.

“Would they like to come inside for some tea?” the queen asks, motioning toward the door.

“Do you have any soda?” Jonah asks.

I elbow him in the side. “No soda. I mean, no pop!”

“Fine,” he grumbles. “Milk?”

“Of course,” the queen says, and enters the palace.

Inside, it’s cool and still smells like roses. My nose is not getting used to the rose scent and I hope it never does.

The floors are covered in different rugs. Every inch of wall space is covered in paintings, large and small. Every surface is covered in vases filled with bouquets of different colored roses and bowls filled with rose potpourri. There are also large candles everywhere.

“Wow,” Jonah says. “You guys have a lot of stuff.”

“Yes we do!” the queen cheers. “Do you like the new rug we got last week?” She points to a white rug under a coffee table. “Isn’t is grand?”

I’m not sure if
grand
is the word I’d use. More like
shaggy
. But I nod anyway.

I’m not sure how, but the room looks funky. It has style.

Seeing all this
stuff
reminds me that we have
three
tasks — not two — to get done. Yes, we have to wake up Robin and put Bri to sleep, but we also have to find the enchanted object that will take us home. Sometimes it’s a mirror, but sometimes it’s a chimney or a cauldron. This palace is crammed with stuff. The object could be anything.

Since it’s probably already about two o’clock, and if we want to be home by nine thirty, before our parents start to wonder about us, we have only seven and a half hours to find it. Although usually the portal pops up when we’re ready to go …

My heart rate speeds up. So much to do. So little time. Usually we’re in these fairy tales for a few days, at least, and we have only two tasks. This time we have only a few hours and we have three tasks. We need to get this show on the road. We need to get Bri’s brother to Robin in the tower.

Hmm. Where is Felix?

The king and queen lead us into the royal dining room. Royal servants come in carrying trays of pastries, a large pot of tea, and milk. The pastries are really pretty. One is a tower of fluff and almonds and raspberry drizzle. It will be hard not to get distracted.

We all sit down at the table.

I make sure to put my napkin on my lap and motion for Jonah to do the same.

My brother downs a cup of milk and then grabs a chocolate scone.

I take a pastry. Then another. Traveling to fairy tales makes me hungry.

“Are you two going to take a nap?” the queen asks me, sipping elegantly from her teacup.

“A nap? No, we’re too old to nap,” I say, but then I realize that she’s looking at our outfits.

We’re wearing our pajamas.

Why am I always wearing pajamas whenever I meet royalty? It’s so embarrassing.

Having a pair of shoes on wouldn’t be so terrible, either.

A large crash comes from another room.

“Felix!” the queen hollers. “What are you doing?”

“It wasn’t me!” a squeaky voice yells back.

The king and queen both laugh.

Bri rolls her eyes. “It was so him.”

Felix dashes through the room and smacks right into the table. “Not me again!” he cries. Up close he looks exactly like the king, but little. Same dark-blue eyes and spiky hair.

“Stay where we can see you,” the king orders.

“Look at me!” Felix calls, and launches himself into a cartwheel and then into a side table. A vase of roses plummets to the floor.

He straightens up, yells “Girls are gross!” and pinches his sister’s arm.

“Ouch! Mom! Did you see that?” Bri calls out.

“See what?” the queen asks. “Isn’t your brother adorable?”

Um … he does not seem so adorable. He seems more like a little monster. I almost expect to see skid marks on the floor.

He runs around the room a few more times before crawling into an empty chair.

We all munch silently. Mmm. Raspberry-almond-fluff pastries are
gooooood
. Next time I have a sleepover I’m making these instead of s’mores.

After a few minutes, the queen folds her napkin and places it on the table. “Bri, keep an eye on your brother.”

Then the royal couple wave to us and head off to another room.

Felix pops out of his chair and marches over to Jonah. “Who are
you
?” he demands.

“I’m Jonah,” my brother says, giving the little boy a smile.

Felix narrows his eyes. “I don’t like to share. Are you going to take my toys?”

Jonah’s smile falters. “No.”

“Play with me!” Felix pokes Jonah in the side with his wooden spoon. “You have to play with me!”

Jonah scoots his chair sideways. “Stop it.”

Bri crosses her arms. “Felix, we need your help with something in the west tower.”

Felix grabs an unlit candle off the table and lies facedown on the ground. “No.”

“Come on, Felix,” Bri says with a sigh. “Please.”

“No.” He turns his head toward us and sticks out his tongue.

Now what? I can’t believe I thought Jonah was annoying. Felix is a hundred times more annoying and I’ve known him for only five minutes.

“Pretty please with a cherry on top?” I ask, my voice sweeter than raspberry drizzle.

Felix flips onto his back and balances the candle on his little feet. “What will you give me?”

“Excuse me?” What nerve this little boy has! Then I add, “You may want to be careful with that candle.” I can’t help it. Once a big sister, always a big sister.

Felix ignores me and tries balancing the candle with only one foot. “You want me to come with you. Sounds like you need me. So what do I get?”

Bri stands up and grabs the candle off his foot. “What do you want?”

He points to Jonah. “I want him to give me a horseyback ride to the tower.”

“You mean piggyback?” I ask. “When you carry someone on your back?”

Felix stomps his feet. “Horseyback! Horseyback!”

“Same thing,” Bri says with a nod.

“Fine,” Jonah says with a shrug. He stands up. “Horseyback does make more sense if you think about it.”

