The Tori Trilogy by Alicia Danielle Voss-Guillén Page A

counts, we’re alike, and we try to do as much as possible together. There’s nothing better than having your best friend built right in to your family!
    Now I rush over to give her a hug. I saw her just an hour ago at school, but it feels like much longer. Time has a way of dragging when you’re really looking forward to something.
    â€œI’m so excited!” she exclaims, dancing on the rug inside the front door.
    â€œMe, too!” I cry. “Let’s stay up all night and tell ghost stories!”
    Gina shivers. “We can definitely stay up all night...but your ghost stories scare me. They seem so real!”
    Mom walks in from the living room, smiling at Gina’s remark. “That’s the actress in Tori,” she says. “She can bring any character to life.”
    I love to act. I go to drama day camp for two months out of every summer, and I’ve taken several theater and improv classes with the YMCA and the park district. I blush happily at Mom’s compliment.
    â€œSome characters are better off not coming to life,” jokes Gina, and we all laugh.
    Auntie Luz shakes her head. “All I can say is, you girls had better get some sleep tonight!”
    â€œI agree,” Mom adds. “Or else we’ll have two sleepyheads on our hands tomorrow.” She bends down to kiss me goodbye. “Have a wonderful time, sweetheart. Be good for your grandparents. We’ll see you tomorrow!”
    â€œI can hardly wait for that ,” Joey mutters under his breath. “Laters, Gory Tori.”
    I stick my tongue out at him. “I’m not exactly thrilled to be coming home to you, either,” I say.
    Mom gives us both a withering look.
    â€œSibling rivalry at its finest,” Auntie Luz says. She reaches out and gives my hair a playful tug. “You ready to go, Tori?”
    â€œShe’s been ready all week,” Mom answers for me. She helps me into my jacket, then hands me my overnight bag.
    â€œBye, Mom,” I say. “I love you.”
    And we’re off! Gina and I huddle with Auntie Luz under her big designer umbrella. Auntie Luz, you see, does everything with style. We make a beeline through the cold rain to my aunt and uncle’s SUV, parked in our long, winding driveway.
    Auntie Luz throws open the doors, and my cousin and I scramble inside, where two-and-a-half-year-old Sofie is waiting for us in her car seat. We slam the doors shut as quickly as they were opened, and I toss my bag into the cargo hold. Then I slide into the space between Gina and Sofie, and begin cooing and ooh-ing to my littlest cousin.
    â€œHi, Sofie-boo!” I say, poking her button nose.
    â€œToe-wee!” she cries, the closest she can get to “Tori.” It rhymes with “Joey,” in fact, which is super-unfortunate. “We go see Lita an’ Lito.”
    â€œThat’s right. We are going to see Abuelita and Abuelito,” I reply. “Well, at least me and Gina are.”
    We all settle in for the long drive to Cicero. What normally takes forty-five minutes takes over an hour, because everyone’s getting off work and going home or going somewhere, because it’s Friday.
    Gina and Sofie and I watch out the windows as the houses and yards change. At first, in the unincorporated area of Forest Grove where I live, the houses are big and the properties stretch around them for acres. Our house used to be a farmhouse, built back in the early-1900s, and it’s large and wandery and drafty in the cold weather.
    As we get back into the incorporated areas of Forest Grove and other towns, the houses and yards turn smaller, meaning that if you lived in one of them, like Gina does, you could stand on your front porch and have a good view of all your neighbors’ houses. Most people can do that, but I’ve grown up acres away from my next-door neighbors!
    And as we get nearer and nearer to Cicero, meaning that we’re also