I looked, and now the bottle was full to the top. I slowly pulled out the stopper, careful not to spill even a drop of the precious purple liquid inside. Raising the bottle to my nose, I took a deep breath.
The most amazing scent filled the room: lavender flowers with a hint of lemon.
I held the bottle toward the window and let the crystal cast more dancing rainbows on the ceiling and floor.
“Hey, Spirit,” I called out to where he stood, waiting for me in the shady spot of the yard. “How would you like a bubble bath?”
Spirit whinnied.
“Sounds great, right?”
I knew this was the perfect thing I could to add to the PALs’ Horse Spa Day. We could wash Chica Linda, Boomerang, and Spirit with Aunt Cora’s bubble bath. Groom them with Pru’s brushes. Then, tie Abigail’s ribbons in their manes and tails.
When I jumped on Spirit’s back to ride over to the barn, I smiled. The Summer of Spirit was off to the perfect start.
And then everything went totally wrong.
Turned out that Boomerang didn’t like the smell of the lavender-scented bubble bath. When Abigail put a little of the purple soap in her hand, he backed away from her.
“Try it again,” I encouraged as I poured some into my hand, then passed the bottle to Pru.
I reached up to slather Spirit. He caught one whiff of the lavender and protested loudly as well, huffing and moving back away from my hand.
“Oh, come on, Spirit,” I cooed. “You’ll smell like Aunt Cora.”
I guess Spirit wasn’t into smelling like Aunt Cora.
Abigail was still struggling to put the soap on Boomerang. She was chasing him in and out of barn stalls with her hand held high.
“Maybe the horses would have liked the smell of Snips’s stinky mud better?” she suggested. Abigail admitted she’d tried the mud mask. She said it made her eyes water for a week. No matter how much she scrubbed, she couldn’t get the smell off!
I remembered that after Christmas, she’d worn a garlic necklace around her neck. She told me and Pru it was to keep away vampires in the new year. I should have guessed it was because garlic smelled better than the mud!
So, here’s how the day went from good to bad to worse:
Chica Linda was the only one willing to take a bubble bath. She got all soapy and slippery. She was loving it, but then, just as Pru was handing me back the crystal bottle, Boomerang reared up, once again backing away from Abigail.
Pru’s hands were slippery from the bubbles. Since Spirit wouldn’t let me put soap on him, my hands still had the soap dollop I’d intended to use. That meant my hands were slippery, too.
When Boomerang bumped Abigail, she bumped Spirit. Spirit bumped me, and I dropped the crystal bubble bath bottle. The good news was that before it crashed down, I reached out and caught it again by throwing myself over a barrel of oats with an outstretched hand.
But just as I was about to celebrate, I heard the distinct clatter of crystal on the barn floor.
What was that? I wondered.
It was the lid. I hadn’t caught the bottle and the stopper. Just the bottle.
Abigail shouted when she saw the diamond-shaped stopper on the floor near me. It was casting rainbows of light on the barn walls, which was pretty, but made it hard to see exactly where the stopper was.… We searched through wet bubbles and around horses until…
CRACK.
Boomerang stepped on it.
It wasn’t Boomerang’s fault, or Spirit’s for bumping me. Or Pru’s for having slippery hands. Or even Chica Linda’s fault. She had been the one who loved the bath.
Later, when I went to see Aunt Cora, I had to explain that the broken crystal stopper was all my fault. The truth was hard, but I told it. I’d taken the bubble bath from her box. I’d brought the crystal bottle to the barn.
Aunt Cora was pretty nice about it all. She didn’t yell at me. Or ground me for life, which is what I expected. She didn’t even tell my father. She sat calmly on her sofa, looking at the empty bottle and the broken stopper.
And then she said the words that ruined my summer vacation.
“Lucky,” Aunt Cora told me, “you will need to earn money this summer to replace the bottle and fill it with bubble bath.” She looked me straight in the eye. “I like lavender.”
The Summer of Spirit was over before it had even started. I won’t be doing nothing all summer after all. The best day turned into the worst because…
I need a job.
Mr. Winthrop!”
The instant the ice cream shop opened, Lucky flew through the door. “Mr. Winthrop!” she called again. When he didn’t reply, her first instinct was to check behind the counter. That’s where she’d found him that time his back went out.
He wasn’t there. She called again. “Mr. Winthrop! Where are you?”
Lucky looked around the parlor. There was a long counter for ice cream and some tables with chairs. She’d worked there for a few weeks while Mr. Winthrop’s back healed. It was after Spirit got hurt and he was healing, too. Lucky had liked working there and hoped he might need some help for the summer.
“Hello, Lucky.” Mr. Winthrop stuck his head out from the back room. He was wearing his work apron. “How can I help you this fine day? I was just whipping up some new butter pecan. Would you like some?”
“Oh, I’m not here for ice cream,” Lucky said, though butter pecan sounded delicious. “I was hoping for a summer position.” She rolled up on her tiptoes to look older and more mature since the last time she’d worked there.
“Ah,” Mr. Winthrop said, studying Lucky closely. “Yes, you were very helpful.”
Lucky smiled. “I know! Who would have guessed it was so difficult to serve ice cream?” In fact, she’d given the customers some confusing advice along with their cones, but it all turned
