“I need you, Pili,” Danny whispered to himself.
His corner of the library was quiet. Only the hum of the blasting air conditioner vibrated in the air. He felt his breath catch when there was a flash of movement in the corner of his eye. Dark wisps moved in the air. His heart raced. There was someone standing at the end of the corridor. He couldn’t see anything else but a girl-shaped shadow. A light giggle that sent a jolt of lightning to his chest. He knew that laugh anywhere.
“Pili?” he said again. This time his voice was stronger. He made to run after her but tripped over his stack of books.
When he righted himself, the shape was gone. Had there been someone there or had it been his imagination again? Mrs. Contreras had reminded him that sometimes kids, especially lonely kids like Danny, wanted to believe in something so much that their minds played tricks on them. Was that what was happening to him? His own mind was one big trick? He hated that thought.
Then the squeaky feedback of the speakers made his ears hurt.
“The library will be closing in fifteen minutes,” a voice said.
Danny hurried between the shelves to return the books he’d been reading. For a moment, a dark blurry figure caught his attention again. Danny shut his eyes and counted backward from ten. When he peeked, the shadows against the wall had begun to move. It reminded Danny of the time he was in art class and dropped a bit of ink in a water cup. The black unfurled and billowed. It was unlike any shadow Danny had ever seen. He remembered that it wasn’t just stars that could take you to another realm. Shadows could, too, as long as they were enchanted. He leapt against the wall, his hands ready to close on the dark moving shape.
Pain splintered up his hands and shoulders from slamming into the wall.
“My word!” the librarian, Mr. Dussek, muttered as he walked around the corner. “What are you doing, Danny?”
Danny looked up at the wall behind Mr. Dussek. There was nothing there but paint and posters of famous people telling kids to read.
“Just clumsy,” Danny said, and picked up the mess of books he’d knocked over.
He convinced himself that the shadows hadn’t moved and the blurry shape must’ve been the librarian passing by. That’s what happened when he thought about magic. He forgot what was real and what was fake. Stars were gas, not transportation. Shadows did not move on their own; it was a trick of the light. Everything had a really real, magic-less explanation.
“Are you okay, Danny?” Mrs. Haydenson asked him during dinner that night. Mr. Haydenson was working late again. “You’ve been quiet since we left the library.”
Danny pushed his rice around the plate. He hadn’t been able to forget the moving shadow, but he was going to keep his promise to Mrs. Contreras. He was turning eleven in six months, after all. If years in the System had taught him anything, it was that once you hit your teenage years, you didn’t believe in anything, anyway. You started scowling and yelling and listening to punk rock music. Danny couldn’t imagine himself like that.
“Nothing, I’m just hungry.” Danny scooped up his rice and shredded pork and ate faster.
Mrs. Haydenson laughed and patted her belly to show she was full. “Me too, kiddo.”
A few weeks later, Mrs. Contreras came to bring Danny back to the group home. The Haydensons hugged him and said they were sorry and they cried, but then let him go anyway. Danny didn’t understand why. He’d done everything right. He’d been good and stayed out of trouble. He’d gotten good grades and was one of the best students in his class. He did what everyone had asked him to and it didn’t work. What else could he possibly do to find a family that wanted him?
As they rode back in the car, Mrs. Contreras finally explained to him that the Haydensons were going to have triplets and had changed their mind about keeping Danny. It hurt the most because Danny knew he would make an excellent big brother.
He looked out the car window. It was daylight and kids were playing on the street. There was a girl with long black hair who looked just like Pili. He knew it wasn’t her but his insides felt like knots. Then he wondered—could he do what she’d done and run away?
That was the moment Danny could feel everything changing, like the turn of the planets and the seasons and all the things that couldn’t be controlled. He was changing. Danny, the boy who believed, was ready to grow up.
GROWING UP DIDN’T HELP Danny fit in with his new foster family, the Garners.
The Garners were his twelfth foster family overall, including the ones he’d shared with Pili. It felt like he could divide his eleven-year-old life into two sections: Before Pili Left and After Pili Left. Before Pili Left was a whirlwind of stories. Of fairyland magic. Of promises and wishes. Without her, after her, the world felt drained of color. It was like living somewhere permanently cloudy and gray. It had only gotten worse after his book had been thrown into the trash.
He tried to start fresh with this new family, but he simply didn’t have anything in common with the Garners. Though, as bad as they were, Danny knew they could be worse. Mrs. Contreras remained hopeful that Danny would find a permanent home. He didn’t believe the Garners would be it, but they were a family. So even when Freddy and Teddy were mean, even when they hid his schoolbooks in places he couldn’t reach, even when Mr. Garner was red with anger and shouted and Mrs. Garner pretended like nothing was wrong, Danny made it work.
On the morning of a school field trip, Danny woke from a fitful dream. He’d been alone in the dark, surrounded by shadows and whispers. Then someone called out to him from a great, long distance. He didn’t recognize the voice because it sounded like the echo after a bell. He rubbed tired, blurry eyes and told himself it was just a dream.
The smells of breakfast wafted up the steps and into the open door of his bedroom. His foster mother must’ve been in there because the curtains were spread open and let in the orange glow of sunrise. Danny shot up in bed. Another ten minutes and he would have overslept. Mr. Garner liked to wake everyone up at the crack of dawn with him. Danny didn’t mind, especially today. But before he got out of bed, he had to make sure it was safe.
Danny peered around the room he shared with Freddy and Teddy. He had to be very careful with Freddy and Teddy because they liked pranks more than anything in the world, even more than bacon. Sometimes he woke up with roaches all over his bed. They were plastic, of course. But that is hard to tell when you first wake up and see dozens of bugs covering every inch of your comforter. Freddy and Teddy knew Danny hated bugs. He tried to tell Mr. and Mrs. Garner, but they wouldn’t listen. Mr. Garner said it was just good fun, and Mrs. Garner smiled in that strange way of hers, like she really wanted to be somewhere else.
Another time, Danny woke up to find his ankles tied with Mrs. Garner’s craft ribbon. When he tried to get out of bed, he tumbled right over and fell on his funny bone. There had never been and would never be anything funny about a funny bone. He told Mr. and Mrs. Garner again. Mr. Garner said, “Boys will be boys! Join the fun.” But Danny didn’t think that was how boys were supposed to act, and there was nothing fun about hurting someone on purpose. After all, Danny and the twins were the same age—eleven. And Danny didn’t act like them. Meanwhile, Mrs. Garner smiled her faraway smile, and Danny learned to keep quiet.