Brilliant Hues Page 15

  Maybe because they were twins, and maybe because they knew each other so well, Charlotte was able to understand what any other six-year-old couldn’t. Somehow, here with Cici, Charlotte seemed much more whole than she’d ever been at camp. Which should be impossible. Most kids would be terrified, I’d guess, or something, but Charlotte seemed strangely at home.

  Charlotte refolded the paper and pressed it into Cici’s hand. As she did, Cici’s eyes fluttered, once, twice, and then she opened them and locked eyes with her sister. No one breathed. Finally, Cici breathed out, and her eyes drifted closed.

  “Daddy, Cici needs the doctor,” Charlotte said, turning those blue eyes on him.

  Tyler rushed out of the room, and came back with a doctor. He checked the monitors and Cici’s pulse and gave a quick nod. “We need to take her back up to quarantine. Somehow … I can’t say how, but …”

  “She’s getting better, isn’t she?” Charlotte asked him.

  The doctor gave Charlotte a quick once-over, head to toe, as though he was judging whether to answer her question at all. Finally, he said, “Her fever broke, and her vitals … yes. Something happened—I don’t understand what.”

  Then, the room filled with a flurry of masked and gloved nurses, who whisked Charlotte and me out of the room, and seconds later, hurried Cici up the hall on a rolling gurney.

  “What happened?” Charlotte’s mom was on her feet. “Where are they taking her, Tyler?”

  His face was hard to read. He took Charlotte’s mom into his arms.

  “They’re taking her back to quarantine,” he said into her hair.

  “But that means …” she said.

  “Yes,” was all Tyler said.

  Chapter 26

  Catch the Wind

  After they rolled Cici out of the room, Charlotte finally started to sob, huge, racking sobs like half of herself had been ripped away. I wrapped my arms around her and rubbed her back, and looked helplessly at Mom. We couldn’t just sit here in the hospital and wait. Charlotte’s parents asked if we could watch her, and so in a few minutes, we found ourselves back out in the Hummer, with no definite plan.

  “Seems like we should go somewhere,” Mom said. “Not just home.”

  Charlotte had finally cried herself out and now she was pale, and didn’t look like she was in any condition to make decisions. Her painting was in the back, and I wanted to give that to her, but not in the car.

  What now? I silently asked, and then smiled in spite of myself. Maybe I wasn’t the girl on the island with the messages in the bottles anymore. Maybe, finally, I had dove into the water. And suddenly, I had my answer.

  “Can we go to the beach?” I asked Mom.

  “It is a windy day,” Mom answered, as though she’d read my mind.

  Charlotte leaned her head against my arm and fell asleep on the drive over the mountains. When the car stopped, she opened her eyes and stretched.

  “Where are we?”

  I smiled. “I’m going to teach you how to catch the wind.”

  “We’ll wait for you here,” Mom said, and even though sadness panged through me, thinking of catching the wind without her, I knew this was right too. Charlotte and I, catching the wind together.

  “What does that mean … Catch the wind?” Charlotte asked.

  “You’ll see. But first, I have a surprise.”

  I helped her down from the back seat and took her around to the back of the Hummer. When I threw the doors open, she gasped.

  “It’s me, jumping!” She threw her arms around me and squeezed. “Can I have it?”

  “It’s yours,” I took her hand and we ran out across the sand.

  I pointed at the bluff.

  “We’re going up there?” she asked.

  “I’ll help you,” I said.

  We scaled the rocks, and when we reached the top, I helped Charlotte find solid footholds. I reached out my hands, face toward the ocean. She threw her hands wide too, and air rushed through our outstretched fingers. As we stood, with the wind swirling around us, pink tipped the clouds, the beginning of sunset.

  “I’m going to catch some extra and put it in my pocket to take back to Cici. Do you think she’ll like that?” Charlotte asked.

  “She’ll love that,” I said, feeling warmth seep into my skin, not from the wind, but from what vibrated through the wind, the feeling of God, close, as close as my next breath.

