The Zodiac Collector by Laura Diamond Page A

dress.”
    Right there, without warning, my heart melts. The lack of blood flowing through my body creates a sharp ringing in my ears. I press a shaky finger to my temple as if it’ll stop my brain from exploding. He’d commented about how Mom’s dress brought out the color of my eyes, but he hadn’t mentioned anything about looking pretty.
    â€œAre you okay?” He drapes his hands on my shoulders. So gentle. His touch shatters me.
    â€œY-yeah.” I lie. I mean, I’m not complaining about him being so close to me that I can smell his soap or feel the heat of his breath on my cheeks. It’s one hundred percent, completely what I want. Which is what makes me not okay. We’re best friends. Have been since we were in diapers. This is new territory and I don’t know how to act.
    Maybe there’s a spell for that.
    * * *
    I slip my backpack off as soon as I reach the top of the porch stairs. Slinking to the far corner, past Dad’s rusty bench, I drop to my knees and steady my breathing. Mary would flip out if she knew what I’m about to do.
    Huddling in the dark like a robber planning a break-in, I unzip my backpack and draw out a candle and book of matches. It takes three tries to get the wick to light. I scrape the wax off the stardust bottle’s top with my thumbnail. The cork sticks and I have to wiggle it back and forth. It comes free with a soft thunk .
    My stomach tumbles like an Olympic gymnast. I still haven’t had a chance to practice spells with Gamma and the last one was a mess. This would probably go better with Mary, but she doesn’t want any part of it. I take a deep breath and begin.
    â€œFour elements of the Zodiac ,
    Earth, fire, water, air .
    Gemini twins ,
    Castor and Pollux .
    Hear my plea .
    Help me figure out
    How to make William and me be!”
    I tip the bottle toward the flame, my hand shaking. Am I really doing this?
    Yep.
    With a flick of my wrist, a flurry of glitter rains down. It sizzles on contact with the melted wax and the candle almost goes out. Then the sizzling grows louder and the fire brightens, at first to a pale yellow, then a bright white.
    I expect it to die down, but it doesn’t. Instead, the light keeps getting more dazzling, more blinding, more… star -like.
    I lean back, squinting. This isn’t normal. I gulp. The old woman, Zeena, couldn’t really have given us real stardust. She couldn’t be a real witch. A kooky chuckle gurgles up my chest and past my lips.
    The candle starts wobbling all by itself. There’s no wind, no earthquake, no reason whatsoever for the thing to move on its own. Except for magick.
    â€œHoly Castor and Pollux,” I blurt. Had I listened to Mary and tossed the stuff away, I wouldn’t be here, crouching on my front porch, caught in a spell beyond my control.
    With a loud crack, the candle explodes and…
    â€¦disappears.
    I’m surrounded by all-encompassing darkness, like the sky without stars.

Chapter Nine
    M s. Sutters, Math Teacher Extraordinaire, goes at the whiteboard with her marker like a butcher hacking into a rack of ribs. Red ink smears across the surface in symbols and letters that are supposed to make some sort of sense. Maybe they do to a smart person. Me, on the other hand, I can’t organize a math problem from start to finish, even if my life depends on it.
    The teacher walks us through the problem and adds another for us to practice. I copy the wonky mess and stare at it, mouth slack. I squeeze the daylights out of my wizard’s-staff-shaped pencil. There’s no way a solution will come out of this. Maybe the ghost of a math whiz will possess my hand and scrawl something across the page and help me out, ‘cause I sure as heck can’t.
    After five agony-filled minutes, I drop my pencil and smash my cheek against my notebook with a groan.
    Mary jerks and the tip of her pencil snaps off. She purses her lips and glares at