Read Online Between Us by Cari Simmons - Free Book Online Page A

trees in the neighborhood.
    â€œI’m not splitting my money with you,” Gus warned.
    â€œI know, I know. I didn’t think you’d recently had a personality transplant,” Bailey joked. Gus always had something he was saving his cash for—some first-edition comic, or a new piece of electronics equipment, or new special-effects makeup for the monster movies he was always making.
    â€œSo what do you want then? Because I know you’re not a dog person,” Gus said. It was true. She was more of a cat girl. He volunteered at the Moss Street shelter and had convinced her to go with him once. She hadn’t even lasted an hour. Too much noise. And drool.
    â€œAnd you’re not much of a people person,” she shot back. He was clearly in annoying almost-brother mode today, instead of fun almost-brother. Still, he was the only almost-brother she had. “Actually, I wanted to ask you something.”
    â€œYeah?”
    â€œOkay, so, Olivia thinks my cousin Hannah is copying me,” Bailey told him. “Here’s the deal. She is in four of my classes, but that’s because her mom askedthe school to put her in them. Also, she just joined the Spanish club, like me.”
    â€œSo?”
    â€œThere are other things too, like she always wears polka dots like me, and she thinks the same things are funny that I do, and sometimes she repeats things I say. And she’s having my grandfather paint her room the way I wanted it when it was my room, you know, when it was the room I always had when I slept over. Do you think it’s weird?”
    Gus opened his mouth to answer, but before she could, Monsieur, the poodle he was walking, saw a squirrel and lunged for it, cutting in front of Bruce. Bailey had to duck under Monsieur’s leash to avoid being decapitated. Then she had to unwind Franz’s leash. Somehow it had gotten wrapped three times around one of his back legs.
    â€œSomebody should make a device that makes squirrels invisible to dogs,” Gus muttered.
    â€œMaybe that should be your next project.” Gus was always fooling around with inventions.
    Gus snorted. “You actually think that’s possible?” He shook his head.
    â€œSo getting back to my problem, do you think it’s weird? Or normal?” Bailey asked.
    â€œHannah seemed cool at the party. I don’t get why it’s bugging you,” Gus told her.
    â€œHere’s the real question. I think I want to have some time with Olivia and my other friends without Hannah. Especially because she’s sort of started to make Olivia a little crazy. But I don’t want to hurt Hannah’s feelings. Because, really, nothing she’s doing is bad. Like you said, she’s cool. So is it okay for me to do things without her sometimes? Yes or no?”
    â€œAlthough maybe some kind of spray that blocks the scent . . . ,” Gus mumbled. He got what Bailey thought of as his mad-scientist expression. “Scent is more important to dogs than sight.”
    â€œFocus,” Bailey snapped at him. “Me not wanting to hurt Hannah’s feelings. Like on Olivia’s birthday!” She couldn’t believe she’d forgotten even for a few minutes that Olivia’s birthday was that weekend. She and Oh always spent their birthdays together, and there was no way Hannah could come. Not now that Bailey knew how much Hannah annoyed Olivia. “It would ruin the whole day if Hannah came with us. But how am I supposed to tell her that?”
    â€œDon’t,” Gus said. “It’s not actually necessary to tell everyone everything. For example, I really didn’t need to hear any of this.” He shot her a teasing grin and shegave him a somewhat light punch on the arm.
    â€œIt’s not that easy. Hannah always texts me, asking where I am. She wants to sit next to me every day at lunch. And she and her mom come over to my house a lot,” Bailey