Page 28 of The Bleak Beginning

“Yeah, I mean look for yourself,” he says, shoving the bottle in my direction. “It saysrealfairy dust.”

I grit my teeth. My patience is completely gone. Un-freaking-believable.

I pinch the bridge of my nose. “That’s a bottle of glitter from a craft store. It’s for children’s art projects, not magical feats,” I say, pointing at the label on the back.

He blinks at me, deflating like a punctured balloon. “But…but it sparkles just like they say fairy dust does in the stories!”

I must be losing it, because I can’t help but chuckle, despite my exasperation. “Of course it sparkles. It’s glitter. It’s designed to sparkle.”

He turns the bottle over in his hands, squinting at the label.

“Well,” he says, a hint of a grin playing at the corners of his mouth, “I suppose this explains why nothing happened when I sprinkled it on the hummus I had in my bag.”

“Why would you do that?”

“Chickpeas,” he responds like that’s a logical answer. “I wanted to grow a giant bean stalk.”

I stare at him, mouth agape, torn between calling out his lunacy and face-palming. “You…you put glitter in your hummus?”

He shrugs, a crazy glint in his eye. “Well, when you say it like that, it does sound a bit ridiculous.”

“A bit?” I choke out. “You’re lucky you didn’t end up with the world’s most fabulous case of indigestion.”

“So you’re saying I probably shouldn’t eat the carrots either?”

My head shakes side to side. “Probably not.”

“Well, I gotta go,” Alfie says suddenly, and a giant cloud of white smoke appears around him with apoof.

Coughing, I blink, swatting away the influx of smoke and stare at the spot where he’d just been standing. The door chime dings a moment later.

“Well, that was…different,” I mumble to myself, shaking my head in bewilderment.

I swear, Altair gets weirder and weirder by the day.

As I turned to leave the mailroom, my eyes fall on the letter I’d come to mail in the first place.

With a groan, I pick it up and slip it into my pocket, as flecks of glitter fall onto it.

Another irritated sigh settles in my throat. Great.

As I step out of the mail building, sparkles mock me with its cheerful glimmer. Glitter clung to every inch of me, sparkling in the outside air. I squint, momentarily blinded by my own radiance.

“Well, well, well,” drawls a familiar voice. “If it isn’t our favorite charity case. Get all dolled up on our account?” Sylvester taunts.

“Yeah, you’re practically glowing,” Camden chimes in right after.

My eyes shoot to the sky. As if this couldn’t get any more embarrassing.

Of course Camden and Sylvester would be here now, of all times. I turn to face the duo casually lounging against the opposite wall.

“Gents.” I nod, trying to maintain my dignity while shedding a small cloud of glitter with every movement. “Lovely day for some sparkle, isn’t it?”

“Looks like someone had an accident with some fairy dust.” Camden drawls.

My eyes narrow, instantly knowing I’d been set up.

Of course. Literallyof course,because why couldn’t this day be any worse?

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