Read Online Just Like Me by Nancy Cavanaugh - Free Book Online Page B

rushing across the room toward Vanessa.
    â€œYou guys, c’mon,” Avery said, jumping in between them. “We don’t have time to fight! Let’s just get ready!”
    â€œJulia and I have to straighten out our stuff first,” Gina said.
    â€œJust do it later,” Becca said, pulling on a T-shirt over her wet hair. “We can’t be late again.”
    â€œ Let’s go, girls! ” Tori said, coming out of her room. “We should be heading down the hill right now.”
    â€œGet dressed quick,” said Avery, digging through a pile of clothes on top of my suitcase and tossing me a shirt.
    Then she grabbed a shirt of Gina’s that hung over the end of Gina’s bed and threw it to her.
    Gina and I peeled off our pj’s and pulled on the T-shirts, then dug around for some shorts.
    â€œWe still have to brush our teeth,” Gina wailed. “I’m not going if I can’t brush my teeth.”
    â€œJust go do it!” Avery said. “But hurry up!”
    Gina and I grabbed our toothbrushes and headed into the bathroom. We brushed and spit as if we were in a relay race. But we shouldn’t have gone quite so fast because as I was tossing my toothbrush back into my cubby I said, “Oh no!”
    â€œWhat?” Gina asked.
    She still had her toothbrush—or what she thought was her toothbrush—in her hand, and I pointed to it. That’s when she realized what I had just realized.
    â€œWe used the wrong toothbrushes!” she wailed.
    â€œ Eeeeeeewwww! ” the other girls squealed.
    â€œLess than five minutes, girls!” Tori called to us from the porch where she was putting on her shoes.
    There was no time to worry about it.
    â€œ Let’s! Go! ” Becca yelled.
    And we all headed out the door for the flagpole, hoping we’d make it on time.
    Dear Ms. Marcia,
    This morning at breakfast, Donnie’s Thought for the Day was about being thankful for the people in our lives who mean the most to us. Sometime during the day, we’re supposed to say a prayer of thanks for those people.
    Donnie’s “thought” made me wonder about something I had never wondered about before. If there really is a red thread that connects us to all the people we meet, that must mean there’s one that connects me to my birth mom.
    Could that really be true?
    And if it is, what does that mean?
    Julia

15
    â€œJulia, do you and Gina want to go on a hike with Becca and me?” Avery asked, as we walked down the steps of the mess hall.
    All around us, girls were making plans with their cabinmates to canoe or swim or play four square during free time.
    â€œNo thanks. We’re going down to the arts-and-crafts room to make one of those twig-covered picture frames,” I said.
    We’d seen the frames on display in the arts-and-crafts room the day before, and both Gina and I had talked about how cute they were.
    â€œWe’ll see you guys later,” I said, hurrying to pull Gina toward the woods near the mess hall, so we could collect some twigs for our projects.
    I didn’t want to give Avery the chance to change her mind about the hike and come with us. Working on a craft might be the perfect time for her to start yakking about the Ms. Marcia project, and that wasn’t how I wanted to spend the morning.
    By the time Gina and I got downstairs to the arts-and-crafts room, a counselor already sat at the front table helping three younger campers make coin purses with pieces of leather and plastic lacing.
    She pointed us to the corner table where the supplies we needed were all laid out, so Gina and I took the twigs we had collected and headed that way.
    â€œI was talking to Avery yesterday, and she told me you and she and Becca all came from the same orphanage in China,” Gina said as we organized our twigs into piles according to their length.
    I had a feeling this was only the beginning of a whole bunch of things