Felix jumps up and onto Jonah’s back in about three seconds flat. Then he hits my brother on the head with his spoon. “Go, horsey, go!”

Jonah frowns but obeys.

Giddyup.

F
elix insists that if we want him to go upstairs, Jonah will have to horseyback him
all
the way there.

There are about eighty stairs.

By the time we’re halfway up, my brother’s face is the color of a tomato. No — of a red rose.

“So now you know what it’s like to have a little brother,” I tell Jonah with a laugh.

He grunts in reply.

“Faster, horsey, faster!” Felix commands.

I have met a lot of princes through the magic mirror, but he is the most demanding BY FAR.

Once we’re finally at the top, Felix hops off and Jonah slumps against the wall.

“This better work,” Jonah mumbles.

Felix launches himself into another cartwheel. “There’s a girl sleeping on the bed!” he cries.

“Yes. We need you to help our friend Robin wake up,” I say.

His face scrunches up in horror. “Nooooooo!” he shrieks. “No way! I’m not helping a girl!”

“You said you would help us,” Bri says. “That was the deal. Jonah gave you a horseyback and now you have to help us.”

Jonah, meanwhile, has spread out on the stone floor. He is panting.

“No,” Felix says. “I said I would come with you if he gave me a horseyback. I did not say I would help a girl.”

“Jonah will horseyback you around the room again if you help,” I pipe up.

Jonah groans. “I will?”

“No,” Felix says. “I want his box.”

“His what?” I ask.

“His box! The box that fell out of his pajamas when he was horseybacking me up the stairs. I want it.”

“No way,” Jonah snaps. “He can’t have my game.”

“Yes way,” Felix says. “Or forget about me helping you!”

“But we need it to tell the time,” Jonah says. “Right, Abby?”

“Not technically,” I say. “Since we know that time here is the same as time at home. And I spotted a clock on top of a pile of plates downstairs.”

Jonah gives me the stink eye.

“Give it to me,” Felix orders.

Jonah reluctantly hands over the game, grumbling to himself.

Felix runs up to Robin and stops short in front of her ear.

“WAKE UP!” he screeches. “WAKE UP!”

She doesn’t move.

“Can I pinch her?” he asks.

“Um … gently,” I say.

He pinches her, not so gently, on the arm.

She still doesn’t budge.

“She’s not waking up,” he tells us. “Should I poke her with my spoon?”

In the story, it’s the prince’s kiss that finally wakes up Sleeping Beauty. “Can you try, um, giving her a quick kiss on the cheek?” I suggest.

I brace myself for a shriek. I expect him to fall back on the floor and throw a tantrum. I expect him to ask for a million dollars.

Instead, he leans over and kisses Robin’s cheek with an ear-shattering
smack
.

Bri shrugs. “He likes giving kisses.”

We wait for Robin to open her eyes.

She doesn’t.

“Robin?” I ask. “Are you awake?”

No answer.

Argh! “It didn’t work,” I say. “Why didn’t it work? A prince tried to wake her up! He even kissed her! That’s what happened in the original story! A prince kisses Sleeping Beauty and she wakes up!” I turn to Bri. “What did the twelfth fairy say, exactly?”

“That I would be woken up in a hundred years by a prince,” she says.

“Then maybe a prince can wake her up only
after
a hundred years,” Jonah says, still on the floor. “Not today.”

That is a big problem. Huge. Ginormous! We can’t wait for a hundred years to pass! How are we ever going to wake her up?

“There’s only one thing that’s going to fix our problems,” I say.

“What’s that?” Bri asks.

I sigh. “Magic. We should talk to a fairy.”

“I don’t know any fairies,” Bri says. “Except Lottie. But she disappeared.”

“Sometimes knocking on stuff works,” Jonah says. He knocks on the wall. “Hello? Lottie? Are you there? Are any other fairies there?”

No one answers.

“We can’t knock on
everything
in the royal court, ” I say. “The king and queen have a lot of stuff.”

“Can’t we ask the king and queen to call a fairy?” Jonah asks. “They invited twelve over when you were born,” he reminds Bri. “They probably know where to find one.”

Bri shakes her head. “No way. My parents will never let me invite a fairy over. They’ve hated fairies ever since that day.”

“I hate fairies, too!” Felix yells for no reason. Then he starts running in a circle around the attic. Again and again.

“Should I stop him?” I ask Bri.

Bri shakes her head. “He’ll tire himself out eventually. Just leave him.”

She’s so patient! I wouldn’t be that patient. Suddenly, I feel lucky to have Jonah. As far as younger brothers go, he’s not so bad.

“So which fairy would we want to talk to?” I ask. “The twelfth one? She’s the one who tried to help you in the first place. And it’s her spell that made Robin fall asleep.”

“Her name is Shaznay,” Bri says. Then she bites her lip. “You know, I bet my friend Tom would know how to find her. His dad is the mailman. Tom used to help him with the deliveries.”

“Let’s call him!” I say.

“You mean yell his name out the window?” Bri asks, looking confused. “He lives outside the palace. He won’t hear us.”

“No, I meant using a phone. Which you don’t have.”

“Not yet,” she says. “Though I bet I will in a hundred years.”

“So how do we ask him?” I wonder. “No e-mail, no phones. What do we do?” I begin to panic. How will we talk to Tom?

Bri motions for us to follow her down the stairs. “We go to his house.”