Survival Strategies of the Almost Brave by Jen White Page A

HALSTRONG . Born in 1940. Wow, she was really old. I stared at the weird picture with her eyes sort of crossed.
    Suddenly, the front door flew open. The voice of Myrna Ann Halstrong, aka the Lavender Lady, rang out.
    â€œThat stupid clerk! I swear I told him I wanted a room on the bottom floor.” She cursed and slammed the door behind her. “Orson, people don’t listen anymore. Nobody listens.” She turned the car back on and squealed out of the parking space. “I’m going to give that guy a piece of my mind. I told him there was no way you could climb the stairs.” The car jerked forward as she sped back to the front of the hotel to yell at the person who manned the front desk.
    Hurry. Hurry.
    All I could think of was Billie and me being stranded here with nothing, not even a dollar to make a phone call. I jerked the money out of the wallet and shoved it into my pocket, the bills fat and heavy. Then Billie and I quietly scrambled to put everything back into her bag. Tissues. Lipstick. Sanitizer. I grabbed the empty mint tin under the seat and tossed that in, too. The Lavender Lady still ranted. She parked the car and stomped inside.
    Billie chomped on her mints, her cheeks full like the chipmunks we saw at Zion National Park. Now the backseat smelled like pee and breath crystals. I zipped up the bag and set it on the little bump behind the armrest, between the rack of clothes. The money in my pocket poked me in the hip, like an outstretched finger saying Liberty is a criminal. Was there such a thing as kid jail?
    The lights in the parking lot flicked on. The sun had set and cast shadows across the pavement. The Lavender Lady still yelled at the guy at the desk and Orson fell back to sleep. I stretched up and pulled the money out of my pocket. It was damp with sweat, or maybe Billie’s pee.
    One. Two. Three. Four twenty-dollar bills sat safely in my hand.
    Eighty dollars. How many Twinkies could that buy? No matter how bad I felt about stealing, looking at the wad of money, I knew I would never give it back. Instinct had kicked in.
    I turned to Billie. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

 
    Survival Strategy #14:
    BEWARE OF “SKIP TO MY LOU”
    When Billie and me moved into Dad’s camper, I realized he didn’t have a TV. Sometimes campers had TVs and stuff, but his didn’t. There was a computer, but it was for his work. And I really missed my animal shows. Having a dad was way better than watching any old TV show, though. Still, it was an adjustment. I didn’t complain because he had to like us.
    After Dad picked us up in San Diego, he said we were headed to Arches National Park in Utah so he could get some pictures of all the rock formations called arches. I was really excited to see them. I had an information pamphlet in my notebook—it was about chipmunks, prairie dogs, tortoises, coyotes, and mule deer who lived there. I had really wanted to see a mule deer.
    That first night in the camper we parked at a rest stop and slept inside. The sleeping bag was hot. And for a second, it was so quiet and dark that I felt like maybe we were floating somewhere in outer space. In the middle of the night, Billie fell off her bed and landed right on top of me. So I let her stay next to me, because really her bed was too small and high. When she fell, Dad didn’t even wake up. He just slept and slept.
    â€œTell me a story, Liberty,” whispered Billie. Because even though she had a brand-new koala, I could tell she really missed San Diego, and our condo, and George and Martha, and Mom. And maybe so did I, but I didn’t want to let Billie know that.
    â€œOnce upon a time, there was a sea turtle floating through the ocean all by her lonesome.”
    Billie nodded.
    â€œAnd she had a secret. She was going to have baby turtles. But she needed to find a special place where she could hide her eggs so they could grow up happy and strong.”
    Billie