Page 13 of By the Book

I managed—with some frantic signaling—to quell the lute and still the tabor. (Or whatever the medieval expression was.) Then I took up position with Bobby along one side of the room. The snack side. Next to the cupcake tower, in case anyone needed to know.

“Friends,” Mrs. Shufflebottom said. “Friends.”

People continued to talk over her.

“Everybody be quiet!”

That came from Princess McAdams.

Everyone got quiet. Fast.

“Friends,” Mrs. Shufflebottom said. “Thank you all for coming tonight. I can’t tell you how much it means to me.” She paused, overcome by emotion, and I was a little surprised to see tears gleam in the lamplight before she wiped them away. “We’re excited to begin the auction portion of our charity event. If you’ll come with me, we’ll see if we can do some good tonight.”

Approving murmurs floated up from the crowd.

“Let’s save the library!” Princess McAdams shouted.

Cheers went up, and with Mrs. Shufflebottom in the lead, everyone began to file out of the living room.

Bobby and I started to follow, working our way into the press of bodies. It was tight, with everyone moving en masse. Bobby took the lead—have I mentioned he has these amazing shoulders? When you have shoulders like that, it’s a lot easier to work your way into a crowd.

I was stepping forward to follow Bobby into the crush of bodies when I heard a voice behind me. It sounded familiar, but I couldn’t place it. “Excuse me.” It was a woman, and it sounded like she was right next to me. “Excuse me!” The voice was soinsistent that I started to turn. Then there was an angry cry, and someone bumped into me from behind.

I had the brief, outraged thought that someone was trying to push past me—and the second, even more outraged thought that nobody would ever try to push their way past Bobby. But all of that happened in a flash. Then I realized the bump had sent me off-balance, and I was falling.

I crashed into the snack table. The cupcake tower wobbled. Time stretched out, and I had an infinitely long heartbeat to watch the tower teeter back and forth. In that frozen moment, I thought I smelled cotton candy. And then the tower toppled, and cupcakes went everywhere.

Screams. Shouts. So much frosting.

Somehow Bobby made his way through the chaos and steadied me by the arm. “Are you okay?”

I nodded. “I tripped.”

I glanced around, but the well-ordered line of adults making their way out of the living room had dissolved into a mob of milling bodies—many of them bespeckled with frosting and cupcake crumbs and glaring at me. My anxiety (normally buzzing along at a steady five out of ten) jumped up to a nine. It was like a checklist of the perfect storm: lots of angry people; being the center of attention; social humiliation.

Then it got worse.

“My hair!” Mrs. Knight wailed.

And Mr. Eggleston, who was bald as, well, an egg, put his hands to his head, touched frosting, andscreamed.

“It was an accident,” Bobby said.

Something about that seemed wrong, but through my rising panic, I couldn’t think. I couldn’t do anything, actually—I was frozen.

“My suit is ruined!” That was a rail-thin hipster; it looked like the suit in question had been purchased from a thrift store (and not one of the hip ones).

“Everyone calm down,” Bobby said, and this time, it was his deputy voice. “If you’re okay, please move along to the billiard room. If you need to clean up, Millie and Indira will show you—”

Mrs. Shufflebottom’s scream rang through the house.

The commotion cut off until the only sound was the scream. We all turned to look. At the far end of the hall, barely visible in the gloom, the doors to the billiard room stood open. Ambient light outlined the faintest silhouette in the doorway.

“Stay here,” Bobby said.

As I hurried after him, a hub of frenzied voices erupted behind me.

Bobby glanced sidelong at me.

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