Sunny Days and Moon Cakes Read Online Free PDF

dog, to help her.
    As I hear footsteps coming up the stairs, my stomach starts to go jittery again. I’m worried that Rosie will expect me to speak, despite what she said earlier. I put down my pencil and do some milkshake breathing.
    When Mum and Rosie come into the living room, I’m giving Goldie a rub. There’s a tray in Mum’s hands. On it is a pitcher of her homemade lemonade, three glasses, three side plates and a large plate piled high with golden fairy cakes. “I’ll put this down on the coffee table so everyone can help themselves and I’ll sit over there.” Mum gestures with her head at the armchair. “And, Rosie, you take a seat next to Sunny on the sofa.”
    As soon as Mum puts down the tray, the delicious smell of the cakes wafts towards me. But I’m so anxious, I know I won’t be able to swallow one.
    Rosie sees me looking at the cakes and hesitating. “Would you like to have a snack later?” she asks. “I’m sure your mum won’t mind.”
    I nod at her gratefully.
    “Good idea,” Mum says. When she moves the tray onto the side table, I’m relieved.
    “I’ll read my book now,” Mum tells Rosie. “If you need anything, just ask.” She takes a crime novel out of her back pocket, sits down and opens it.
    “Thanks, Nadia. Right, Sunny, I have something special in here to show you.” Rosie unzips her red rucksack and pulls out a large spiral-bound sketchpad, plus a pencil case, which is full of really cool Derwent art pencils, all different leads – soft and hard – a plastic bag of oil pastels and a whole rainbow of Sharpies.
    “As I said before,” Rosie goes on, “there’s no need to talk unless you’d like to, Sunny. If you have anything you want to share with me, you can write it down or draw something if you’d prefer.” She opens the sketchpad and taps a blank page. “And your mum is staying here, remember?” she adds. “And Goldie too.”
    I give Rosie another nod. I feel much more relaxed now.
    She smiles back at me. “Good. Now, I want to show you some of my favourite paintings and drawings. Then maybe you can show me which ones you like.” She takes a white hardback book out of her rucksack. It says “Art” on the front cover in red letters. There are coloured sticky notes marking lots of the pages. Rosie thumbs through the book.
    “There,” she says, opening to a page with a painting of a woman with black hair, dark eyes, red lips and eyebrows that meet in the middle. She’s not pretty exactly, but she’s strangely beautiful. I can’t take my eyes off her. There’s a small black monkey on her left shoulder and a dog in front of her.
    “Frida Kahlo,” Rosie says. “It’s a self-portrait. I love the way she’s staring straight out of the picture, like she’s challenging you. She looks like she’s thinking deeply about something, doesn’t she?”
    Rosie turns the page and there she is again – Frida Kahlo. This time she’s painted herself with green jungle leaves behind her. There’s a monkey, a cat and a bird in the picture too – but what really catches my eye is the necklace made of thorns around her neck. Some of the thorns are piercing her skin. I stare at the picture for a long time, taking in what I’m seeing.
    “Her art really makes you think, doesn’t it?” Rosie says. “That’s why I like it. She had a hard life. When she was a teenager she had a terrible accident and was in pain for most of her life. She had to paint lying down sometimes.” She shows me a photo of Frida lying on her back, painting in bed. “Would you like to see another painting I love?”
    I nod.
    She flicks back through the pages until she comes to a swirling blue night sky. The stars are picked out in bright yellow.
    “‘The Starry Night’ by Vincent van Gogh,” Rosie says. “I love the colours. And also in this picture, by Monet.” She turns to another painting. This time it’s one I recognize – a pond with pink, blue and green water lilies.
    “We saw