Her father opened the door again.
“Dani, what are you doing?” he sighed. “Go to bed!”
He wanted to go to bed, too.
He was going to drive Dani the whole way.
“I’m so happy I can’t sleep,” she complained.
“I know a trick,” said her father. “If you count sheep…”
“No, not sheep,” said Dani. “That’s boring.”
“Count backwards then,” her father suggested. “Count backwards from twenty!”
“Twenty, nineteen, eighteen…” Dani counted, but that didn’t help either.
When she got to seventeen, she remembered a trick she had learned from her cousin Roseanna.
The trick was to close your eyes and pretend you were asleep.
Sometimes you fall asleep properly.
It worked!
Quick as a wink, Dani fell asleep.
And when she woke up it was morning and she was going to visit Ella.
That meant a new chapter would begin in Dani’s happy life.
