She jumped a little bit; she hadn’t realized that he was right there. The man was quiet as a cat.

Matty scowled up at his dad and Seb scowled right back. Via chuckled at how incredibly similar they looked. “Well, it’s a good thing you didn’t bring anything to do.”

“What?” Matty looked up at her.

“Yes.” She nodded solemnly. “I wouldn’t want anything to distract you from your mission.”

She could feel Seb’s gray-green eyes on the side of her face but she ignored them.

“What mission?”

“Do you remember my friend Fin? You sat with her a few weeks ago?”

“The pretty lady with the loud jewelry?”

Via laughed. “Exactly.” She crouched low and brought her voice down an octave. Matty leaned in to hear her better. “Don’t tell anyone. But Fin is a little bit magic. Just a little bit.”

“What do you mean? Magic isn’t real. Right?”

“Well...” Via weighed her head back and forth. “There’s lots of kinds of magic, and lots of them aren’t real. But some of them are. And Fin’s magic is real. She can’t turn you into a toad or something like that, but she can do spells.”

“What kind of spells?”

“Like, good luck spells and get well spells. She can do spells to help people who are sad or lonely or scared. That kind of thing. It’s kind of like medicine, but you have to believe it for it to work.”

Matty’s blunt little face was open and very still as he listened. There was no trace of a pout anywhere on his little mug.

“So,” Via continued. “Fin asked me if I could help her with some spells she’s working on, but I have to play this dumb softball game. Can you help me? Can you take over my mission for me?”

Matty pursed his lips but there was no confusing the look of intense interest in his eyes. “What would I have to do?”

“You’d have to collect some ingredients for one of her spells. Here.” Via dug through her bag and came up with a small towel. She pulled out her practice bat and tied the four corners of the towel to the end of the bat. She showed Matty how he could carry it over his shoulder like an old-timey drifter. “You can put everything you collect in here. You need to find two yellow leaves and two red leaves from the trees. A flower. Something shiny. And...” She racked her brain, trying to think of something that would take a long time. “Some rocks from the gravel area over there. I want you to find one rock of every color.”

“But those rocks are all gray!”

“No. Not if you look closely. Lots of those rocks have little flecks of other colors in them. You’ll see.” Then she gave him a skeptical look and held the towel carrier away from him. “Unless you don’t think you can help. Then I’ll just tell Fin that I’ll do it on my own tomorrow.”