Aunty Em’s Gnome Emporium

It wasn’t a fast-food restaurant like I’d hoped.

The neon sign above the gateway was impossible for me to read, because if there’s anything worse for my dyslexia than regular English, it’s red cursive neon English.

“What the heck does that say?” I asked.

Grover translated: “Aunty Em’s Garden Gnome Emporium.”

The front lot was a forest of statues: cement animals, cement children, even a cement satyr playing the pipes, which gave Grover the creeps. Then the door creaked open, and standing in front of us was a tall woman.

Go ahead, call me an idiot for walking into a strange lady’s shop like that just because I was hungry.

“Ah,” Aunty Em said sadly. “You notice some of my creations do not turn out well. They are marred. They do not sell. The face is the hardest to get right. Always the face.”

“You make these statues yourself ?” I asked.

“Oh, yes. Once upon a time, I had two sisters to help me in the business, but they have passed on, and Aunty Em is alone. I have only my statues. This is why I make them, you see. They are my company.” The sadness in her voice sounded so deep and so real that I couldn’t help feeling sorry for her.

Annabeth had stopped eating. She sat forward and said, “Two sisters?”

“It’s a terrible story,” Aunty Em said. “Not one for children, really. You see, Annabeth, a bad woman was jealous of me, long ago, when I was young. I had a…a boyfriend, you know, and this bad woman was determined to break us apart. She caused a terrible accident. My sisters stayed by me. They shared my bad fortune as long as they could, but eventually they passed on. They faded away. I alone have survived, but at a price. Such a price.”

….

“Look away from her!” Annabeth shouted.

Then I heard a strange, rasping sound above me. My eyes rose to Aunty Em’s hands, which had turned gnarled and warty, with sharp bronze talons for fingernails.

Her hair was moving, writhing like serpents. Aunty Em. Aunty “M.” How could I have been so stupid? Think, I told myself. How did Medusa die in the myth?

“You have to cut her head off.”

I slashed up with my sword, heard a sickening shlock! Something fell to the ground next to my foot. It took all my willpower not to look. I could feel warm ooze soaking into my sock, little dying snake heads tugging at my shoelaces.

“Oh, yuck,” Grover said. Annabeth came up next to me, her eyes fixed on the sky. She was holding Medusa’s black veil. She said, “Don’t move.”

Very, very carefully, without looking down, she knelt and draped the monster’s head in black cloth, then picked it up. It was still dripping green juice.