Zacktastic (9 page)

“That's my grandfather,” Trey tells me. “He commissioned this building for Millings
Academy.”

“I don't know what ‘commissioned' means,” I admit.

“What
do
you know?” Trey says with an eye roll. It's the kind of question I know I'm not meant to answer. “It means he paid for it to be built.”

Holy smokes, how rich would you have to be to build a building like this?

“I'm sure he wouldn't want a useless newbie genie staring at his portrait,” Trey says. “Come on.”

I follow him out of the room and down a long hallway. It's carpeted, and it feels good under my bare feet, extra soft and extra thick. It's definitely the softest, thickest carpeting I've ever walked on. Back at home, the carpet is kind of old and worn thin. And at my school, we don't have carpet at all. The floors are plain old scratched-up linoleum, and—

BRRRIIIINNNNGGGG!!!!
goes the world's loudest bell.

Is the hallway on fire? Is the
building
on fire?
Those lobby drapes looked awfully flammable.

“Quick, in here,” Trey says, pushing open a door. There's a sign on it that says, “Under Construction: No Entry.”

In the background, there's a stampede of footsteps.

My heart is pounding at least as hard. “Nearly three thousand people have died in construction-site accidents in the last twenty-five years,” I say in a rush. “We don't even have hard hats.”

Trey doesn't say another word. He just grabs my arm and pulls me in with him.

On the other side of the door there's . . .

A bathroom.

A really fancy one, of course. The floor is made of sparkly tiles. There are three wooden stall doors that go all the way to the ground, so you can't peek under them and see who's in there. Plus, three sinks. They're not hooked up to the walls yet, and the drains are coming out of the wall behind them. There's also a big gold
mirror waiting to be hung.

“I don't think anyone's supposed to be in here,” I say.

“Precisely,” Trey says. “I came in here because no one else will. You need a private place to come up with a plan to get that bottle back. And I need a private place to think of what wishes to make.”

With the mention of the
W
-word, my big toe wakes up and starts tingling again.

Trey pushes his crooked glasses up the bridge of his nose. The left side sticks up at an even higher angle. “Maybe I'll wish for Jake and Oliver to come down with a mystery illness that makes them puke for seven straight days,” he says.

My stomach twists at the thought of puking for that long.

“Or maybe,” he goes on, “I'll wish that no one will be allowed to step into any building that anyone in my family paid to build unless they have my permission—and if they want my permission,
they'll have to do some serious sucking up to get it. Or maybe I'll wish . . .”

Trey's still talking. Meanwhile, my foot's still itching. The worst spot is right on the genie bite. It's traveling down the line of my toes. I reach down, trying to be oh-so-casual about it, and scratch and scratch. Ooh, that's better.

“What is it with you and your foot?” Trey asks.

“It's an old genie ritual to formulate a plan to find one's bottle,” I tell him. “Scratch your toes and the answer will come to you.”

Trey's mouth twists like he's just sucked on a lemon. “The answers better come fast,” he says. I keep on scratching, even though it's not making the itching go away. Trey pushes open the heavy wooden door of the stall on the far right. “If my dad saw they'd used oak on these doors instead of walnut, he'd have a fit.”

“They seem fine to me,” I tell him. “Did your family pay for all this, too?”

“Affirmative,” Trey says.

I've never heard anyone say that word before, but I know without asking that it means yes.

“Jake and Ollie are probably still in Heddle's office,” he says.

“Heddle is the head of the school?” I ask. Trey nods. “Is that the same as a principal?”

“Yup,” Trey says. “And I can think of some wishes about getting rid of him, too.”

Itch. Itch. Itch.

“Once we get the bottle back, if Heddle gives us any trouble or tries to call my dad, I'll just wish him away. I'll wish them all away.” Trey pauses, and looks over at me. “What do you think about that plan?”

Scratch. Scratch. Scratch.

“I'm still thinking,” I tell him.

