Read Online A Little Bit of Spectacular by Gin Phillips - Free Book Online

myself from considering. What if the possibilities I’d told myself were crazy were actually true? What if the Plantagenets were magical—if they were aliens or a secret club or whatever—and they had some kind of special powers?
    Maybe the Plantagenets wrote on the walls because they wanted to be found. And if you found them, they could do all sorts of wonderful things. Make all your wishes come true. Make anything happen. Or unhappen.
    Maybe.
    As Amelia would say, I needed more data. The only question was where to find it. And I was beginning to think I had a decent guess.
    Gram was waiting for me on the sofa when I finally let myself back into the condo. I didn’t see Mom.
    â€œGood day?” Gram asked, sipping a glass of water.
    â€œSure,” I said.
    â€œThat’s why you were out there lurking on the stairs?”
    â€œI wasn’t lurking.”
    â€œYour mom says you disappeared nearly an hour ago.”
    She patted the sofa next to her, and I didn’t see any easy way to avoid sitting down for more talking. But when I eased onto the cushions, folding my legs up under me, Gram didn’t say anything. She turned back to the television, which had some dumb judge show on it. I hate judge shows. The judges are always so sure of themselves. Just once I’d like to hear one of them say, “
Hmm, that’s a tough one. I don’t know. I tell you what—I’m thinking of a number between one and a hundred. Whoever guesses closest wins. Loser goes to jail. Case dismissed.”
    That’s how things are really decided, isn’t it? Just luck or no luck.
    â€œHomework?” asked Gram after a while.
    â€œFinished,” I said. “And no tests tomorrow.”
    â€œYou see Amelia at school today?”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    â€œI did good, didn’t I? I told you you’d like her.”
    We’d sort of already been through this—I’d told Gram when we drove back from Amelia’s that we’d had fun. I’d said I liked her. I’d said we were going to hang out again. But Gram wasn’t letting it go. She liked to hear how right she’d been.
    â€œI know,” I said, trying to smile. “I’m glad you introduced me to her.”
    â€œYou still hoping to go over to her place tomorrow?”
    I didn’t want to get into that quite yet. “I think so. Or we might go somewhere else, I guess. I’m going to call her tonight.”
    The judge on television banged her gavel, and Gram was quiet for a while.
    â€œYou should go talk to your mom,” she said.
    I just kept looking at the television.
    â€œShe asked me to send you into her room.”
    Gram flexed her bare feet back and forth like they were bothering her. Her ankles looked swollen.
    â€œAnd she said to tell you that you didn’t have to talk,” she added. “Or that you could talk about how many times the average human blinks in a day. Something like that. I never know what you two mean.”
    â€œOkay,” I said, relieved. “I know what she means.”
    No more Dad conversation. I felt my mood improve a little bit.
    Gram nodded, either at me or at the television.
    â€œYou know,” she said, “these poor people come on this show and let that judge ask them all sorts of questions and insult them and order them around. Don’t you wonder why anyone would ever come on this program?”
    â€œYes,” I said, because I had always wondered that exact thing.
    â€œI think,” she said, “that it’s because people just need to talk. They get stuff built up inside them, and they need to let it out. They need somebody to listen. Even if they don’t know it.”
    â€œI don’t think that’s it,” I said.
    I stood up and turned away from the television.

Chapter 7
    WHAT THE TREE TOLD US
    It was easier than I thought it would be to get a ride to the old Plantagenet High School. It turned out