A Whirlwind Vacation (13 page)

The next evening, Katie and Annabelle sat beside each other in the back room of a restaurant near Venice's Grand Canal. Katie giggled as Annabelle placed three strands of spaghetti in her mouth and quickly slurped them up.

“Good one.” Katie laughed. She was having a great time. Too bad it was all about to end. This was her last night in Europe. The people in her tour group were having one final meal together.

The Garcias and the McIntyres were passing around some pictures they'd taken during the trip.

“Oh, look,” Mrs. Garcia said. “That's me being a gargoyle at Notre Dame!”

“And here we are at Buckingham Palace,” Mrs. McIntyre said. “We were pretending to be guards, remember?”

Katie frowned. She'd been a guard there, too. Only she hadn't been pretending.

“Here's Katie and Annabelle acting like penguins at Faunia,” Mr. McIntyre said as he pulled another photo from the pile.

“That was a fun day,” Annabelle exclaimed. “Wasn't it, Katie?”

Katie nodded. They had all been fun days. She looked around the table. The grown-ups were exchanging addresses and phone numbers so they could stay in touch. Even the adults didn't want to say good-bye.

But they had to. It was time to go home.

“Good-bye, Europe,” Katie whispered quietly to herself. “
Au revoir, adiós, arrivederci.”