Free Flower Power by Nancy Krulik Page B

just to get the focus back on her.
    “Katie, could you help me clean this up?”Suzanne asked, grabbing a pile of napkins from her tray.

    “Um…sure,” Katie said. She frowned slightly. She couldn’t just let her best friend stand there in a puddle of red fruit punch, could she?
    It didn’t take very long for Katie and Suzanne to clean up the mess. A few minutes later, things were back to normal. Katie was seated between Jeremy and Suzanne. And once again, Suzanne was the center of attention.
    “I got geranium seeds to plant,” she boasted. “They are such beautiful flowers. They’re going to be bright red.”
    “I got impatiens,” Jeremy said. “I’m going to give them to my mother to plant in our garden when they’re big enough.” He turned to Katie. “What flower did you plant?”
    “I don’t know,” Katie told him.
    “You’re not planting seeds?” Suzanne asked. “What a bummer. We had a lot of fun doing that in
our
class.”
    “We will be planting seeds,” Katie assured her. “It’s just that I don’t know what flowers are going to come up.”
    “Why not?” Jeremy asked curiously.
    “We all got mystery flowers,” Katie explained. “We have to use the clues Mr. G. gave us to find out what we’re growing. After we solve the mystery, we’ll get to plant our seeds.”
    “It’s fun,” George said, looking up from the disgusting mush of tuna, Jell-O, and fruit punch he’d been creating on his tray. He pulled a slip of paper from his pocket. “‘This flower was used by native Americans for food and oil,’” he read aloud. “‘Some farmers use it to feed their animals. It’s the national flower of Russia.’”
    “I wonder what that could be,” Jeremy said.
    “My flower smells very sweet,” Kevin chimed in. “It’s used for decoration and it comes in a lot of colors. Some of them are even striped!”
    “Mystery flowers,” Jeremy remarked. “Wow. Mr. G. sure has a lot of cool ideas.”
    “Oh, give me a break!” Suzanne exclaimed. “It’s a
dumb
idea.”
    “No it’s not,” Katie said. “I love solving mysteries.”
    Suzanne sighed. “I can’t stand this place anymore. Everyone’s talking about dumb things like braces and mystery flowers. I wish I went to a school where people cared about
important things
, like fashion and makeup.”

    “You do not!” Katie exclaimed suddenly. “You do not wish that at all!”
    “Whoa, Katie Kazoo, calm down,” George said, using the way-cool nickname he’d given her. “Suzanne’s just being Suzanne. It’s no big deal.”
    But Katie knew that wasn’t true. Wishes were a very big deal. And only Katie knew why.

Chapter 3
    Wishes were dangerous
.
    Katie had learned that lesson after one really bad day back in third grade. That day, after dropping the ball, she lost the football game for her team. Then mud got all over her favorite pants. Worst of all, she’d let out a giant burp in front of the whole class. Talk about embarrassing!
    That night, Katie had wished that she could be anyone but herself. There must have been a shooting star flying overhead, because the next day the magic wind came.
    The magic wind was a big tornado that swirled only around Katie. It was so powerfulthat it could turn her into somebody else! The first time the magic wind came, it turned Katie into Speedy, class 3A’s hamster. She’d spent the whole morning running round and round on a hamster wheel. And when she finally escaped from her cage, she’d wound up inside George’s stinky sneaker. YUCK!
    Since then, the magic wind had been back again and again. One time it turned her into Mr. Starkey, the school music teacher. The band sounded really terrible when Katie was the conductor!
    And then there was the time Katie had turned into Dr. Sang, her dentist, at the very moment Emma W.’s little brother Matthew was having his first checkup. Matthew was scared to begin with. But once Katie made a mess of things, little Matthew vowed he would