“While you're thinking, I'm going to go to the bathroom.” Trey pauses before ducking into the stall. “It's a shame for Jake and Ollie. It's a shame for all the kids at Millings. None of them
like me very much, and I'm the one with all of the wishes.”

Trey takes a deep breath, and then so soft it's almost to himself, he adds, “Actually, here's my wish. I wish I could turn into someone people like.”

There's a sound, like a snap. I guess it's the stall door clicking shut, though I've never heard a door sound like that before. But never mind that. Right now my whole foot is itching so badly, it's as if I stuck it in a tank of mosquitoes that hadn't had anything to eat for a week. I shake it all about, like I'm playing the hokey pokey, which at ten years old, I am way too old to play.

Ten years old! I remember being home at my birthday party just a few hours ago, leaning over the cake. I had a wish of my own, and to tell you the truth, it wasn't so different than the wish Trey just made. Just before I blew out my half of the candles, I said in my head:
I wish next year on my eleventh birthday, I have a crowd of friends
watching. Even more friends than Quinn
.

But I don't care about my wish right now—or Trey's, either. My foot is practically on fire. If I were blowing candles out now, I'd wish to make it stop.

I don't have any calamine lotion with me, but there are three sinks here. Ice-cold water on my foot would feel mighty good right about now.

I hop over—my foot's too itchy to walk on—and turn the dial. The pipes make a gurgling sound. I turn the dial around a bit more. No gurgling this time. Hmmm. Now what?

I'm about to turn around, thinking maybe I'll stick my foot in the toilet water. Quinn would think that's the grossest thing I've ever done, but everything in this bathroom is brand-new, never used before. And besides, desperate times call for desperate measures.

Gurgle, gurgle
goes the sink, and then
SPLASH!
The water comes out in a rush all at once. I twist the knob to turn it off. Water has
splattered all down the front of my shirt and dripped down to my pants and my bare feet.

I look in the mirror to assess the damage, and when I catch my reflection, my hair looks so . . . so neat.

Kinda like the way Uncle Max's hair had looked when he was performing his own magic.

Uh-oh.

I hear Trey unlatch the stall door. He pulls it toward himself and steps out, one brown loafer at a time.

Holy smokes. That's not Trey.

That's Quinn.

10

O
H, THE
Q
UINNSANITY

M
y mouth is open but I've forgotten how to make words come out. If I could speak, I would say: Oh, the
quinnsanity!

Quinnsanity
. Noun. Insanity that involves Quinn.

Quinn, meanwhile, isn't having a problem talking, and her words come out in a rush.

“Where am I?” she asks. “Where's Madeline? What is this place? And why are these things on my face?” She knocks Trey's glasses to the floor. The remaining unsmashed lens now smashes, too, making the glasses completely useless. Quinn
looks down. “Why am I wearing these . . . these
clothes?!
”

Clothes are important to Quinn. She takes about an hour to choose an outfit in the morning, and usually goes through several “test” outfits before settling on the one she's actually going to wear for the day. But now she is dressed in nothing she'd ever pick out for herself: khaki pants, a green-collared MA shirt, thick white socks, and brown loafers.

There's something else strange about her, and it takes me a second to realize it's her hair. It's parted down the middle with the left half up in some kind of braid, and the right half hanging loose across her shoulder.

But I still can't get any words out, and she's not done speaking anyway.

“Zack? ZACK? ZACHARY NOAH COOLEY, I'M GOING TO TELL MOM ON YOU AND YOU'RE GOING TO BE IN SO MUCH TROUBLE!”

“I . . . I . . . ,” I stutter. I move past her and glance into the stall she just came out of, looking for Trey. But he's not in there. Not that I expected him to be. In fact, I suspect I know what's going on, but my suspicion is insane, and out of this world. It's absolutely, positively the most crazmazingest thing I've ever suspected before.

For just a second, the bathroom is silent, except for the slightest
gurgle, gurgle
from the sink. Quinn puts her hands on her hips. “You have three seconds before I start to scream. Three. Two. O—”

“All right. All right. I was at Uncle Max's and he gave me a bottle and—” I stop short. “The problem is, if I just tell you flat out what happened today—that I learned I'm a genie—you're not going to understand me.”

