Crossing Over Read Online Free PDF Page B

Kat,” Mrs. Gray said, sounding surprised to see me, like she didn’t realize I was along on the trip. “I need a word with
Jacqueline.”
    “I’m right here,” Jac said, sitting up, but she made no move to stand. Jac was usually either openly at war with her mother
or in an uneasy truce. This qualified as an uneasy truce.
    “This ee-phone…”
    “iPhone,” Jac corrected. “Like I Spy.”
    Mrs. Gray took a not-quite-patient breath and held the offending piece of technology out.
    “This eye-phone is not working,” she said. “I was told it was the very best, and it doesn’tseem to work at all. I can’t make
a simple phone call.”
    “Well, did you call to enable international dialing?” Jac asked.
    Mrs. Gray looked mystified.
    “It was on the trip memo,” Jac said. “Here—if you need to make a call, just use my phone for now. And if you want your iPhone
figured out, talk to that kid Phil. He figures out everybody’s phones.”
    She tossed her phone at her mother, who not only didn’t catch it but barely managed to be hit in the head by it. I retrieved
the phone off the floor and handed it to Mrs. Gray.
    “Thank you,” she said, to one or both of us. “Oh, and we’re meant to announce that there is a quick meeting everyone has to
attend at eight forty-five by the soda machines.”
    She left, closing the door quietly behind her.
    “Jac,” I said. “You shouldn’t throw things at your mother. You could have put her eye out.”
    Jac shrugged.
    I opened my mouth to suggest that Jac consider being a teensy bit nicer to her mother but remembered how angry the same suggestion
had made Jac during our trip to the Mountain House. So, I decided to file away my comment for later.
    “I’m going to brush my hair before the meeting,” I said, walking into the bathroom.
    “Here,” Jac said, appearing suddenly behind me with her flowered cosmetics bag. “Have a squirt of this.”
    She spritzed me with something delicious smelling, a mix of orange blossoms and cloves. Jac obviously really was pro-Ben.
I felt a little zap of nervousness in my toes. She pointed at my head.
    “Dangly earrings,” she commanded.
    “Really? The crescent moon ones? You don’t think they’re too much?”
    “I think they’re perfect,” she said. “They’re very you.”
    I found the earrings in question and put them on. I went into the bathroom and stared at myself in the mirror.
    Sometimes I looked so much like my father it made me furious. I didn’t like being reminded of him. But there he was in the
mirror. I had his good hair—thick and dark and glossy—and I wore mine long. I had his odd sea-green eyes, but my pale skin
and the shape of my face, nose, and mouth were my mother’s. Oh, and the whole “I see dead people” thing. That was all from
mom’s side of the family, too.
    “We should probably go,” Jac said. “I hear people out there.”
    I took a breath and gave myself a final once-over in the mirror. It wasn’t bad. I had grown two inches over the summer, and
my hair was getting to a decent length. I might not have a tiny waist and long, lean legs, like Shoshanna, but I was blessedly
zit-free, and as un-teenage as it might be, I secretly felt a certain sense of satisfaction with the way that I looked, in
spite of my flaws.
    “Okay,” I said. “I’m ready.”
    Our group was gathering, as advertised, in the alcove by the soda machines. Three of the Random Boys were tossing around a
miniature football made of something squishy. Phil was attempting to engage Mikuru in conversation but was being practically
body-checked by her brother, Yoshi.
    Indira was chattering happily to Alice, who was examining the contents of the soda machine with great concentration. Shoshannawas sitting cross-legged on the floor holding a Montreal guidebook, Lacy on one side of her and Brooklyn on the other, both
in identical poses. The other two Satellite Girls, Shelby and Stacy, were nowhere to be seen.
    Perched on a wide