The Forget-Me-Not Summer by Leila Howland Page A

grown-up,” Marigold said. Zinnie shot her a dirty look.
    â€œWell, Pruet is a lot safer than Los Angeles, so I think it’ll be just fine,” Aunt Sunny said. “As long as you sisters stick together.”
    Zinnie grinned and sopped as much maple syrup as possible onto her last bite of pancake.

19. Making Contact
    M arigold carried her clothes to the little bathroom in the attic and put on her white sundress and the gold wedges that gave her an extra two inches of height. This might be some dinky little town, but it didn’t mean that she had to dress like a loser. The only mirror in the bathroom was about as big as a math book and kind of blurry. It was pretty much only good for brushing teeth and making sure your hair wasn’t standing up. Still, she applied a little lip gloss and, because her mother wasn’t here, some mascara. She brushed her hair and put her cell phone in her purse.
    Finding a cell phone signal was the mission of the day. She didn’t care how far she had to walk to find it. She would walk out into the ocean if she had to. After her moment of homesickness last night, Marigold decided that she couldn’t sit around for threeweeks being sad. She needed to take action. The plan was to get in touch with her brand-new agent. She was determined to go to the audition for Night Sprites , no matter what her parents said. Marigold had an emergency credit card, and she would use it to get herself back to Los Angeles if she had to. They would understand when she was a movie star. She would even treat them all to a family vacation in Hawaii, she’d decided.
    â€œReady?” Zinnie asked as she bounded into the bathroom. “Wow, you look like a teenager, but one who hasn’t . . . developed yet.”
    â€œHa-ha,” Marigold said, observing Zinnie in her shorts and T-shirt with her hair pulled back and an old sweatshirt tied around her waist. “Well, you look like my little brother. And why are you wearing that thing around your waist?”
    â€œAunt Sunny said the weather here is very unpredictable, so it’s always good to have layers. Now come on, let’s go.”
    Marigold and Zinnie followed Aunt Sunny’s map and set off down Anchor Lane. The street was shady, with rambling stone walls on either side.
    â€œLook!” Zinnie said, stopping to look at two horses in a field, their heads bent and their tails swishing. Marigold paused, but only to check her phone. Still no signal.
    â€œLet’s keep going,” Marigold said.
    At the end of the field they turned onto Harbor Road, which led right into the little village. After only a few minutes one of the bars on Marigold’s cell phone flickered. Marigold looked up to see that they were standing in front of a big driveway and a sign that said PRUET YACHT CLUB . She took a few steps past the sign into a parking lot, and the signal strengthened for a second.
    â€œFollow me,” Marigold said.
    â€œOkay,” Zinnie said. “Except, um, are we allowed?”
    Marigold had to admit this did not seem like a place where everyone could just wander in. There was a guy with a clipboard sitting at a table checking cars as they drove in. She was going to use a strategy she’d learned in acting class: the “magic if.” She could almost hear Ronald P. Harp’s voice in her head as she asked herself how she would act if she did know the clipboard guy and if she did come here all the time and if she knew exactly where she was headed.
    â€œJust be casual,” Marigold said to Zinnie through one of her winning smiles. The clipboard guy squinted as he watched them pass.
    â€œHi!” Marigold called. She waved to him as if she’d known him her whole life. He smiled, waved, and turned back to his clipboard. Success!
    The girls walked down the long pebbled driveway, past a gray shingled building roughly the size of the Silvers’ house and a bright-green lawn with a