“What?” she asks.

“I tried to tell you before,” I say. “It's not my fault the words don't make sense. It's a safety mechanism the board put in place.”

“A safety mechanism? From the board?” Quinn repeats. She's shaking her head. “You're right you're not making any sense. And hey, genius, if you're a genie, where's your bottle, then?”

“The Reggs took it with them,” I say. But then I cut myself off. “Wait, you understand me?”

“I understand you're a nut job and a liar.” Her eyes scan the room and I can practically see the wheels turning in her head, trying to figure out where she is and how I managed to get her here.

But there's something
I
just figured out. “Holy smokes! I just discovered an exception to Genie Board Decision two hundred and fifty-eight!”

“Zack!” Quinn says. “Tell me what's really going on here!”

“I
am
telling you,” I say. “It's supposed to come out like gibberish when I talk about genie stuff. That's what Uncle Max said. But I can tell Trey, of course, since he's the one who rubbed the bottle. And if he makes a wish and I turn him into you—”

“Who the heck is Trey?”

“The one who made the wish that brought you here,” I tell her. “You turned into him. Well, sort of. It's you, but you're wearing his clothes.”

“You expect me to believe that this kid, this Trey—someone I've never met—made a wish to become me?”

“Not exactly,” I say. “He wished to turn into someone people liked. And you popped into my head because, well . . .” I toe the ground, feeling a little embarrassed. I may be a genie, but I don't know how to be popular, like Quinn does. “People like you,” I mumble.

“That's right, they do,” Quinn says. “Unlike some people I know.”

“Don't get such a big head about it,” I say. “I don't think Trey would actually like
being
you. But at least it helped me discover the exception. So I can talk about being a genie and you'll understand.”

“I understand that you need serious help,”
Quinn says. “Mom will probably send you to a mental hospital when I tell her.”

“She will not,” I say. But really I'm not so sure. After all, I was convinced Uncle Max had Alzheimer's disease when he first told me. And explaining things to Mom might be impossible with Genie Board Decision 258 in place. Unless there's a
second
exception to the rule, in the event your mom is about to have you committed. I'll have to ask Uncle Max about that—if I ever see him again. Which reminds me, I have bigger problems right now.

“You know what else I think?” Quinn asks, and she keeps on talking without waiting for my answer. “I think there was another pair of twins being born at Pinemont Hospital on this exact day, ten years ago, and you got switched out with my real brother.” She's nodding to herself now. “Yeah, that's it. We're not really related after all!”

“Wishful thinking,” I mutter.

“I know you love to play make-believe and
pretend to swoop in and rescue people, but you've gone too far this time.”

“I'm telling the truth, and I can prove it to you.”

“Oh, really? How?”

“Isn't being here proof enough?”

“I don't know where
here
is!” she says.

“This is Millings Academy,” I tell her. “In
California
.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Fine, if you don't believe me, I'll prove it another way.”

Uncle Max had licked his finger and twirled it in the air. So I do that, but nothing happens. There's certainly no car-horse-zebra-dinosaur combination.

“This is ridiculous,” Quinn says.

“Okay, look,” I say. “See those sinks on the floor, and how their pipes aren't hooked up?” Quinn nods. “Well, I made water come out of them! Just before you got here—I turned the faucet and the water rushed out. Here, watch.”

I twist the dial on the same sink I used before, but nothing. I try the knobs on the other two, but their spouts remain dry.

“Nice try,” Quinn says.

“No, really,” I say. “Look—I'm all wet from before—the water just came rushing out and—” But even as I say it, I realize my shirt and my pants and my feet are bone-dry, like I really had made the whole thing up. “Maybe genies can't get wet,” I tell her.

“I don't have time for this stupid game,” Quinn says. Her voice is shaky. I think she may even start to cry. “Madeline was in the middle of braiding my hair. She's waiting for me. I've GOT TO GET HOME!”