Blackthorn Winter by Kathryn Reiss Page A

bottle—"
    "And then a huge wave nearly capsized the barge! And the bottle fell overboard..."
    "Maybe it fell down, down into the sea, and it conked a mermaid on the head! And she put a
curse
on it—"
    "Yeah—a
curse
!"
    And the Goops were off again as the clouds rolled in and obscured the sun. I shivered on the cold beach. My brother and sister were perfect playmates for each other. It was always like that with them. I could just as well have gone to the Pethering Portrait Gallery or be back at the cottage for all they needed me there, or noticed me. But I knew Mom wouldn't want the nine-year-olds left alone at the ocean's edge. They were good swimmers, true, but that
was in California, where the sky was as blue as the water. This English ocean was as gray as the English sky above it had become, and I didn't trust it. I was glad to turn away from the wind blowing off the water and zip my raincoat and walk up the deserted beach a bit. Glad, too, to get away from the Goops and their ancient bottle, and Mrs. Bobblehead, and all of Edmund's dumb, fake memories.
    They had to be fake. Of course he couldn't remember anything about his adoption or what life was like before
us;
he had been only a few months old when we brought him home to California. It wasn't as if he'd been older, as I had been when Mom and Dad adopted me. I had been, after all, fully five years old and ready for kindergarten when I joined this family. And kindergartners were old enough to remember all sorts of things.
    So why
didn't
I?
    The waves crashed over the concrete pier with a vengeance, spraying me. I jumped back, then tripped on a loose stone and sat down hard on another one. "Ouch!"
    "Are you all right?" called a concerned voice out of nowhere, and I jerked my head up to see a girl about my age and my height (which is pretty tall), striding down the beach from the stone stairway. She wore a bright red jacket and had a large camera slung around her neck. The wind blew her short mouse-brown hair into spikes, then flat again. Her gray eyes looked worried. I stood up slowly, rubbing my bruised backside (
bum,
Mom said it was called here).
    "Yes, I'm okay," I called back.
    "I saw you fall," the girl said, coming to stand next to me, and then we both just stood there awkwardly for a moment. Then she added, "You sound American."
    "I am American!" I laughed. "My name's Juliana Martin-Drake. We just moved here." I pointed to the Goops, who by now had taken off their shoes and started piling stones into a big tower by the water's edge. "And
those
strange, half-frozen creatures are my brother and sister."
    "Oh—you must be the people living in the Old Mill House Cottage," the girl said. "Everybody's talking about the new artist and her three kids. That must be you."
    "We're big news?" I was surprised.
    "Well, it's a small village. Any new thing is big news." Her voice was a little defensive, as if I had somehow insulted Blackthorn.
    "Anyway, what's your name?" I asked hastily.
    "Oh! Sorry! Mother always goes on at me about my atrocious manners, and I guess she's right ... I'm Kate Glendenning. It's nice that I'm meeting you now, because we were going to meet tonight at Quent Carrington's party, and I was a bit nervous."
    "Nervous? How come?"
    Kate ran one hand through her wind-tossed hair. Her eyes still held that worried look. "Well, I don't know. Meeting new people ... well, it's hard. I never know what to say, and I always make a fool out of myself somehow. Mother says I'm highly strung."
    So it seemed I wasn't the only one with problems. But at least I didn't go around
announcing
mine to people I'd just met. "Well," I said encouragingly, "we've met now, so you don't have to be worried anymore, and you've said all the right things—and I'm the one looking like a fool, tripping over my own feet and falling on my ... my
bum.
So now when you come to the party, we'll have each other to
talk to, and that's good because I don't know anybody here