Lauren Magaziner - The Only Thing Worse Than Witches

“Don’t worry,” his mother said. “I’m almost done with you. I just want to get this muck off your arms, now that I’ve started scrubbing. Then I promise I’ll leave you alone. What do you want for dinner — pizza? I’ll even let you eat in the tub.” She winked at him.

“I think I’ll take it in my room, please,” Rupert said. He didn’t want to think about dropping a slice of pizza in the grimy bathwater, but his mind instantly went there. He knew that if Mrs. Frabbleknacker were here, she would make him eat the bathwater pizza, and that was an even worse thought.

“I can give you microwavable pizza, microwavable lasagna, microwavable quesadillas, microwavable popcorn, microwavable rice, microwavable chocolate soufflé, microwavable cheese, microwavable toast, or microwavable cheese on toast. Which do you prefer?”

Rupert groaned. “Does everything in our house have to be microwavable?”

“Oh, Rupert, you know I’m too exhausted to cook by the time I get home from work.”

“So, how was work today?”

Rupert’s mother hummed absently. “The day was lovely. Except… ” She froze and looked at nothing in particular with glazed, distant eyes. “Mrs. Marmalin had to chase a witch out of the quilting shop with a broom.”

Rupert nodded. “I ran into Mrs. Marmalin on the way up here. She told me.” His mother wrung out the dirty washcloth in the sink. “What did the witch look like? What did she say? Did she do any spells? Did she hex you?”

His mother laughed.

“I just can’t believe you actually met a witch. I mean — I’ve obviously seen the pack flying around Gliverstoll, but I’ve never talked to one!”

“And let’s hope you never have to,” his mother said with a shudder. “Remember what I said about the witches, Rupert. This one in particular had a downright dreadful temper. She kept calling herself the ‘Queen of the Sea,’ and threatened to slap us with a dead fish.”

“Cool! Then what happened?”

“Rupert!” his mother said, in a scolding sort of voice. “I will not indulge your curiosity! I’ve told you a thousand times: stay away from the witches—”

“But why?”

“They are dangerous! And horrible! And terrible!”

“Why? What’s wrong with them?”

“Wisdom is just another word for obedience,” his mother said, reciting a fortune cookie.

“Didn’t you tell me last week that another word for genius is obsession?”

“Rupert!”

Rupert folded his arms. “All right, all right. I’ll stay away from the witches.”

There was a long pause, and Rupert hoped his mother had let the subject drop.

His mother finally put the grimy washcloth on the bathroom floor and stood up. “I suppose that’s as good as I’m going to get. I’m leaving so you can take a real bath.” His mother turned to leave the bathroom, but then she paused with her hand on the doorknob. “Rupert, why don’t I see any of your friends around the house anymore? Did something happen? Are you fighting?”

Rupert frowned. Now that his mother mentioned it, the loneliness seemed real. And it all boiled down to Mrs. Frabbleknacker. She was the horrible, rotten reason that none of them talked to him anymore — because she forbid them to talk before class, she forbid them to talk during class, and she forbid them to talk after class.

“Everything’s fine,” Rupert lied. “We’re just really busy, now that we’re in fifth grade.”

His mother sniffled. “My little boy is growing up!” And with the soft creak of the closing door, she was gone.

Rupert watched the dirt swirl around in the bathwater. Dirt and grime. Grime and dirt. Rupert churned it with his finger. When he got bored, he hung his body over the side of the bathtub, thinking about what had happened. Millie Michaels found the paper clip — but then Mrs. Frabbleknacker made her stay while the rest of the class got to go. Poor Millie. She thought she had won the lottery, only to have the rules changed.

Rupert leaned forward out of the bathtub, accidentally dripping water everywhere as he grabbed the newspaper that was sitting in the rack beside the toilet. He flipped right to the comics section for a bit of cheering up, but on the adjacent page, a notice in the classified section caught his eye:

One apprentice. Tasks include testing potions and other things. Skill sets for applicants should include intelligence and other things. Applicants should be children preferably. Don’t worry — will not make Toecorn out of you (this witch finds Toecorn much less appetizing than Knuckle Soup). Rabbits need not apply.

Rupert tore the article out of the paper. Then he folded it and placed it in the sole of his shoe.

A witch’s apprentice. As he thought about the job, excitement bubbled in his stomach (or maybe that was the dump sludge finally catching up with him).

This was perfect. Beyond perfect. The most perfectly perfectest perfecty thing to ever fall beside Rupert’s toilet.

ON SATURDAY — AFTER RUPERT’S MOTHER LEFTfor work — Rupert changed into his very best suit and tie for his job interview. He was to meet the witch in Digglydare Close, a stuffy alleyway at sea level.

As Rupert left his house, he was thinking about how far up the mountain he lived. On the one hand, Rupert loved the beautiful view of the ocean from his window, but on the other hand, Main Beach was quite a hike down the hill. Today, Rupert wasn’t particularly excited to schlep all the way to Digglydare Close, which was right off Main Beach.

Rupert crossed the street diagonally to get to the top of the staircase that cut through the town and led all the way down the hill. The steps were quite narrow, winding, and steep, and Rupert had to hold onto the broken stone walls of the stairs all the way down. Even climbing down the steps was a workout, and when Rupert finally reached the Main Beach at the bottom, he wiped his sweaty forehead with his sleeve.

He stared at the Main Beach, a small area of grainy sand that connected to the endless ocean. The water glowed a neon shade of blue, and the smell of the salty seawater was so strong that Rupert could almost taste it. He had heard tourists complain about the stench, but this fishy tang smelled like home to him.

Rupert walked through the beach to the shops that lined the bottom of the rocky hill. A few local shopkeepers waved in Rupert’s direction, and Mrs. Gummyum, the owner of the ice-cream store where his mother worked, called out to him.

“Rupert!” she said, waddling over to him. “Where’s our favorite ice-cream taster today?”

“You mean Mom? She’s working at the…” he was about to spill his mother’s fortune-cookie secret. “Working on learning how to cook,” he said, which was a terribly unconvincing lie to anyone who knew his mother at all.

“Cook?” Mrs. Gummyum said. “Cook! Why does she need to cook when she can eat all of my ice-cream flavors? She’s not trying to make ice cream, is she? Not that we couldn’t handle a competing store—”

“Mom’s not cooking ice cream, Mrs. Gummyum,” Rupert reassured her. “She’s making vegetables.”

“Vegetables? Who needs vegetables? Unless you’re making spinach and artichoke ice cream, the only vegetable ice cream around. Though lately I’ve been dreaming of carrot ice cream… perhaps I should try that…”

“She’s cooking vegetables for my health. I’m a growing boy,” he said, which is something that every adult had said to him for as long as he could remember. “But anyway, Mrs. Gummyum, I have to go. I’m late!”