CHAPTER NINE
So a week later I was back in school, sort of, working on Mr. Billet’s painting in the art room. It was way better than working at home, because I had an easel and a palette and everything. And people to talk with. I was even glad to see Mrs. Antonio. I had my own brushes and paints, but she gave me all sorts of cool stuff to play with, like opaque watercolors called gouache, and a paint tool, which was sort of a double-ended eraser, and texture sponges. I was messing with the sponges when I heard a quiet voice behind me. “Hi.”
“Hey, Trish!” I knew it was her even before I turned around. She stood there with an armload of books nearly up to her chin, smiling a little Mona Lisa smile and studying the paper I was experimenting on.
She asked, “Are those trees?”
“They could be, I guess. Right now they’re just sponge monsters.” I held up one of the paint sponges.
Her eyes widened. “Mrs. Antonio is letting you use her stuff?”
“Yeah. As long as I don’t use it on anybody.”
“Cool beans.” Trish shifted the stack of books in her arms.
I told her, “Put those down, for gosh sake.”
She set the books on the table beside my brushes and stuff. Then she looked around for a chair, but there weren’t any.
“Sit on the table,” I told her.
She kind of leaned against the table, I guess because sitting on tables or desks is against the rules, although the teachers do it all the time. “Are those new jeans?” she asked.
“Yeah.” New for me, anyway Really great, funky, old flare-legged jeans from Goodwill.
“I like them,” Trish said.
I eyed her clothes—brown slacks like the office ladies wore, a beige sweater, hair pulled back in those brown clips they call tortoiseshell and on a turtle they might have looked good. I blurted, “Trish, do you like your outfit?”
“Huh?” She looked down at herself, then she looked at me. “What’s wrong with it?”
“Nothing.” Actually, everything. If she wore a sign advertising I’M A NERD she couldn’t have done much better. But I didn’t want to get into a fight with her. “Never mind.” I grabbed the paint tool and started scraping gray bones into the sponge monsters.
Behind me, Trish asked, “Did you get your poetry paper back?”
“Yeah. I got a B.” For me, this was fantabulous. I’d done the paper on the poem I liked, “Fern Hill” by Dylan Thomas.
“Rats,” Trish said.
I peered at her. “Trish, B is good!”
“The one I ripped up would have gotten an A.”
“No, it wouldn’t.” It probably would have gotten a D. The teacher adored Emily Dickinson.
She said, “B is better than nothing, I guess. Have you decided what you’re going to paint for Mr. Billet?”
“Maybe … I dunno. He wants some kind of nature scene.” I realized that my so-called sponge monsters really did look like trees. Trish was right; the sponge texture made great foliage. Blue and crimson trees, why not? I grabbed for the gouache. White tree trunks. Monster big gray-white-brown-green trunks and branches and touch up the foliage with some green and some shading and—I forgot Trish was there. I jumped when she said, “In answer to your question, no.”
“Huh?” I turned to stare at her. Didn’t know what she was talking about.
“No, I don’t like my outfit. I hate all my clothes.”
“Well, make Mom get you something else, then!” I didn’t want to talk about clothes. I wanted to paint.
“I can’t,” Trish said.
“Yes, you can. If she says no, keep asking.”
“I can’t!”
“Sure, you can! Whine a little for once!”
“Donni, I just can’t! I can’t bother her.”
Something in her face made me put down my paintbrush.
We looked at each other.
“I’m not you,” Trish said.
“Well, heck no. Why would you want to be me?”
She actually smiled.
“Dad would get you new clothes,” I said.
“That’s not the point.”
“What is the point, Trish?”
Her smile faded. She just studied me, frowning like I was a calculus problem that was giving her trouble. Or maybe she was looking at me but thinking about something else. “Can’t I just be a nerd?” she asked finally.
“Sure, if that’s what you want.”
She just stood there.
“Well?” I prompted.
“Well, what?”
“Well, is being a nerd what you want?”
“Oh, shut up, Donni.” She didn’t sound like a nerd. “Give me a break. You are such a pain.”
I grinned, picked up my favorite big sable brush and kept on painting. Under the trees I roughed in some deer, then a python and a couple of peacocks and a unicorn. I knew what to paint now. Sunny sky, maybe some blue roses, wild canaries in the pomegranate trees, and coati-mundis, swans, ponies, Gila monsters, Galapagos tortoises, possums, cheetahs, griffins, sparrow hawks, meerkats, marmots, lots of animals, all kinds. And far away in the distance, so you could just barely see them, people. A family. A man, a woman, a couple of little kids. I mean, Eden got shot long ago, but I could still paint it, right? I could paint whatever I wanted.
About the Author
Nancy Springer has passed the fifty-book milestone with novels for adults, young adults, and children, in genres including mythic fantasy, contemporary fiction, magic realism, horror, and mystery—although she did not realize she wrote mystery until she won the Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America two years in succession. Born in Montclair, New Jersey, Springer moved with her family to Gettysburg, of Civil War fame, when she was thirteen. She spent the next forty-six years in Pennsylvania, raising two children (Jonathan and Nora), writing, horseback riding, fishing, and bird-watching. In 2007 she surprised her friends and herself by moving with her second husband to an isolated area of the Florida Panhandle where the bird-watching is spectacular, and where, when fishing, she occasionally catches an alligator.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2001 by Nancy Springer
Cover design by Drew Padrutt
ISBN: 978-1-4976-8893-3
This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
345 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
www.openroadmedia.com
EBOOKS BY NANCY SPRINGER
FROM OPEN ROAD MEDIA
Available wherever ebooks are sold
Open Road Integrated Media is a digital publisher and multimedia content company. Open Road creates connections between authors and their audiences by marketing its ebooks through a new proprietary online platform, which uses premium video content and social media.
Videos, Archival Documents, and New Releases
Sign up for the Open Road Media newsletter and get news delivered straight to your inbox.
Sign up now at
www.openroadmedia.com/newsletters
FIND OUT MORE AT
WWW.OPENROADMEDIA.COM
FOLLOW US:
@openroadmedia and
Facebook.com/OpenRoadMedia
; -moz-filter: grayscale(100%); -o-filter: grayscale(100%); -ms-filter: grayscale(100%); filter: grayscale(100%); " class="sharethis-inline-share-buttons">share
Separate Sisters Page 6
