The Sister Solution (13 page)

I scream.

My sister's entire head is
purple
!

“You okay?” Banana pulls into a parking space in front of Miss Larkspur's Tea Room. “You hardly said a word at the aquarium.”

I chip a big piece of coral polish off my thumbnail. “Sorry.”

“Aren't you having a good time? Do you want to go somewhere else?”

“No. I mean, yes, I'm having a good time and no, I don't want to go anywhere else.” I look out the car window at the black-and-white sign of the Whitaker Art Gallery across the street.

“Is it Jorgianna? Your mom mentioned the two of you were going through a rough patch.”

“She
dyed her hair purple. Not lavender. Not violet.
Purple
.”

“You know your sister. She's a great blue heron soaring among mallards.”

“Now she's a great purple heron—a purple heron I have to go to school with on Monday. This is all I need. I've already gotten complaints from Eden and some of my other friends over last week's flock.”

“Flock?”

“Jorgianna wore a bright orange hat to school with a bunch of fake crows on it, but the birds looked real enough—I mean, dead enough—to freak out half the Wildlife Conservation Club. I had to do
a lot
of explaining to Miss Fleischmann.”

She tries to hide her grin.

“Plus, we had a big fight this morning.”

Her lips straighten. “I'm sorry, hon.”

I drop my head into my hands and pull my bangs through my fingers.

“Most sisters go through a stage where they can't seem to do anything but fight,” says Banana. “I did with mine. Ellen and your mom certainly did. When the two of them were teenagers they nearly drove me
insane. Every day it seemed there was a battle, and over the silliest things, too.”

“Jorgianna and I have had our battles too, but we've never been mean to each other—not like this.”

Banana takes her keys out of the ignition. “Let's go inside. You'll feel better after we've had some lemon verbena tea and cucumber sandwiches. I hear they have a new molten chocolate cake. Chocolate is good for the soul, you know.”

Cutting into a yummy chocolate cake with a warm, gooey center
does
sound good, but there's something I have to do first.

“Banana, could we go over to the Whitaker Gallery before we eat? I promised Jorgianna I'd see her artwork.”

“Of course, sweetie.”

I won the crepe flipping bet, so I don't have to visit Jorgianna's exhibit, but I want to. Plus, there's a certain photograph I
have
to see.

Inside the gallery we are met by a mousy-looking woman with a chestnut-brown Pebbles-style ponytail on the top of her head. It's thin but long, reaching almost to her waist. She is wearing a black-and-white striped suit, a frilly white blouse, and the reddest, tallest
high heels I have ever seen. Banana tells her we are here to see the school district art show, and a red fingernail with dark pink tips points to an arched white hallway. “The last three galleries on the right.”

“I remember,” says Banana. “Jorgianna's sculpture is in the second gallery.”

The moment I see my sister's art work, my breath catches. Jorgianna was right. The spotlights, the clear acrylic display stand, the little stairs that lead to the top of the cube—everything in the gallery works together to create the right atmosphere. Several overhead lights have been carefully arranged to bring out the colors of the Northwest landscape on the sides of the cube. While Banana tries to look inside the miniature Space Needle, I skip up the steps. Peering inside, I see the mound of pop cans, lightbulbs, batteries, and other trash scattered on Jorgianna's mock seashore.

“I remember when she was making this,” I say to Banana, who is slowly moving the hinged blue dog's tail on the back of the box. “She was so worried.” I backtrack down the steps and stand back, taking in the entire piece. “I told her everyone would love it.”

FIRST PLACE, SCULPTURE.

BEST IN SHOW.

Good for you, Jorgianna
, I think to myself.
Good for you.

I know I should say it to her. I think it often, but I don't say it enough. I don't know why. I guess part of me has always felt that the more Jorgianna achieved, the less I mattered. It seemed each time she won a spelling bee or aced a test, it took a little piece away from me. It seems silly now, but that's how I felt . . .

“Exceptional, isn't it?” The woman from the reception area is back. Talk about stealth stilettos! “It's so insightful,” she says. “I love the interactive feature that draws you in. This is my favorite piece in the show.”

I stand tall. “It's my sister's.”

She claps. “How delightful! You got here in the nick of time. The exhibit ends tomorrow. We'll be packing this piece up to send on to the state competition in Seattle.”

I smile at Banana. “Wouldn't it be something if Jorgianna's artwork won the state competition?”

“If it does, it goes on to Nationals in Washington, D.C.,” says the lady.

