My Last Best Friend Read Online Free PDF Page B

Rachel is already sitting at the table, wearing a paint smock over her clothes. The smock is splattered with paint, and there is a paintbrush in her hand. Several rocks painted like bugs and butterflies are on the table around her.
    Rachel looks up as we come into the kitchen. "We're painting rocks!" she cries.
    "Duh, Rachel," Jenna says. "We're not blind."
    Jenna turns to us and announces, "We collected these rocks on our summer vacation. Find one you like and paint it."
    There aren't enough chairs for everyone, so I just stand next to Rachel. The girls start digging through the rocks. I start digging, too, even though all the paint and newspaper and brushes make me think of the messy art projects Elizabeth and I used to do. Which makes me miss her even more.
    "That's an interesting one, Ida," I hear someone say.
    I look up and see Stacey pointing at a rock that has fiddled its way into my hand. It doesn't look very interesting to me. Just an ordinary grayish color, flat on one side with a knobby bump on the other side.
    "It looks like a humpback whale," Stacey says, taking the rock from my hand and turning it so that the knobby bump is on top. Then she moves it up and down in the air like it's swimming. "Maybe an enchanted whale...," she adds in a dreamy voice, "...who rose from the depths of a magical sea in search of you, Ida."
    "Huh?" I say.
    Stacey just smiles and swims the rock back to me. "It's a nice rock, Ida. I like—"
    But before Stacey can finish what she was
going to say, Rachel yanks on my sleeve, getting brown fingerprints all over it. "Look!" she hollers. "Biscuit!"
    Rachel holds up a drippy brown rock in her equally drippy hand. The rock also has two drippy yellow dots that are apparently supposed to be eyes.
    Jenna groans at her little sister. But Stacey looks at that mess of a rock and smiles. "It looks
exactly
like Biscuit," she says. Then she reaches over and takes the rock from Rachel. She paints
Biscuit
on the back while Rachel beams.
Beaming
is what you call it when your face just about splits open because of your big smile.
    I know all about beaming. That's because Elizabeth was a great beamer. When she beamed, you just couldn't help beaming right back.
    I do not beam at Rachel. I just stand there looking at all the rocks the girls are painting. Jenna's rock is carob colored with creamy speckles. She's painting wings and a beak on it. Brooke's rock is flat and squarish. She's painting it to look like a picture frame and says she's going to paint herself inside. Randi's rock is almost perfectly round. She's painting it to look like a basketball. Meeka
and Jolene are painting matching flowers on their rocks. And Stacey finds two rocks that are the same shape and starts painting them like a pair of pink ballet slippers.
    Jenna's mom comes over to see how we're doing. She notices my painted sleeve. "Jenna," she says. "Ida has gotten paint all over herself. Go get a clean shirt for her to wear while I wash this one."
    Jenna's jaw drops. "One of
my
shirts?" she says.
    "Yes, one of your shirts," her mom replies. "A large one."
    Jenna pushes away from the table, grumbling.
    "Never mind," I say. "I have an extra shirt in my bag."
    Jenna sighs with relief.
    I set down my whale rock and go upstairs to change.
    When I come back to the kitchen everyone is gone except for Jenna's mom. "The girls went outside to play, Ida," she says, taking my painted shirt from me. She heads off to the laundry room.
    I think about going outside, too. I walk over to the table instead.
    All the painted rocks are sitting together at the center of the table, drying. My whale rock sits off to one side. I'm surprised to see it now has a tail, fin, and smiling face painted on it.
Stacey
, I say to myself.
    Just then I hear a noise under the table. I bend down, expecting Biscuit to spring out and lick my face.
    "Hi, Ida!"
    It's Rachel.
    "What are you doing under there?" I ask, pushing aside one of the chairs.
    "Hiding," she