Page 2 of The Silent Waters (Elements 3)

Pause.”

Nothing.

She huffed and placed her hands on her hips.

I huffed and copied her stance.

“BOYS!” she shouted, unplugging their video game system.

“MOM!”

“MS. FRANKS!”

I giggled. The boys turned to face us, utter shock in their stare, and Katie smiled. “Now that I have your attention, I want you to say hello to Maggie. Calvin, she’s staying with us, along with her father. Remember me saying you were gonna get a sister, Calvin?”

The boys stared blankly at me. Calvin was clearly the blond one, who looked identical to Katie. The boy sitting next to him had dark messy hair and brown eyes, along with a hole in his pale yellow t-shirt and potato chip crumbs on his jeans.

“I didn’t know you had another sister, Cal,” the boy said, staring my way. The more he stared, the more my stomach hurt. I stepped behind Katie’s leg, my cheeks heating up.

“Me neither,” Calvin replied.

“And, Maggie, this is Brooks. He lives across the street from us, but tonight he’s sleeping over.”

I peeked around Katie’s kneecap at Brooks, who gave me a small smile before eating the crumbs off of his pants.

“Can we play the game again?” Brooks asked, going back to his controller and staring at the blank television screen.

Katie snickered to herself, shaking her head back and forth. “Boys will be boys,” she whispered to me as she plugged their game back in.

I shook my head and giggled, too, just like Katie. “Yeah. Boys will be boys.”

Next, we stopped by another room. It was the pinkest room I’d ever seen, and a girl was sitting on the floor, drawing, wearing bunny ears and a princess dress, and eating Doritos out of a pink plastic bowl.

“Cheryl,” Katie said, walking into the room. I hid behind her leg. “This is Maggie. She’s gonna be staying with us, along with her father. Remember I told you about this?”

Cheryl looked up, smiled, and stuffed more Doritos into her mouth. “Okay, Mom.” She went back to drawing, and her red curly hair danced back and forth as she hummed a song to herself. Then she paused and looked up again. “Hey, how old are you?”

“Six,” I said.

She smiled. “I’m five! Do you like playing with dolls?”

I nodded.

She smiled again and went back to drawing. “Okay. Bye.”

Katie laughed and walked me out of the room, whispering, “I think you two are going to be really good friends.”

She showed me to my room next, where Daddy was putting my bags. My eyes widened at how big the space was—and it was all for me. “Wow…” I took a deep breath. “This is mine?”

“This is yours.”

Wow.

“I know you two must be tired from the long drive, so I’ll let you get Maggie ready for bed.” Katie smiled at Daddy and kissed his cheek.

As Daddy pulled out my pajamas, I asked, “Can Katie maybe tuck me in?”

She didn’t argue.