It's Only Temporary by Sally Warner Page A

locked the front door behind them and they made their way toward the Toyota, Maddy’s pink tail swishing against the low bushes that lined Gran’s front path. “Why did she do that, Skye?”
    â€œI don’t know,” Skye said, nearly growling the words. “I really don’t want to talk about it.”
    â€œOkay, Skye,” Maddy said, unperturbed – and prepared to have a wonderful evening – as long as there were no green peppers on any of the food.

    As it turned out, Pip was the only other kid who’d even tried for an art-related costume. “Who are you supposed to be?” Maddy asked, eyeing his curly blond wig, his polka-dotted dress, his skinny, twirling-up mustache, the cutout picture of a clock drooping over one shoulder, and his bulging chest with thinly disguised alarm.
    â€œI’m two people,” Pip said proudly. “I’m the surrealist artist Salvador Dalí, and I’m the country singer Dolly Par-ton. So I’m Salvador Dalí Parton.”
    â€œI think Pip’s going to win it for both guts and originality,” Amanda’s mother said, setting down a big box of Halloween decorations on the front porch.
    â€œSkye is Georgie Keef, who was a famous Mexican artist who painted bones,” Maddy announced uncertainly.
    â€œ
New
Mexican.
New
Mexican,” Skye said, trying to be polite as she said the words. But it was hard not to sound snappish. New Mexico was famous, in New Mexico, anyway, and Albuquerque had a population of over half a million! But no one in Sierra Madre even seemed to know that Albuquerque existed, much less that New Mexico was part of the United States.
    Duh.
    â€œOh,” Mrs. Berrigan said. “Georgia
O’Keeffe.
Very clever, dear. Now, listen, Amanda,” she said over her shoulder as her daughter – masquerading in a drooping tutu and lots of makeup as a bad ballerina, which Skye now wished she’d thought of herself – erupted onto the porch with Jamila and Matteo close behind. “No crepe-paper streamers, because the dew will make them sag by Halloween, which is not until Tuesday,” Mrs. Berrigan told them. “But everything else in here should be fine,” she said, patting the cardboard box she’d been carrying.
    And in no time, phase one of Amanda’s party began, and the art jerks were so busy making a scary masterpiece of the Berrigans’ front porch that everyone’s costume was forgotten, to Skye’s intense relief.

    â€œStep back a little farther, Skye, and tell us how it looks,” Amanda called from the front porch forty-five minutes later – kind of bossily, Skye thought, but in keeping with her bad ballerina costume. Amanda sounded just like Taylor Shuster-man, in fact.
    The Berrigans’ porch glowed like a stage set as Skye trudged across the wet lawn toward the street, which was dark on this moonless October night. Streetlights in the small foothill town were scarce among the narrow roads that crept rootlike into the canyons.
    â€œIt looks good, Amanda,” Skye called out as convincingly as she could, though she thought they should have stopped decorating the porch fifteen minutes ago. Now, rubber bats hung from the porch ceiling, the Styrofoam tombstones – illogically dripping with pretend blood–leaned crazily against the light-festooned front door,pumpkins balanced precariously on the porch railing, and spiderweb strands had been tossed in large and unconvincing hunks over absolutely everything. “It looks good,” Skye shouted again, wondering when their hamburgers would be ready. Her stomach growled.
    â€œI can barely even hear you – or see you, it’s so dark,” Amanda yelled back. “Pip’s coming out there to check, ’cause I have to go inside and help my mom. Hang on.”
    â€œI’m hanging, I’m hanging,” Skye muttered to herself. She shifted her feet in the soggy