The Sugar Mountain Snow Ball (2 page)

“
Pssht!
” Eleanor hissed as she wiggled her long, skinny finger at me to get me moving.

I peered around the corner of my locker and saw that the girls had already filed out to the bleachers.

“Thanks, Mrs. Petite. I promise to be on time tomorrow.”

So after a day filled with mishaps besides my tardiness—like, I also forgot my social studies homework, and then the girl ahead of me in the lunch line got the last spicy chicken burger, and between Spanish and English classes I dropped my books in the hall, right in front of JB Knox, the most gorgeous boy in all of Paris, New Hampshire (and the star of all my daydreams)—
finally
something good happened.

I was hurrying as fast as I could to get to detention, because if you're late, then you automatically have to come back the next day for another detention, even if you're on time for school that morning. And I had promised Mrs. Petite that this wouldn't happen.

Anyway, I hurried down the halls and there it was! A sign on the cafeteria door that said
ALL DETENTIONS CANCELED TODAY—NO MAKEUP DETENTION REQUIRED
.

Never in my whole life had I seen a sign like that, and, believe me, I have been to a lot of detentions.

Then the next thing I knew, Eleanor silently glided around the corner and poked me in the shoulder. Except it felt more like a butterfly had landed there instead of a real poke.

“Hey, you,” I said. “Don't you have Math Squad?”

“Canceled,” she replied, and grinned.

“So is detention. Wonder why everything's canceled?”

“Emergency Union Reconfiguration Workshop.”

“A
what
workshop?”

Sometimes Eleanor had to tell me stuff twice: the first time using the giant vocabulary words she liked to try out, and the second time, speaking normal like everyone else.

“A big meeting.”

“Oh.”

Then a brilliant idea-light went off in my head, telling me that
both
Eleanor and I had some free time at the same time, which almost never happened, since I babysat the twins most afternoons and her mother made her sign up for practically every brainiac activity in the school.

“Eleanor!” I grabbed her bony elbow, the one she supposedly wrenched in gym class earlier. “Let's go hang out in the village.
Ohmygosh
, wanna do that?”

I could tell she did, but—like always—needed to think about it first.

“Come on, Eleanor,” I begged as we stood in the hall, the clock ticking away. “Your mother won't know. She'll think you're at Math Squad.”

She squeezed her left eye shut like she really needed to concentrate.

“I promise we can go over to Wonderland's Used Books first,” I said, “practically your favorite store?”

Well, that sealed the deal, because Eleanor can never resist a bookstore or the library or anything that involves the alphabet in general. So she looked right, then left, as if her mother might burst out of the walls, and then she smiled one of her special curled-up grins. And without saying another word we charged through the school doors into the frosty winter air . . . having no idea our lives would soon change forever.

2

“I don't think we should sit,” said Eleanor.

My wheezing had begun acting up again, so I had to take a mini break on a bench and catch my breath, which surrounded me like puffs of cold smoke.

“Geez, Eleanor, relax. You act like we're being followed by the FBI.”

Even though Eleanor had never met my parents, I'd had the chance to meet hers last summer at the Winterberry Festival, which takes place every year when tiny white flowers cover the winterberry bushes before the blooms turn into bright red berries. I knew Mr. and Mrs. Bandaranaike had moved a long time ago to America from an island country near India, called Sri Lanka, but they still seemed super foreign. At least her father spoke with a thick accent as he told me about the low prices at his full-service gasoline station. Her mother barely said a word and studied me like
I
looked strange, even though she wore a long, silky dress over matching pants and two shiny gold bangles on her wrist . . . something you'd never, ever see anyone wearing around here.

After arriving in this country, they had thought it would be a good idea to name their only kid after the greatest American woman they could think of—Eleanor Roosevelt—which is pretty awesome, except for the fact that Eleanor hates her name. I don't think she feels anything like an old lady who was married to a president a million years ago.

“I'm so starving I'm about to eat my tongue!” I said, still wheezing a bit between each word. “Let's take a teeny-tiny detour and get a mocha ripple milkshake at The Avalanche.”

“Ruby, you promised—the bookstore first,” said Eleanor. “Besides, tongue is chewy. You wouldn't like it.”

“Yuck! Who would eat a tongue?”

“Duck tongue is a delicacy throughout many parts of Asia.”

“Ducks have tongues?”

“Apparently, and they are very tasty to some people,” she giggled, “but I wouldn't know. We are pescatarians.”

“Pesca-whats?”

“Fish-eating vegetarians.”

Eleanor and her giant words.

“I don't care what you call it, Eleanor, but whatever you eat, it smells better than
anything
in the whole cafeteria when you bring your lunch from home. And if you didn't act so stubborn, your folks would have me over for dinner so I could try some of it.”

“I've already told you,” said Eleanor, “eating a meal at my house is the same as testifying in front of a jury.”

Even though we had been best friends since we were in the same fourth-grade class, neither of us had been to the other's home. It
was mostly because Eleanor's mom had so many rules for her and scheduled almost every moment of her life. But I also felt there was more to it, as if Eleanor didn't want anyone to get to know her family.

“Your mother can't be
that
bad, Eleanor,” I said. “The problem is, you're
too
good, and FYI, being perfect is very harmful if you've read anything about it. We went over it in health class. You can get eating disorders and cold sores and depression and joint pain and all sorts of stuff from trying to be perfect. Look at me. I don't have any of those problems, and you know why?”

