Read Online Abby Carnelia's One and Only Magical Power by David Pogue - Free Book Online Page B

he’d said. “Now it’s an aquarium!”)
    Carly and Josh stepped a couple of paces closer to the aquarium table and stood on either side. Carly steadied the egg, and then the two of them lowered it into the water.
    â€œThat’s it,” Abby said. “Just rest the ruler across the top.”
    There the egg sat, halfway down in the fish tank, completely inaccessible to air currents, utterly untouched by human hands. An egg in a tank.
    The cameraman crouched down to focus his lens on the underwater egg.
    â€œNow, we’re all magicians here. You’re all capable of figuring out how any trick is done. What I’d like you to do now is figure out how
this
is done.”
    And with that, she reached up to her earlobes again and made that egg spin
in water.
It was the creepiest darnedthing most of those campers and counselors had ever seen.
    This time, Abby didn’t have to wonder what they were thinking. The applause was immediate—and thunderous. It continued as Abby dropped her hands to her sides, and the egg slowly swam to a stop. Abby took a step backward, beaming.
    She looked out into the theater, the waves of fear finally falling away. For the first time, she was able to experience the audience’s reaction, and it was
awesome.
She felt like flying. She wasn’t a freak anymore—she was a magician! With Ben’s help, she had turned her pointless power into an actual stage illusion—and
that,
she thought, was quite a trick.
    She scanned the audience, hoping to spot Ben, but the spotlights continued to blind her.
    Much later, though, she would remember something that she
did
see, something she didn’t think was important at the time: a line of three counselors sitting together in the second row. They were the only ones not clapping. Instead, they were bending forward in a huddle, talking fast, looking up at the egg and pointing in her direction.

CHAPTER
10
Ferd
    A BBY QUICKLY DISCOVERED a great thing about performing a hit trick at Camper Show: you become a minor celebrity. When she got back to Witches 3 that night, No-H Sara and the other girls mobbed her, hugged her, high-fived her, and pelted her with questions and congratulations.
    â€œI thought you haven’t done much magic before?”
    â€œWhat’d Ferd say?”
    â€œWill you look at my trick and tell me if you think it’s any good?”
    â€œHow long did you have to practice?”
    â€œWhere’d you get those Nerf balls?”
    But Abby also quickly discovered a not-so-great thingabout performing a hit trick at Camper Show: the conversation turned pretty quickly to how she did it.
    â€œHey, so how does the trick work?”
    â€œYeah, how’d you do it?”
    â€œWhat’s the secret?”
    â€œCan you teach me?”
    â€œCome on, you can tell us. We’re your best friends!”
    Unfortunately, she couldn’t tell them. Oh, she
would
have told them the secret of the trick—if there were one to tell. But what do you say when you don’t even know how it works yourself?
    So Abby froze, unable to say anything at all. “Well, it’s—it’s kind of complicated,” she managed in a small voice.
    Fortunately, Claudia the counselor caught her panic-stricken look and stepped in to help. “Come on, witchezzzz,” she said matter-of-factly, “There’ll be time for that later. It’s already past lights-out time. Who’s first for the outdoor shower?”
    And just like that, the party broke up. Little No-H Sara was the last to leave Abby’s side—“You’re gonna tell me how you did that, girl!” she said with an evil look—and then it was over.

    In the morning, on the way to breakfast, everybody seemed to recognize Abby. Nobody had the first clue what her name was, but everybody who’d been at the show high-fived her, gave her a thumbs-up, or at least smiled as they passed. The whole feeling of