if i got three wishes, first i'd find out all about how wishes work

[self_composed]

Bella brings two blank notebooks to school the next day. Her old one is safely computerized and boxed up with its predecessors.

At lunch, she sits with Angela; Jessica and Eric and Lauren sit at the same table but mostly talk to each other, and Mike is nowhere to be seen.

Bella is just about on time to gym, thanks to an overnight icing that means she has to pick her way with extreme care across the slippery grass or the slick sidewalks. The second time she falls down, she gives up on attempting any dignity at all, and, cradling her thwacked elbow, scoots the rest of the way to the gym on her rear. This leaves her with damp jeans but no further injuries, and they were a little damp anyway from the falls.

She doesn't have time to do more than smile and wave at Alice on her way to get her mat and get out of the way of careening balls. She spends the class doing the subset of her safe activities that won't stress her elbow.

Comments

[self_composed]

Bella giggles. "Can I borrow this?"

[edgeofyourseat]

"Go for it! If there's a book that is my brain, it's that book," says Alice.

[self_composed]

"I don't know what I'd say if I had to pick a book to represent my brain," Bella says. "I like old literary fiction, but it doesn't mirror me, it's just fun to read."

[edgeofyourseat]

"You have, like, a hundred books that represent your brain," Alice points out, perching on a corner of his bed. "Literally."

[self_composed]

"Oh. I guess that's perfectly true," laughs Bella. "For some reason that didn't occur to me. They're in the background."

[edgeofyourseat]

He looks across the debris field at the brick chimney set into the opposite wall.

"...Now that I know you can fall through that thing, it's kind of creeping me out," he says.

[self_composed]

She sits on his bed, safely away from the bricks. "I don't think putting another barrier in front of it would even help. It's magicked to let me in."

[edgeofyourseat]

"Yeah, let you in and then let you fall straight to the basement," he says. "Were there any skeletons of previous descendants down there?"

[self_composed]

"The only thing in the room was a weird sourceless probably-magic glow, and the book and the hex."

[edgeofyourseat]

"Great, now I'm imagining that the floor down there eats skeletons," he says. "...Stop me if I'm creeping you out."

[self_composed]

Bella laughed. "I don't think so. I think Elias Frobisher just didn't have a lot of descendants who happened to wander into the house. It's a two-story fall - it could kill me if I dove headfirst, but it wouldn't be too likely." She shrugged. "For practical reasons he wasn't really concerned about being injured, himself - maybe the point of the fall is specifically so what happened to me was possible."

[edgeofyourseat]

"Well, it's definitely one way to make sure whoever finds the book would use it," he says, rubbing the back of his head and looking half-suspiciously, half-admiringly at the chimney.

[self_composed]

"It does seem like it could backfire, though. Anyone can use the coin and there was only the one in there. I could have wasted it fixing my leg if I'd been a slightly different person." She glances at her backpack, currently on the floor. "I guess that's what the stash is for."

[edgeofyourseat]

"Yeah, something like that."

He grins. He can't help it.

Actual magic powers.

[self_composed]

She grins back, and giggles, and then laughs aloud. Not at all maniacally.

A little bit maniacally.

[edgeofyourseat]

"You're totally gonna take over the world," Alice predicts.

[self_composed]

"Maybe," sings Bella.

[edgeofyourseat]

"You are. I'm falling in love with you again," he declares.

[self_composed]

Bella laughs, and laughs, and laughs, and bites her own hand to keep from laughing, and a triangle appears between her first and middle fingers.

[edgeofyourseat]

Alice actually hugs himself with glee.

[self_composed]

This just sends Bella into another paroxysm of giggles. She gets another triangle out of biting her hand, then chomps harder and gets a square.

[edgeofyourseat]

...It's kind of...

Where'd he put that notebook she gave him? He gets up to look for it.

[self_composed]

Bella watches this with interest, releasing her hand from her teeth. She puts the coins in her pocket, which now contains enough that the glow is visible through the material. She frowns at this, and then puts her accumulation in the thicker backpack.

[edgeofyourseat]

"So," he says, digging in the laundry drifts near the chimney, "will it creep you out if I say it's kinda hot when you do that?"

[self_composed]

"Nah," Bella says. "It would only escalate to creepitude if you started swatting me without me signing up for that - whether you were doing it because it's hot or to try to steal the coins or because I annoyed you or whatever."