The Mystery of the Birthday Basher

to call first—but Amirah’s special knock always told her she was there.
Sure enough, Mrs. Maria was already grinning when she opened the door.
“What a special surprise on such a steamy day!” Mrs. Maria cried. “Come in out of the heat!”
“And here’s another surprise!” Amirah said as she held out the little cake. It didn’t seem possible, but Mrs. Maria’s smile grew even bigger.
“Mmm, how beautiful! You’ll split it with me, I hope,” Mrs. Maria told her.
“I’ll just have a bite . . . or three,” Amirah replied with a grin.
“And how about some nice cold horchata?” Mrs. Maria suggested.
“Perfect!” Amirah replied.
A few minutes later, Amirah and Mrs. Maria sat across from each other with plates of cake and glasses of horchata. The sweet, creamy horchata was flecked with cinnamon. It was cool and refreshing, the perfect drink to accompany the cake Amirah had made.
“Mmm,” Amirah said happily, wiping her mouth after she took a big sip of her horchata.
Mrs. Maria smiled. “Some people only like to have cinnamon during the cooler months, but I like it every day of the year,” she said in a voice that sounded like she was telling Amirah a big secret.
“Me too,” Amirah replied.
“And cake, of course,” Mrs. Maria continued, her eyes twinkling. “I could eat cake every day of the year too. Especially one as delicious as this one. Tell me, my dear, where did you get this recipe? From one of your cookbooks?”
“Not exactly,” Amirah replied. “It’s our favorite vanilla cake recipe. But, speaking of cookbooks . . .”
“Go on,” Mrs. Maria encouraged her.
Amirah sighed. She didn’t know where to begin. So she jumped right in and hoped that Mrs. Maria wouldn’t laugh. “It’s about The Power of Sprinkles,” she said. And with just those words, the whole story tumbled out—from the missing invitations to the empty shelves at the store to the way the words seemed to fade on the page to Amirah’s troubling dream.
“It’s almost—like—like—there’s something wrong in the birthday universe,” Amirah struggled to explain. “I feel like I have to fix it, but I don’t know how.”
Mrs. Maria didn’t laugh. As Amirah looked at her friend’s face, all wrinkled with concern, she knew that that was something she didn’t need to worry about. Not ever.
“I can tell that your heart is troubled,” Mrs. Maria finally said. “I could tell it from the moment I opened the door and saw you standing there with this pretty little cake.”
Amirah nodded as she took another sip of horchata. Of course Mrs. Maria already knew something was bothering her. Sometimes she just seemed to know things like that—even before Amirah could tell her.
“What do you think I should do?” Amirah asked. “I feel like I have to go back.”
“Go back?” Mrs. Maria asked, raising an eyebrow.
“To the Magical Land of Birthdays,” Amirah tried to explain. “Something’s wrong, and I need to make it right. My birthday’s not for six whole months, though. And I don’t want to wait that long! I don’t know if I can!”
“No,” Mrs. Maria said thoughtfully. “When there are troubles weighing on your heart, every minute that passes feels like an eternity.”
Amirah smiled gratefully. Somehow, some way, Mrs. Maria always understood. And she always knew just what to say.
“So what should I do?” Amirah asked again.
“You must trust your heart, of course,” Mrs. Maria told her. “You’re already listening to it—that’s why you feel these troubles so intensely. But here is the secret . . .”
As Mrs. Maria’s voice dropped to a hush, Amirah leaned forward until she was sitting on the edge of her chair.
“You have to believe,” Mrs. Maria continued. “You still believe in the magic of birthdays, yes?”
“Of course!” Amirah replied. “I’ll always believe in it.”
Mrs. Maria nodded, satisfied. “Then if you believe in birthday magic, and you follow your heart, you will figure out what to do,” she promised Amirah.
Amirah was so lost in thought that initially, she didn’t answer. Then an idea came to her . . . shadowy and half formed at first, but the more she thought about it, the more she understood.
Amirah stood up so fast that her chair screeched as it slid across the floor. “Thank you,” she said breathlessly. She started to pick up her plate to take it to the kitchen, but Mrs. Maria rested her hand on Amirah’s wrist.
“Leave it,” Mrs. Maria said gently. “You do what you need to do.”
Impulsively, Amirah gave Mrs. Maria a fast hug. Then she hurried out the door and ran down the sidewalk, not even noticing the blistering heat of the midafternoon sun.
She knew that she needed to get back to the Magical Land of Birthdays—there wasn’t a shred of doubt in her mind about that—and she knew that she needed to go right now. Today! She couldn’t wait six more months for her birthday. She didn’t want to wait even one more day.
Back at home, Amirah slipped through the door so quietly that Mama and Amir didn’t even hear her. She could hear Mama’s voice as she read to Amir and the clinking of the ice cubes in their glasses of lemonade.
Amirah pressed her hand over her pocket. The vial of sprinkles that she carried with her—everywhere, always—was there, just as she expected. And that was a good thing, because Amirah had a feeling that it was going to take all the birthday magic she could muster and the power of sprinkles to transport herself back to the Magical Land of Birthdays when it definitely wasn’t her birthday.
In the quiet of the kitchen, Amirah shook a rainbow of sprinkles into her hand. Then she picked just the ones she needed: pink for herself, purple for Mei, green for Elvis, blue for Olivia . . . What about yellow and orange, though? The rainbow wouldn’t be complete without them.
And neither, Amirah thought, would birthday magic.
She carefully lined the sprinkles, one of each color, on the counter. She thought of her B-Buds and wished that she could see them.
Then Amirah closed her eyes, made a wish, and popped the sprinkles into her mouth.
Almost