“Alakazoo! Alakablam! Put me inside the book. Shazam!”

That’s not a real spell,” I yelled at my brother, James.

“Uh huh,” he replied.

“Then why aren’t you in the book,” I sneered.

“Shut up,” said James.
Hi, my name’s Gabriella. We’re wizards in training, in case you haven’t noticed. Right now we had some downtime and we were trying to magic ourselves into a book. It was called…well, I actually don’t know. The name’s in German, but the cover seems nice enough. There was a picture of a meadow with a lady walking through. I think the only reason James wanted to go inside the book was because it was the only book inside the house that he couldn’t understand. James loved to read and he was frustrated because he didn’t know what happens inside the book.

“Fine, if you’re so smart, give me the spell for it.”

“Hold on. I’m thinking. It’s…uhh,” I grunted in frustration, “I can’t remember. Hmm…do you remember what dad said about improvising spells?”

“Yeah,” said James, “he said they had to rhyme and be specific.”

“Ok, then I’m going to try and improvise one. Let’s see…



“Our summer has been perfect without fail

Soo…take me and James inside the magical tale.”


Whoosh. The wind picked up suddenly with a deafening roar. The leaves were swept up and surrounded us. The wind blew my hair around and I couldn’t see. Buildings started to spin and I got so dizzy, I closed my eyes. After a few seconds, the wind died down and I opened my eyes. I cleared the hair out of my face and…

“Whoa.”

“It really worked!”
We had made it inside the book.

“Mmm…what’s that smell,” I said.
James stuck his nose in the air and sniffed.
“It smells like pumpkin pie. My favorite! Let’s go!”
James took off down the road. I followed, yelling

“Stop! Wait! You don’t know where you’re going.”

“The smell’s coming from here. Come on,” James exclaimed as he knocked on the door.
The door opened.

“Hello?”
In the doorway, there was a woman standing. She was about 5’5 with long brown hair. She had an apron on.

“Well, hello children, she said, “my name’s Susan. Are you lost?

“Well…kinda,” I said, “you see we’re wizards and we kinda, might’ve, accidentally been sucked into this book.”

“That’s unfortunate. Is there any way I can help? Come in. Come in. I just finished baking a pumpkin pie. Would you like some? By the way, what are your names?”

“Well,” said James, “my name’s James and this is my sister, Gabriella. And yes, I would love some pumpkin pie. It’s my favorite.”

“Sit down and I’ll get you a slice,” she said.
Her house seemed relatively normal. The outside was blue with a white door. The lawn was perfectly manicured and the bushes were trimmed. When you walked inside, you entered into a large hallway. The kitchen was off to the left where we were now. The living room was off to the right and the bedrooms were in the back of the house. It was nice and orderly and it had a comfortable, homey feeling to it.

“I love your house,” I said, “Do you live here with anyone else?”
“No, I’m here all by my lonesome, but I don’t mind it. It’s actually kind of nice.”

“But,” said James, through a mouthful of pie, “don’t you want a husband and kids? I mean, I would get lonely being by myself all the time.”

“No, Susan replied, “Like I said…it’s kind of nice.
She stared out the window with a faraway look in her eyes. James and I stayed in our seats for a few minutes. After a couple minutes I cleared my throat.

“Huh hum”

“Oh. I’m sorry. I seem to have forgotten my manners today. Is there any way I can help you get back home?”

“We don’t want to go back home just yet. We actually thought we’d stay here for awhile. You know, like a mini-vacation,” I said.

“Ok. Well, if you need a place to stay. You’re welcome here.”

“Thank you. That would be most welcome.”

“Ok. I’ll go set up your beds. Why don’t you guys go explore a little bit?”

“That sounds like a good idea. We’ll see you at dinner.”
James and I walked outside into the sunshine. The sun was bright, so we shielded our faces with our hands.

“What luck that we met her, huh,” I said, “where would we have slept if we hadn’t?”

“Yeah, I know,” replied James, “how long do you think we should stay here?”

“I was thinking a couple of days.”

“But, won’t mom and dad get worried?”

“Nah, we’ll just tell them when we get back. They’ll probably get a kick out of it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

“You know, there’s not really that much to explore here. It looks just like home, except a lot less houses and a lot more trees.”

“Do you want to go back?”

“No. Let’s just walk around a little more.”
We walked around a little more, talking about nothing in particular. We finally got bored and started walking back to Susan’s house.

“Back so soon? Well come in. Dinner will be ready in a minute or two.”
Susan then began serving us our dinner. It was steak and mashed potatoes. It smelled delicious and it tasted as good as it smelled.

“Alright,” she said, yawning, “I’m beat. I’m going to bed.”

“Ok,” I said, “We’ll probably go to bed soon too. I’m tired from the ride here.”
Susan walked upstairs and we followed shortly after. James went into one of the rooms while I went to the room next to him.

“Ahhh!!!”

“What? What? What happened,” I woke up with a start.

We’re in a cage!! That crazy woman locked us in a room! Where are we,” yelled James.
I rubbed my eyes and looked around. James was right. We were in a small room. I went to the door and tried opening it, but it was locked. All of a sudden, I heard footsteps coming down the stairs. The door opened slowly. It was Susan.

“Why did you lock us up?! We haven’t done anything to you,” I yelled at her.
She looked a lot different than she did yesterday. She had a half-crazed look in her eyes and she looked like she hadn’t slept in weeks. I stepped back from the door.

“Because,” Susan said, “Your brother here was right. I am lonely. I am going to keep you and make you my children. I am going to take care of you and raise you and you’ll live here for the rest of your lives.”

“You’re crazy,” shouted my brother.

“Let us out. We wanna go home. Please.” I pleaded.

“I’m sorry children, but you’re mine now. This is your new home. You might as well get used to it,” she said, shutting the door.

“What are we going to do? We can’t stay here forever. This is all your fault,” I exclaimed.

“My fault! How is this my fault?”

“You and your books. You wanted so bad to know what this book was about and I got dragged into with you. Looks like we know now what it’s about.”
“Well, you’re the one who said the spell that got us into this book, so technically it’s your fault.”

“It doesn’t matter whose fault it is. The fact is, we’re trapped and we have to get out. Do you have any ideas,” I asked.

“Uhh…how about if one of us says we have to go to the bathroom and when she opens the door, we both tackle her.”


“I don’t know. Don’t you think she’ll be expecting that?”

“Yeah. Maybe. Hey, look, a window,” said James, “Do you think we can escape through it?

“I don’t think so. Look how small that window is. I‘ll never be able to fit through it. Wait! Wow. I feel dumb. We’re wizards. Why don’t we just magic ourselves out of here?”

“Oh yeah! I forgot too. Think of something.”

“I am. Hold on…..

“Susan is in her house, the one and only, help her not feel so lonely.”

What are you doing? I thought you were gonna get us out of here! I am but I feel bad for her. She kidnapped us because we were lonely now she won’t be so lonely anymore.”

“Ok, we took care of her being alone. Now take us home”
Suddenly, the room began spinning.

“You did it, James. You rhymed. We’re going home!”

“I d-“

“Where have you two been? I’ve been calling you for over ten minutes. You both nee-“

“Mom!!”

“Did I miss something?”

“Nope”

“Nothing”

“Alright. Well come inside and eat your dinner. It’s getting cold”
James and I just looked at each other and smiled.