She sighs.
“I remember that everyone, the troop leaders, the other Daisies, even my mom, started laughing at me.”
I put my hand over hers. “Oh, Julia.”
“And they weren’t even trying to get me to laugh with them.” She presses the heel of her other palm into her cheek. “They were just laughing at how stupid I was. That I was dumb enough to believe that elves and magic mirrors could really exist.”
For a moment, I picture Julia as a kid, off in some quiet area of Golden Gate Park. I can imagine me and Cam just on the other side of a nearby tree, scaling up its winding branches, pretending we were lost in the enchanted woods. Cam and I believed in magic then too. We believed in magic for a long time. Until one day…we just didn’t.
“You must’ve felt lonely,” I say, staring off into the distance.
“Yeah—I ended up quitting. Sunny once mentioned being a Girl Scout Brownie, and I didn’t say anything at the time, but, gosh, on the inside, I was so angry. I couldn’t believe thatSunnyof all people outlastedmein Girl Scouts.”
She lets out a halfway laugh.
“But, anyway, that’s why I’m doing the treasure hunt now,” Julia says. She blinks and looks directly at me. “Because fuck my troop.”
My eyes bug out. “Excuse me, did you just say the f-word?”
Julia raises her chin. “You shouldn’t laugh at people who believe in things. Sometimes, even in the real world, magic can exist. Sometimes fairy tales can be real.”
“Yeah, well.” I sniff and stare off into the distance. “Sorry it didn’t turn out that way for us this time.”
Julia pushes herself from the wall. “Ivy, what are you talking about? We’re doing amazing. This, already,ismagic.”
I roll my eyes. “Yeah, all those books on how to design support beams and retaining walls looked super magical back there. What a treasure trove.”
“Stop it,” Julia says seriously. She pauses, contemplative. “You know, the reason I wanted to tell you this story earlier was because there was this ugly voice in my head saying you guys would all laugh at me and then kick me out of the group. And I wanted to get that over with before I got too involved.”
I give her a look. “Why would we have kicked you out?”
“I don’t know.” She flaps her hands. “Because you three are cool, and I’m just this nerd trying to do vengeance for my eight-year-old Girl Scout self?”
I laugh. “Are you kidding me? Girl Scout vengeance is probably the best motivation I’ve ever heard of.”
Julia laughs and stands. “So my mean internal voice was wrong,” she says. “I wonder if yours is too.” She offers me her arm.
I take Julia’s hand and stand up after her, then surprise myself by not immediately letting go.
“I feel like I’m going to give you another hug right now,” I say, in the same way a kid informs everyone in a car that he’s about to vomit. Which roughly describes how I feel about hugging.
But Julia doesn’t seem to mind. “Of course you are,” she says cheerfully, and pulls me in, technically beating me to the punch.
The crush of her sweater against my jacket feels strange, and I think boobs should really be strategically placed in a hug to not squeeze the life out of anyone. Still, it’s not bad. For a second I even relax into Julia’s shoulder as she squeezes mine.
We separate and look down the shadowy aisle of the library.
“We’re going to figure this out, aren’t we?” I ask.
“Yes.” Julia flashes a playful, unreserved smile. I can almost see her kid self shining directly through it. “We really are.”
We walk back to the others.
Chapter Eighteen
We find Sunny and Gabriel in the same aisle, although at this point it doesn’t look the same at all. Every book marked with the call number 723 has been swept off the shelf and is now sitting in one of several extremely tall stacks along the floor.
“Okay,” Julia says as we goose-step over the shortest pile. “This is either an insanely elaborate game of Jenga or the most creative cityscape model I’ve ever seen.”
