Magic Street Page 0,47

it, it's magic to you." Mack held out his hand.

"What," asked Ceese.

"Take my hand and look up the street. Don't look toward the houses at all. Stand right... right there."

Ceese obeyed.

"Now, when I pull you, you just follow, but don't look where we're going." When he could see that Ceese was following orders, Mack stepped off the sidewalk and headed toward Skinny House.

He half expected to feel Ceese's hand vanish from his, or to have the grass just be the grass between the two visible houses.

But no, Skinny House loomed, and Ceese's hand stayed in Mack's, and in a moment they were standing on the front porch and Ceese was looking back and forth between the neighboring houses and touching the door and the walls, saying, "Good Lord."

"Ceese, I know the Lord got nothing to do with this, and I'm pretty sure that it ain't good."

Chapter 10

WORD Mack and Ceese stood on the back porch of Skinny House, looking at the orange trees and the rusty barbecue and the umbrella-style clothesline.

"We're standing on the back porch of an invisible house, and you still don't believe me?" said Mack.

"Well, there wasn't a fridge in the kitchen, either," said Ceese.

"Because it was your mama's fridge. It was probably all your mama's stuff. I showed you the pants. I showed you the claw marks and the bloodstains. I showed you the five-dollar bills I took out of all the pockets."

"That doesn't prove anything. Lots of people got more five-dollar bills than that."

"But not me," said Mack.

"Miz Smitcher didn't up your allowance?"

"Ceese, you gave me the original five dollars."

Ceese hooted. "That was three years ago!"

"I don't spend much."

"Mack, I believe you, of course I do. But it takes getting used to."

"What's to get used to? Either it's in front of your face or it isn't. This is, so you got to believe it."

"And if it isn't in front of my face?"

"Then you got to have faith."

"When you have faith in something a lot of other people believe, then you a member of the church," said Ceese. "When you have faith in something nobody believes, then you a complete wacko."

"Well, I believe it and so do you, so between us, we half a wacko each."

"And you been keeping secrets like this your whole life?"

"Nothing like this. I only found this place yesterday."

"And there was a man in the house."

"I call him Mr. Christmas." For right now, Mack wasn't interested in bringing Puck's real name into the conversation. He had a feeling that might make things too strange for Ceese.

"Cause he looks like Santa Claus?"

"Well, then, the name 'Mr. Christmas' make perfect sense. I always think of Bob Marley at Christmastime."

"I wish I knew where he was," said Mack. "He could explain things to you a lot better than me.

Except that he lies all the time."

"All the time?"

"No. He tells the truth just enough to keep you from knowing what's what."

"Well, then, I can't wait to meet him. I don't have half enough liars in my life."

"Come on out into the woods with me. Just a little way," said Mack.

"Why?"

"For one thing, so you can see that I'm not making it up."

"I really do believe you now, Mack. I really do."

"You scared of the woods?"

"I'm scared of that panther. He likes you fine, but I don't want to test to see if my pistol can kill a magic cat. Besides, a cop shooting a Black Panther is such a stereotype."

"Ha ha," said Mack. "It ain't that kind of panther, and you no kind of cop at all, yet."

"I don't even have a gun yet," said Ceese.

"Then why you worried about whether you can shoot a panther?"

"Thinking ahead."

Mack took him by the hand and dragged him to the edge of the patio. But the cement didn't turn to brick under their feet, and when they stepped off into the grass they squished rotting oranges, which was fine for Ceese, wearing shoes as he was, but pretty icky for Mack, whose feet were bare.

"I guess I don't have permission to enter Fairyland," said Ceese.

"Then why were you able to get into the house?"

"Maybe halfway is as far as I can go."

"No, let's try getting you in sideways."

They tried crossing the patio with Ceese's eyes closed, and with Ceese walking backward, but there was no woods and no brick path and finally it occurred to Mack that maybe the problem wasn't Ceese.

Where Puck had turned small and slender and green-clad, Ceese had changed in an entirely different way.