Banana whistles. “I've never been to the capital.”

“Me neither,” I say.

On our way out, my grandmother turns left to go back the way we came in, but I tap her arm. “Can we go to the last gallery, Banana? I mean, as long as we're here?”

I have seen every photograph in the show, so far. Patrice's entry has to be in the third gallery.

“Sure.” Banana leads the way.

I am barely a few steps into the room when I see it.

My body goes numb from my brain to my ankles. Only my feet seem to be working. I let them carry me over to a square white support column where there is a photograph frame in a black mat. The image is of a girl in a pink coat staring into a large tank with a giant octopus. One of the creature's eyes looks down at her. Tentacles and fingers meet at the glass. A blue rosette with two long ribbons is attached to the artist identification card. The gold words on the rosette glisten in the light:
FIRST PLACE, PHOTOGRAPHY.
I glance up to read the card:

PATRICE HOUSTON

8TH GRADE, TONASKET MIDDLE SCHOOL

My breath catches. My stomach folds over. A wave of heat rises from my heart, spreading out through my shoulders and arms, then up into my neck and face. I have to clamp my lips tightly together to stifle the shriek. I am in total shock. I cannot believe it. I am staring at
my own photograph
.

“Agggggh!”

I'd held it in as long as I could. Really, I had.

ELEVEN

“SAMMI!” BANANA'S ARM IS AROUND
me and I am slumped against her. “What's the matter?”

“I . . . I'm sorry.” My mind is racing. If I tell Banana what's going on, she'll call Mrs. Vanderslice, who'll call Patrice's parents, who'll confront Patrice, who will lie about the photograph. She'll say it's hers. She'll say I'm the one who's the liar. Everyone will believe her. Why wouldn't they? She has everyone on her side. I can only imagine the gossip Patrice and her friends will spread about me at school. And then there's Jorgianna. A shiver ripples through me. How will Patrice punish her? “I'm okay,” I tell Banana. “I . . . uh . . . I almost slipped, that's all.”

Gallery Lady pokes her head into the room. “Is everything all right in here?”

“Yes,” says Banana. “She nearly took a tumble, but she's all right.”

“Goodness!” says the woman. “Are you sure?”

“I'm okay,” I say, and try to smile.

“Let's go eat,” says Banana.

Before we leave, I reach out to the sapphire-blue ribbon beside my photograph. I feel one of the smooth satin tails slide through my fingers. Doesn't it just figure? I have never won anything in my life. And now that I have, no one will ever know.

While we have lunch at Miss Larkspur's Serenity Tea Room, I try to piece together what might have happened. When did Patrice get the chance to steal my photograph? And how did she do it? We don't have any classes together. I am hardly ever around her. Even at lunch I've never been closer to her than the fourth ring. I shouldn't say never. There was that one time . . .

It was a few months ago. Eden was absent from school and Patrice invited me to sit with her group. I sat in the first ring, elbow to elbow with Saturn. She almost knocked over my apple juice. Patrice was in a mood bad that day.

“Anything I can do?” I'd asked softly.

“I doubt it. I have a dumb photography assignment due in Hargrove's class. We're supposed to do a study of humanity, whatever that means.”

“He's looking for photographs with emotion in them,” I said. “Trust me, I know. I had Hargrove for art last semester. Hey, you want to see some of my photos? You know, for inspiration?”

“Sure.”

I got out my cell phone and showed her some of my best shots: several of a wind-blown but happy Jorgianna beachcombing at Mukilteo State Park, a series of Banana on her first hang-gliding adventure, and—of course!—my new ones of a little red-headed girl in a pink coat seeing an octopus.

“These are great,” said Patrice, tapping the screen. “I love this one of the octopus and the girl. I bet she is thinking, ‘wow, he is so big and red,' and he's probably thinking, ‘wow, she is so small and pink!' ”

I chuckle. “I
like to tell a story with every photograph.”

“A story, huh? Good tip.” Then Patrice said the nicest thing anybody had ever said to me. “You're a great photographer, Sammi.”

I felt my cheeks glow. “Thanks.”

“I'm going for chocolate chip cookies,” said Tanith. “Anybody want to come with?”

“I will,” I said, and because Patrice was still looking at my photos, I left my cell phone in her hands while I was gone.

Two minutes. That was how long it took for me to buy two chocolate chip cookies, and it was all the time Patrice needed to steal my photograph. Dumb, dumb cookies. Dumb, dumb me.