Oliver Twisted (An Ivy Meadows Mystery Book 3) Read Online Free PDF Page B

wooden stage with only a piece of cloth for support. I was afraid of whoever shoved Harley in my closet. I was afraid of the fathoms of water underneath us too.
    Ada hauled herself up one of the silks, like she was climbing a rope but way more elegantly. She wound the fabric around one leg, pulled herself up with her arms, then put her other foot on the silk and pushed herself into a standing position.
    “See that?” said Jonas. “Ada’s using her legs so it’s not just her arms supporting her.”
    She’s using magic and muscles I don’t have, is what I thought. I watched her climb all the way to the edge of the proscenium, where she somehow wound the fabric around her, then turned and did the splits, hands-free. Upside down.
    Never, never would I be able to do that.
    “Ada? Let’s get going.” The miracle dancer shimmied down the silk and landed lightly on the stage. “Your silk is the one with the mat,” Jonas said to me. I walked over and stood on the mat. No way this little bit of padding would break any fall.
    “Of course, you won’t have a mat during performance,” said Ada.
    Great.
    I grasped the silk fabric, which wasn’t actually silk, but some kind of slightly stretchy cloth. I pulled on it and it gave a few inches.
    “It’s Lycra,” Jonas said as I tested the fabric. “It has a bit of stretch so it’s not so hard on your body. Okay, then.” He smiled encouragingly. “We’ll begin by teaching you to climb.”
    He should have said, “by trying to teach you to climb.” After fifteen minutes I’d managed to climb just two steps. Now I knew how Ada got her figure. Climbing a silk took an enormous amount of upper body strength. I had strong dancer’s legs, but my arms…Let’s just say the experience was humbling.
    “God bless us,” Jonas said, implying the opposite. He ran his hands through his hair. “I was afraid of this.”
    I started to apologize but was distracted by the fact that my arms were on fire.
    “I don’t think your muscles will be in shape in time for the show, so we won’t have you climb like Ada.”
    Phew. Maybe I’d just wind the fabric around me while I danced or…
    “We’ll just have a pulley haul you up.” Jonas pointed at a spot far above the stage. “And you can dance from there.”

CHAPTER 7
    A Decided Propensity for Bullying

      
    “Can you die from falling forty feet?” I asked my uncle over the phone as I walked back to my cabin.
    “Sure. Hey, can I call you later? I’m in the middle of something.” This was uncle code for “Olive, I asked you not to call unless it was absolutely necessary.” I knew I shouldn’t have used the phone, but after my debacle of a rehearsal I wanted to hear a reassuring voice.
    After determining that we could do the routine with a minimum of climbing, Ada had taught me another basic, a single foot tie-in, which was basically using my feet and legs to tie a knot around one foot in the silk. A footlock, she called it. Thank heavens I learned that one pretty quickly. But I performed just four feet off the ground. For now.
    My phone buzzed. A text from Uncle Bob: “Forty feet? Depends on how you land. Do you think H. fell?”
    “No. Maybe I will,” I texted back.
    “?”
    “Never mind. Good night.”
    As I neared my cabin, yellow “do not enter” tape crisscrossed over the door reminded me I had bigger things to worry about than aerial dancing. An envelope addressed to me was taped to the door. I opened it. “Due to the earlier unfortunate circumstance, you will need to change rooms,” read the note inside. “Your things have been moved to Cabin 234 on Deck B2. Please pick up a new keycard at the front desk. Sorry for the inconvenience.” Good thing I hadn’t unpacked. And good thing they’d moved my luggage for me. My arms were already so sore it hurt just to text.
    After picking up my keycard, I headed down the stairs. My new accommodations were on a different deck, one for crew members. I opened the