  “I feel purple and green and red,” Charlotte shouted over the wind. “What do you feel?”

  “Electric blue and teal,” I answered.

  “And sparkly gold.” Charlotte spun all the way around before finding her footholds again.

  “How could I forget the sparkly gold?” I asked.

  Our laughter wove together, spinning out into the salty air.

  THE END

  About the Author

  NAOMI KINSMAN has always dreamed of plunging into a fictional world, like Lucy does in Voyage of the Dawn Treader. In Naomi’s first career, acting and directing for the theater, this dream was inches from her reach. But writing has made the dream possible, and now Naomi regularly slips into book worlds and shares her adventures through her company, Society of Young Inklings, dedicated to empowering young writers across the country. Naomi is the author of the 2009 Moonbeam Gold Medal winner, Spilled Ink, and she has written and directed over fifty plays for young audiences. She lives in Northern California with her husband and identically colored pets: a tuxedo cat and a Portuguese water dog.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

  Other Books in the Growing Faithgirlz!™ Library

  Bibles

  The Faithgirlz! Bible

  NIV Faithgirlz! Backpack Bible

  Faithgirlz! Bible Studies

  Secret Power of Love

  Secret Power of Joy

  Secret Power of Goodness

  Secret Power of Grace

  Fiction

  From Sadie’s Sketchbook

  Shades of Truth (Book One)

  Flickering Hope (Book Two)

  Waves of Light (Book Three)

  Brilliant Hues (Book Four)

  Sophie’s World Series

  Sophie’s World

  Sophie’s Secret

  Sophie Under Pressure

  Sophie Steps Up

  Sophie’s First Dance

  Sophie’s Stormy Summer

  Sophie’s Friendship Fiasco

  Sophie and the New Girl

  Sophie Flakes Out

  Sophie Loves Jimmy

  Sophie’s Drama

  Sophie Gets Real

  The Girls of Harbor View

  Girl Power (Book One)

  Take Charge (Book Two)

  Raising Faith (Book Three)

  Secret Admirer (Book Four)

  The Lucy Series

  Lucy Doesn’t Wear Pink (Book One)

  Lucy Out of Bounds (Book Two)

  Lucy’s Perfect Summer (Book Three)

  Lucy Finds Her Way (Book Four)

  Boarding School Mysteries

  Vanished (Book One)

  Betrayed (Book Two)

  Burned (Book Three)

  Poisoned (Book Four)

  Nonfiction

  My Faithgirlz Journal

  Faithgirlz Handbook

  Food, Faith & Fun:

  A Faithgirlz Cookbook

  No Boys Allowed

  What’s A Girl To Do?

  Girlz Rock

  Chick Chat

  Real Girls of the Bible

  Whatever

  My Beautiful Daughter

  The Skin You’re In

  Body Talk

  Everybody Tells Me to Be Myself,

  But I Don’t Know Who I Am

  Girl Politics

  Check out www.faithgirlz.com

  ZONDERKIDZ

  Brilliant Hues

  Copyright © 2012 by Naomi Kinsman Downing

  All rights reserved under Internatio
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  EPub Edition © JULY 2012 ISBN: 978-0-310-72669-2

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  Zonderkidz, 5300 Patterson Ave SE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530

  * * *

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Kinsman, Naomi, 1977–

  Brilliant hues / Naomi Kinsman.

  p. cm. — (From Sadie’s sketchbook) (Faithgirlz!)

  Summary: When Sadie returns to Menlo Park, California, she finds that she no longer fits in, especially when one of her father’s cases places her in the spotlight — and in danger — but she turns to her faith, hoping it will see her through.

  ISBN 978-0-310-72668-5 (softcover)

  1. Interpersonal relations — Fiction. 2. Family life — California 3. Christian life — Fiction. 4. California — Fiction. I. Title.

  PZ7.K62935Bri 2012

  [Fic] — dc23 2012018387

  * * *

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