Twist My Charm Read Online Free Page A

ridiculous tower; we have built friendship and understanding.” He pauses dramatically, raising the “torch” higher. “But only one of you can have the special privilege of placing the ultimate piece—”
    Sam grabs it out of his hand and puts it on top. “There!” she says, slapping both hands on her hips and nodding in satisfaction.
    I would be mad if Samantha ruined my moment (if I ever tried to create one), but Larry laughs. “Nice, Sam, taking charge!” Then they high-five!
    What
is going on here? I’ve never seen them get along like this. It almost seems like Samantha…
likes
him! And not in the way
I
like him. She’s looking at him with dreamy sparkles in her eyes, like she’s watching her first Ryder Landry music video. But this is
Larry.
One time not that long ago, Sam told me not to even be his friend. How could she go from thinking he was “Scabby Larry” to
liking
him so quickly? But I think she has!
    “We did it!” Larry shouts, drumming his hands on the table. The tower shakes.
    Sam drums too, yelling, “Earthquake!”
    “Be careful!” I warn them. “It’ll fall over!”
    That only makes Larry and Samantha laugh and drum harder. “Who cares?” says Larry. “We still have the knowledge of a job well done, with three great leaders!”
    “Well, two,” Samantha cracks.
    I’m too worried about our tower to even care. “It doesn’t matter how well it’s done if Roberta doesn’t see it!” I try to stop them, but I only have two hands to their four, and…CRASH! The tower falls into what looks like a million pieces.
    “Oh no!” I shout. Across the room, I see Roberta walking toward us. “Roberta, we were finished! Really, we were!”
    “That’s okay. I saw.” Roberta knows we finished our tower and is happy we all learned about different styles of leadership. Larry and Sam scoop up the blocks and return them to the supply closet in the back of the Focus! room, laughing and chatting like old friends the whole time.
    Old friends…or two people falling in love.
    I’m starting to get an idea.

L ike almost every day when Dad drives me home from school, I run to the house while he checks the mailbox. He usually grumbles that there’s nothing but advertising and bills (“Wasting paper!” he says), but today his voice stops me before I reach the front door.
    “Cleo! There’s something here for you.”
    I turn around. Something in the mail can only mean one thing—Uncle Arnie! No one else has ever sent me anything.
    I practically tackle Dad to the ground, grabbing at the pile of papers in his hand. “What is it? Which one? Where, where?”
    He gives me his famous “calm down” look. It’s so easy to spot, he should trademark it, like Larry with his sarcasm. So I put my hands by my sides and bite my bottom lip, but I still can’t help bouncing around a little on my toes. And Dad can’t stop the voice inside my head from saying,
Come on, come on, come on!
    Finally, after what seems like a million years, he hands me a postcard and walks inside.
    The side with the picture is facing up. It’s actually two photos next to each other. One shows a cute little pink cottage with a white porch in front, and the other shows a room stuffed with books from floor to ceiling. The words in the corner of the card say “Maple Street Bookshop, New Orleans, Louisiana.”
    I turn the postcard over and immediately recognize the scrawl. It’s the same writing from my voodoo doll instructions.
Knowledge is power, said somebody important. Blaze your own trail, said somebody else. Go, go, go, my friend Cleoooooo!
    There’s no signature.
    Uncle Arnie for sure.
    I turn it over again. What is he trying to say? Is he telling me a story? Giving me a clue to something? Is the meaning of life hidden here somewhere?
    I look at the photos more carefully. There’s an orange cat stretched out on the floor in front of the books, and an owl perched on the top bookshelf. But the owl’s not real; it’s wearing