'The Butterfly Scarf'

"Look at this neat scarf," Ashley said to Beth on the way home from school. "Nana made it for me."

"Are those butterflies on it?" Beth asked.

"Yeah. Don't they look cool?" She touched the yellow and blue butterflies that seemed to be flying across the scarf. "Nana told me this kind of knitting is called intarsia."

"What's that?" Beth giggled. "It sounds funny."

"I know. Nana told me it means the knitter created a picture with different colors of yarn." Ashley pulled paper and a marker out of her backpack. She printed the word intarsia. "Here, I'll show you. I think this is how Nana spelled it," she said, "this is how you pronounce it." Ashley printed in-TAR-see-uh below the word.

"See?" she asked.

"I guess," Beth answered, shrugging. "Do you think that word will be in our spelling bee?"

For weeks, Ashley and Beth had been practicing for their school's spelling bee.

"I don't know," Ashley answered. "I'm working on words like pneumonia and rhapsody."

"I'm working on extra-long words," Beth said.

"You know what, Mom?" Ashley said later when she was practicing more spelling words.

"What?" Mom asked.

"Tomorrow I'm going to wear this scarf for good luck." She flipped the butterflies over her shoulder. "It's telling me that if I have it on, I will win that spelling bee. And I want to win!"

"I think you'll do great without it," Mom said.

The next morning, though, Ashley couldn't find the scarf anywhere. She looked under the bed, behind the closet door, in bureau drawers.

"Mom!" she yelled. "Where's my scarf?"

"I haven't seen it," Mom said. "But hurry. We have to leave. Now!"

"But I need that scarf!"

Mom was already in the car.

On the drive to school, Ashley felt more and more anxious. She'd studied all she could, but there were so many words to learn.

She whispered to herself, spelling the hardest ones over and over.

At the spelling bee, Beth missed the word rhapsody, and Steven Melendez and Ashley were the only ones still standing. "Intarsia," Mr. Harrison, the moderator, said, announcing the next word.

"They did use Nana's word," Ashley thought. "But I don't remember how to spell it." She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to see the word, but all she saw were the letters she'd used to show Ashley how to pronounce it.

Steven scratched his head. "E-n-t-a-r-s-e-e-a," he said slowly.

"Sorry, wrong," said Mr. Anderson. He repeated the word for Ashley.

"I-n-" she began. Her heart was pounding. She touched the collar of her shirt. If only she had that scarf, she'd have better luck. Should she give up? Did the scarf really have that much power? No, it didn't, she decided. She'd have to make her own luck. Ashley closed her eyes again and tried to picture the word as she said it to herself. Then, as if from far away, she slowly began to see each letter in her mind.

"t-a-r-s-i-a." she added loudly.

"Correct!" Mr. Anderson said. "Ashley is the winner!"

Cheers and clapping filled the auditorium. Ashley felt as if she were a butterfly, floating around the stage. She was so glad she'd won the spelling bee! Then she remembered something else Nana had told her: "The harder you work, the luckier you get."

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