Sunny Days and Moon Cakes Read Online Free PDF Page B

some Monet paintings in Paris last year,” Mum says, looking up from her book. “Sunny loved the art galleries.”
    “I’m sure she did.” Rosie smiles at me again. “This one makes me feel calm and happy. I can imagine myself floating over the lilies in a rowing boat, the sun on my face. The last painting I’m going to show you is the ‘Mona Lisa’. I bet you know it too.”
    I nod. Everyone knows the “Mona Lisa” and her strange half-smile.
    “Do you think she looks happy or sad, Sunny?” Rosie asks.
    “Bored,” I write on the sketchpad. “From sitting still for the artist.”
    Rosie laughs. “You’re probably right. I prefer the Frida Kahlo portraits myself. They’re full of emotion, aren’t they?”
    I nod again.
    “The best paintings make you think, don’t they? And they make you feel something. Lots of artists express their feelings through their art. How do
you
feel, Sunny? When you think about speaking in front of strangers, I mean. Can you draw it for me?”
    She’s been so kind to me, showing me all the paintings and talking to me like a real person, that I take a pencil out of her pencil case – a 4B, which has a nice soft lead – and start to draw.
    I imagine that I have to speak to Rosie, right now. My heart starts to beat faster and I get that familiar scared and jittery feeling, like I have no control over my body or anything that’s happening to me.
    I draw a girl in a dark forest. The trees are reaching for her, their branches pressing into her skin, like the thorns in the Frida Kahlo painting, until she’s crushed. She’s alone and scared. There is no one to come and save her. Using an even softer 8B pencil, I frame the forest with a black box. Then I fill the box with swirling shapes, pushing the tip of the pencil into the paper, harder, harder, until suddenly the lead snaps. I drop my head, feeling ashamed that I’ve ruined Rosie’s pencil.
    “Don’t worry, Sunny; the pencils are there to be used,” Rosie says. “And that’s an amazing picture. Is that you lost in the forest? With all those trees attacking you?”
    I shrug, looking down at the floor, still feeling bad about her pencil.
    “Sunny, do you feel you are under a lot of pressure to talk and be a ‘normal’ girl?”
    I nod.
    “I hear you, Sunny,” she says. “I hear you.”
    And even though I haven’t said a word, I know Rosie’s telling the truth.

Chapter 7
    Before lunch, I draw more pictures for Rosie. I use my own sketchbook – hers reminds me of the forest. Rosie’s very interested in China, so I sketch her some pictures of my life there: the apartment, the park we used to play in with the red wooden humpback bridge over the pond, and Puggy. Dogs are hard to draw, but I do my best.
    “He looks like a right little scamp,” Rosie says of Puggy with a laugh.
    I smile and nod. He was always stealing Mama’s silk slippers and chewing them so the stuffing came out.
    Mum is looking at the drawings with interest. “What’s that in the park?” she asks. “The piece of stone?”
    “Chessboard,” I write on the sketchpad.
    “Ah, right, of course. I’d forgotten about the outdoor chess games,” Mum says. “Where we lived it was mainly old men playing. They sometimes brought their birds with them in beautiful cages. Did you ever see them, Sunny?”
    I nod enthusiastically. The man who lived next door to us in Shenzhen walked his bird every morning. It was tiny and blue and sang the most beautiful song. I used to bump into him on the way to school with Mama and then, after she died, with Mama Wei. I draw a quick sketch of him and his bird’s ornate cage.
    “Is that someone you knew, Sunny?” Mum asks.
    I write, “Our neighbour in Shenzhen,” underneath the drawing.
    “Anyone hungry?” Dad asks, coming into the room, rubbing his stomach. “I certainly am. The bagels are heating in the oven so you’d better be quick.” He smiles at Rosie. “You must be Miss Lee. Nadia’s told me all about