1
SEVEN YEARS AGO
Holly Starr wished she weren’t the daughter of a Las Vegas magician. She wished her dad hadn’t changed his name from Stuckenschneider to Starr when he broke into the business. She wished he hadn’t drafted her last autumn to assist him in his headlining casino act. He’d said he wanted her to learn the biz so she could take over as the magician someday. The prospect excited her. But in the meantime, she had to play showgirl, which was not exciting at all. It was mortifying. He made her wear a tacky 1970s-style spangled bikini that matched her mom’s. She was fourteen years old, for God’s sake. Some of her friends still didn’t dare wear a bikini to the pool. Granted, other friends told her (at least to her face) that they’d kill to be on a casino stage six nights a week like her, in the heat of the spotlight and the fever of the adult playground a few miles from their high school. But the more common attitude, especially among the older, cooler kids, children of doctors and lawyers and artists, was disdain for all things Vegas—including Holly, whom they looked down on as a freak with no future, like those double-jointed girls from Bulgaria who hung around the bathroom in the science wing and smoked cigarettes and stuck nails into their noses. She wished she were plain old Holly Stuckenschneider, ninth grader, perhaps a majorette in the marching band, definitely Elijah Brown’s girlfriend. But she wasn’t. She was Holly Starr, magician’s assistant. Her scantily clad likeness was blown up ten times larger than life on a billboard advertising her dad’s act over Interstate 15.
And now she could levitate. It was a bad end to a bad day in her bad life, she thought, as she used her mind to lift her parents’ mod leather couch and matching chairs and rearrange them to her liking as if they were plastic furnishings in a Barbie Townhouse, all from her vantage point floating in the air next to the living room chandelier.
To think, this had started as the best day of her life. First period at school, Elijah Brown had asked her to the ninth-grade prom. All school year she’d looked forward to the bell every morning because Elijah would stumble into the classroom half a second late. His clothes were as consistent as a uniform: faded jeans and a rock band T-shirt. His too-long sandy brown waves were mussed and generally mashed on one side like he hadn’t bothered to detangle them after rolling out of bed. Maneuvering down the row, he would look the guy in the first desk up and down as if he’d never seen him before, and give the same look to the second guy, constantly blinking as if he couldn’t quite wake up. Then he would look at her and his sleepy green eyes would widen, and he’d smile. “Hey, Holly,” he’d say, sending a rush through her as he slid into the desk behind her.
Her friends agreed he was hot, but Holly felt a special connection with him. Elijah’s mom was a blackjack dealer at the same casino where Holly’s dad put on his nightly act. Elijah worked there himself after school, learning the carpentry trade. Holly imagined he understood the casino experience as she did—not as a vice to be pined for, or a sin to be avoided, but a job. He was the only boy in school who greeted her like he was a friend, not a lecher, and never made her feel like a freak for wearing a spangled bikini to work.
And if she’d ever had a chance with him, it was now. The ninth-grade prom coming up in April gave vulnerable fourteen-year-old boys that extra push they needed to ask girls out—even quiet boys, even dreamy boys with green eyes. Finally came the day when Elijah shuffled into the classroom on the bell, gazed at the guy in the first desk, squinted at the guy in the second desk, looked at her, and smiled. This time, instead of saying, “Hey, Holly,” he asked, “Hey, Holly?” He wanted her to go to the prom with him, and he wanted her cell phone number.
In the break between second and third periods, she told her friends she had a prom date with Elijah Brown. They squealed and demanded to know what she would wear. Major dilemma! How could she dress for the prom and avoid looking like she was headed for work? She would need the only prom gown ever made with no sequins.
At lunch she cheered up, because Elijah texted her.
Making sure I input ur # right? Im in algebra. Have a good lunch. Tip: mac & cheese / strange consistency / plz avoid.
Holly’s mom didn’t give her lunch money. She made Holly bring yogurt and a banana from home. Warily Holly eyed the mac and cheese on someone else’s plate, then texted Elijah back.
# is right! Thx for checking. Stick w me: I am going to be a magician someday & I will teach u to change mac & cheese into Fritos.
Every day after lunch she looked forward to waving at Elijah as their paths crossed in the hall. She usually stressed out about the encounter and checked her makeup in her compact, letting her friends think she was vain in general, not for a specific guy. Today the bell rang to end lunch before she was ready. She probably had granola in her teeth. She hugged her friends good-bye and stepped alone into the cacophony of the hallway——and there he was, already walking toward her and grinning. His friend walking beside him was still talking. The friend hadn’t figured out yet that Elijah’s attention and his eyes were on her. Now the friend realized he’d lost Elijah and started pulling at him, teasing him.
Without looking at his friend, Elijah extended his arm—the sleeve of his T-shirt fell away to show Holly the toned biceps he’d developed working out for the high school lacrosse team—and shoved his friend into the crowd, where he was swept away by the current of students headed to fifth period. Elijah leaned against a locker in front of her.
“Hey, Holly,” he said. “I didn’t know you wanted to be a magician.”
She smiled so wide that the corners of her mouth ached, as if she were onstage. But for once, her smile wasn’t fake. Heart racing, she backed against the locker, too, and asked, “Do you like magic?”
He pursed his lips, suppressing a smile, and said coyly, “I’ve never seen any magic.”
“You’ve never come to my show?” she exclaimed, feigning outrage. She was a little hurt that he’d worked at the casino at least as long as she had, yet he’d never sought out her performance, such as it was. The next second she realized she did not want him to see this unfashionable holdover that should have been canceled about the same time the Stardust casino was demolished, and she should not have called it her show. She hadn’t meant to claim ownership of her parents’ old-school charade.
“I’ve wanted to,” he said, “but the guys at work won’t let me.” His half smile told her he was teasing her just a little, but he seemed so focused on her and so earnest that she knew he was telling her the truth. “We’re allowed in shows when a prop needs fixing. Yours is the only show at the casino that’s never broken.”