She crossed her arms and rolled her eyes. “Why, Ruby?”

“Because I know trying to be perfect is practically the worst thing you can do!”

We arrived in the center of Paris a little past three o'clock. And when I'm talking about “Paris,” it isn't that city over in France, although sometimes I wish it were, because it would be more than unbelievably cool if I were a French kid living in Paris.

But our Paris is pretty special, too. It's this old-fashioned New England village that Mim says looks exactly like something Norman Rockwell, the artist, could have painted. It's tucked deep into the eastern side of the White Mountains in New Hampshire, where almost everything is connected to skiing and snowboarding in the winter, which neither Eleanor nor I have ever tried. It's just way too expensive for most people who live around here.

Our main ski resort is Sugar Mountain, and you can literally walk to the entrance from Winterberry Common, which is an enormous square park plunked in the middle of town, where the annual festival takes place. The common is surrounded by tons of
cute shops and restaurants and fun places to browse. And since it's a touristy ski town, a lot of the business owners string cheerful white lights around the windows, so it seems like every single day is some kind of national holiday, even when it isn't.

Well, Eleanor and I hadn't been two minutes inside Wonderland's Used Books when she did her
pssht
noise again, to get my attention.

“
Quoi?
”

That's French for “What?,” and is pronounced
kwa
, with a little gaggy sound in the back of your throat. Pretty much anybody with deep roots in this part of New Hampshire is French-Canadian, like my stepmom and my pop, who can trace both of their families back to Québec, Canada.

“
This!
”

Eleanor pointed at a sparkly poster on the bulletin board, so I stuck my favorite celebrity magazine,
Famous & Fabulous
, back on the shelf and tiptoed over.

“Look!” she said, twitching and hopping like she was really excited, which was
very
unusual for Eleanor.

I gasped.

“
Madame Magnifique?
That must be French for Mrs. Magnificent. I've never heard of Madame Magnifique. Have you, Eleanor?”

Eleanor squinted and lowered her voice.

“No. But I have heard about the powers of astrological clairvoyants.”

“Of
astro-clare-whats?
It says she's a psychic. You know, like those television commercials they have on right before dinner, where you can call this lady named Venus in Las Vegas on the phone and ask her if you can speak to your dead uncle or find out if your boyfriend is going to propose?”

Eleanor's face dropped.

“She's not that kind of psychic, Ruby.”

“What do you mean? What kind is she?”

“Keep your voice down,” she said, peering over the shelves. “I don't want anyone to hear this.”

We turned our backs and faced the window so no one in the store could read our lips.

“A long time ago, my father told me about a visionary his family knew when he was a boy back in Sri Lanka. She lived alone on the highest peak in the jungle. A very old astrologist who not only interpreted birth charts, she
saw
dreams—a person's dreams.”

“Wait, wait, wait!” I said. “Back up to birth charts. What's that?”

“It's complicated, but basically it's a recording of the alignment and energy of the planets at the moment you're born. Some people refer to birth charts when analyzing their personality or weighing
events like marriage or predicting future challenges. But you need a trained astrologist to interpret them. Get it?”

“Sort of, I guess. So the astrologist tells you what your dreams mean, too?”

“No, no, not at all. They do consider our past lives, but that's not what I'm talking about.”

“
Past lives?
Like if you used to be a princess, or a famous actress?”

“That's not what I am talking about either,” she said, and rubbed her forehead like she was thinking extra hard. “Ruby, listen to me. This astrologist, whom my father knew, did not
see
ordinary dreams you have when you sleep. What she saw was your deepest longings in life, impossible dreams you only dared hope would come true . . . just as it says here on the poster.”

Until that moment I had never, ever thought about what Eleanor dreamed. I had assumed she didn't have time to dream, since she was so busy with scheduled activities.

Me? I dreamed like it was my job—like, if I could pick a dream job for life, it would be “dreamer,” or something like that. I was dripping with dreams.

“
Wow
,” was all I could say . . . just as impressed by Eleanor's brilliant thoughts as by her stories of ancient stuff on the other side of the world.

“And Ruby! They called her
Vishishta
.”

At this point her eyes grew even wider.

“
Double wow
,” I whispered a little louder this time. “That's a very mysterious-sounding name!”

“More than that. This is a Sinhalese word, which translates closely to
magnificent.
”

We stared at each other, our mouths open in amazement, because this had to be more than a mere coincidence. The very fact that we both had the afternoon off together
and
happened to see this poster offering a one-day-only
free
reading by a mind reader
just like
the one who lived near Eleanor's father, like, fifty years ago on the other side of the world—and with practically the same name! Well, that's something you do NOT ignore.

Except right then, three perfect girls (dressed in frosty pink and white furry jackets) and two perfect boys crossed the street, and all of a sudden I forgot what we were talking about . . .
An Outers sighting!
The first ones of the season.

In case you don't know, Outers are very rich, very happy, very beautiful people, from some faraway place, who fill Paris in the winter months like the delicious cream in the middle of an éclair. Always perfectly dressed and perfectly smiling, Outers are the happiest, coolest people on Earth. And these perfect people choose to ski and snowboard at Sugar Mountain.

“
Ohmygosh
, Eleanor, look at them. They're sooo . . .
perfect
.” I sighed deeply. “Do you think we'll ever get to go to the Snow Ball?”

The Sugar Mountain Snow Ball is the end-of-the-ski-season glam fest on the last Saturday of March, attended by all the Outers and a few lucky locals in Paris with money and connections.