The Magic Misfits 2. Neil Patrick Harris

” echoed Presto, the store’s prized green parrot. The beautiful bird held court from her perch near the store’s entrance. Mr Vernon cooed at her, holding up his hand for the parrot to nuzzle briefly. He whispered something into her ear, then climbed the spiral stairs to the store’s balcony.

      “Waaaaak! ” Presto answered with a curious blink and a nod before going strangely silent.

      “Leila, I know your magic-club meeting has begun, but would you and Carter please keep an eye on the store for a moment?” asked Mr Vernon. “I think my bottle of vanishing ink has actually vanished.”

      “Of course it did.” Leila giggled. “And of course we will!” She turned to Carter, Theo, Ridley, Olly, and Izzy and then waved them out of the secret room.

      “Boooo,” said Ridley, rolling her chair into the store. “I like it better when our meetings are in there. In the dark. It’s more magical.”

      “More magical than when we are in an actual magic shop?” asked Theo. Olly and Izzy grabbed hands and twirled into the space, then pretended to be dizzy and fell down. Leila slid the bookcase door shut as Theo held his magic violin bow over Ridley’s head. Her notebook levitated out of her lap and floated just beyond her reach.

      “Give that back!” Ridley snarled, grabbing Theo by his tuxedo tail.

      “Easy, tiger,” Carter said, snatching the notebook from the air and returning it to Ridley. “Play nice.”

      Ridley thumped Theo’s bow tie, changing it from a solid black into a garish mustard plaid. Theo flinched as he glanced at himself in the giant mirror nearby, then adjusted the lapels of his tuxedo jacket. He always looked like he was on his way to a grand party. “I suppose I can make these colours work too,” he said to himself, then winked at Ridley. She winked back.

      “Since we’ve got our homework out of the way,” said Leila, “let’s start the actual meeting.”

      “Hey! That’s my line!” Ridley quipped. “Let us bring this meeting of the Magic Misfits to order,” she said, elevating her voice to sound like the mayor during a celebratory speech out on the town green.

      “Hear, hear!” said Theo.

      “You forgot to do roll call,” said Carter.

      “Fine!” Ridley groaned. “We’ll continue with roll call.” She read out everyone’s names, and they all raised their hands. She spent the next few seconds writing down everything she’d just said in her notebook.

      “Let me do that,” said Carter.

      Ridley reluctantly handed over the notebook and pen. “Who has a club announcement?” she asked.

      “Well, we already told you guys about the monkey break-in,” said Leila. “That’s all my big news.”

      Ridley barreled onward. “Anything else we should note?” When the group said nothing, she said, “The Magic Misfits keep no secrets. Remember?”

      “I’m totally secret-free,” said Carter.

      Leila thought of her tin filled with keys upstairs, the one no one knew about except for her. “Nope,” she said. “No secrets here.”

      “I think some secrets are worth keeping,” said Theo, his voice cool and collected. “I certainly do not intend to give my tricks away within the near future.”

      Before Ridley could scold her friend, the door to the shop opened, and the little bell rang.

      Leila leaned around the end of the aisle and saw a couple standing there. The man and woman looked like a pair of tourists down from the Grand Oak Resort. Since Mr Vernon was still upstairs, searching for his vanishing ink, Leila raced over and said, “Welcome to Vernon’s Magic Shop, where we purvey the impossible. Can I help you find anything?” With a wink, she added, “Or perhaps help you make something disappear?”

      Presto rustled her feathers from her perch. “Shall Houdini confess next, I can find a dozen flying, fake deer! ” she screeched. “Shall Houdini confess next, I can find a dozen flying, fake deer!”

      “Don’t mind our bird.” Leila smiled at the customers, who looked indifferent. The parrot’s mishmash of words reminded Leila of poetry – well, really weird poetry. This wasn’t the first time Presto had spouted out such strange things.

      Carter appeared next to the customers. “Feel free to look around.”

      Leila couldn’t help but feel happy that Carter was fitting in so quickly. The couple walked with caution toward a table displaying glass eyeballs stuffed in huge jars, vials of green slime, and quartz crystals.

      “Why on earth does Presto continue to speak like this?” Theo asked, joining the others at the counter. He craned his long neck back, trying to make eye contact with the parrot, then held up his hand. This usually worked with the doves he kept in his backyard, but Presto had been trained differently.

      “Maybe she’s practising for Shakespeare in the Park,” Ridley said.

      “That’d be neat,” said Leila. She patted her shoulder. “Presto! Come!”

      Presto only shouted out again: “Shall Houdini confess next, I can find a dozen flying, fake deer! ”

      The shopping couple whispered something to each other, then glared at Presto. They headed to the door with a quiet “Thank you.” The bell clanged, and then they were gone. Leila’s face burned; she felt disappointed that she hadn’t been able to charm them into staying longer.

      “That bird is crazy,” said Ridley. “Not like my rabbit. Where is my Top Hat?”

      Carter chuckled. “One day, one of us will pull out an actual top hat and say, Here it is! ”

      “Har-har,” Ridley scowled. “Not funny, newbie. Don’t make me kick you out of the club so soon.”

      “It was only a joke,” Theo whispered, slipping the rabbit onto Ridley’s lap.

      Ridley wasn’t having it. “If we’re going to make jokes during Magic Misfits meetings, they’ve got to be much funnier. And Presto has to learn to keep her beak shut.” Theo raised a chiding eyebrow. “Oh, come on,” Ridley added. “You know I love all of—”

      PING! As if from nowhere, a large coin fell out of the air. It bounced twice on the table, rolled on its side in a circle, and fell over.

      “Dad, did you do that?” Leila called upstairs, but Mr Vernon was nowhere to be seen.

      Ridley picked up the coin and surveyed it. Theo and the others peered over her shoulders.

      “It’s letters A through to Z,” Olly noted.

      “And then back again,” Izzy added, “z through to a.”

      “It’s a cipher,” Ridley whispered.

      “A what?” Carter asked.

      “A code, a secret way of writing,” Ridley answered. “See, if I wrote CAT using this cipher, it would become XZG. And DOG would become WLT.”

      “Awesome,” Leila said.

      A shadow appeared outside the window of the shop. “More customers,” Carter said. Wanting to keep their discovery secret, Ridley dropped the coin into the secret compartment of her wheelchair arm.

      The bell chimed as the front door opened again. Leila’s heart soared as she imagined that the couple had changed