Kristy and the Mother's Day Surprise (3 page)

     
Don’t get me wrong. It isn’t bad. Really.

Our family just needs to grow together — so Mom and Watson make a huge deal out of things like all of us sitting down at the dinner table.

     
Our dinners are usually not very quiet. That night, David Michael started things off by singing softly, “They built the ship Titanic to sail the ocean blue. A sadder ship the waters never knew. She was on her maiden trip when an iceboard hit the ship —“

     
“Cut it out!” cried Karen suddenly. “I hate that song. All the people die. Besides, it’s ‘iceberg,’ not ‘iceboard.’

     
“I know that,” said David Michael. But he didn’t. He had said ‘iceboard’ every time he had sung that song.

     
He stopped singing. He made a rhythm band out of his plate; glass, fork, and spoon.

     
Andrew joined him.

     
Chink-a-chink. Chinkety-chink, chink.

     
Mom beamed. Why did she look so happy? Usually dinnertime rhythm bands gave her a headache.

     
“Hey, Karen. Your epidermis is showing,” said Sam from across the table.

     
“What? What?” Karen, flustered, began checking her clothes. Finally, she said haughtily, “Sam. I am not wearing a dress. How can my epipotomus be showing?”

     
We couldn’t help it. Watson, Mom, Charlie,

Sam, David Michael, and I began to laugh.

Not rudely, just gently. Well, all right. David

Michael laughed rudely — loudly, anyway.

     
“What?” Karen demanded.

     
“It’s ‘epidermis,’ not ‘epipotomus,’ “ said David Michael, glad to be able to correct her, “and it means ‘skin.’”

     
Karen looked questioningly at Sam. “He’s right,” said Sam. “It does mean ‘skin.’ “My skin is showing?” said Karen. “Oh, my skin is showing! That’s funny! I’m going to say that to everyone in my class tomorrow.”

     
“Now let’s have a little eating,” said Watson.

     
For a few moments, we ate. I was working on a mouthful of lima beans when I heard David Michael murmur, “Beans, beans, they’re good for your heart. The more you eat, the more —“

     
I kicked him under the table. Not hard. Just enough to make him stop. Mom and Watson hate that song.

     
But soon my brother was singing, “Beans, beans, the magical fruit. The more you eat —“

     
I kicked him again. “Cut it out.”

     
“It’s a different song.”

     
“Not different enough”

     
David Michael grew silent.

     
At her end of the table, Mom put down her

fork and looked lovingly at Watson. “We’re so

lucky,” she said. Watson smiled.

     
I glanced at Sam and Charlie. Mom had been acting weird lately.

     
“We’ve got six beautiful children —“

     
“I am not beautiful,” said David Michael. “I’m a boy.”

     
“We live in a lovely town,” continued Mom, “we like our jobs, we have a gorgeous house . . . with plenty of rooms. Do you realize that we have three spare bedrooms?”

     
My mother was looking at us kids.

     
I glanced at Sam and Charlie again. They shrugged.

     
“It is a nice house, Mom,” I agreed. Mom nodded. “Plenty of extra space.” Suddenly Sam said, “Hey, Mom, you’re not pregnant, are you?”

     
(My mother could have been pregnant. She’s only in her late thirties. She had Charlie right after she graduated from college.)

     
“No,” Mom replied. “I’m not. . . . But how would you kids feel about another brother or sister?”

     
Oh. So she was trying to become pregnant. “Another brother or sister?” David Michael repeated dubiously.

     
“A baby?” squeaked Andrew and Karen. “Great!” said Sam and Charlie. “Terrific!” I added honestly. I love babies. Imagine having one right in my house, twentyfour hours a day.

     
But the little kids just couldn’t be enthusiastic.

     
“Why do you want a baby?” asked Karen bluntly.

     
“Oh, we didn’t say we want a baby —“ Watson began.

     
But before he could finish, Andrew spoke up. “A baby,” he said, “would be the youngest person in the family. But that’s me. I’m the youngest. I don’t want a baby.”

     
“Babies smell,” added Karen.

     
“They cry,” said David Michael. “And burp and spit up and get baby food in their hair. And you have to change their diapers.”

     
“Kids, kids,” exclaimed Watson, holding his hands up. “Elizabeth just asked about another brother or sister, that’s all.”

     
Silence.

     
At last David Michael said, “Well, brothers and sisters start out as babies, don’t they?”

     
And Andrew said, “I think we’ve got enough kids around here.”

     
“Yeah,” agreed Karen and David Michael.

     
But I couldn’t help saying, “Another kid would be great. Really.”

     
Sam and Charlie nodded.

     
No one seemed to know what to say then, but it didn’t matter because Boo-Boo came into the dining room carrying a mole he’d caught, and we all jumped out of our chairs. The poor mole was still alive, so we had to get it away from Boo-Boo and then put it back outside where it belonged.

     
That was the end of dinner.

     
Later that night, I lay in bed, thinking. Sometimes I get in bed early just so I can do that. First I thought about Boo-Boo and the mole. Charlie and I had caught Boo-Boo and held him. And David Michael had gotten BooBoo to open his mouth, which had caused the mole to drop out and land in the oven mitts Mom was wearing. Then Mom, Karen, Andrew, and David Michael had taken the mole into the backyard and let it loose in some shrubbery. It had scampered off.

     
I thought of Mom wanting to have another baby. Even though she’s kind of old for that, it made sense. I mean, she’s married to Watson now, so I guessed that she and Watson wanted a baby of their own. Boy. Mom would have

five kids and two stepkids then.

     
She would need an extra special Mother’s Day present. What on earth could I give her? I slid over in bed so I could see the moon out my window.

     
The moon was pretty, but it was no help.

     
Jewelry? Nah. Mom likes to choose her own. Stockings? Boring. Candy or flowers? Let Watson do that. Something for her desk at the office? Maybe. Clothes? If I could afford anything.

     
I had a feeling I was missing the point, though. I wanted to say thank you to Mom for being such a wonderful mother. (She really is.) So I needed to give her something special, something that would tell her, “You’re the best mom. Thanks.” But what would say that?

     
I thought and thought. And then it came to me. It was another one of my ideas. Carrying it off might take some work, but my friends and I could do it.

     
I couldn’t wait until the next meeting of the Baby-sitters Club.

I don’t know whether to describe myself as a patient person or not. I mean, when I’m babysitting, I can sit for fifteen minutes, waiting for a four-year-old who wants to tie his own shoelaces. But when I have a big idea, I want to get on with it right away. And I had a huge idea.

     
On Wednesday, I begged Charlie to leave early for the club meeting. I reached Claudia’s at 5:15.

     
None of my friends was there, not even Claudia.

     
“She is baby-sitting,” Mimi told me. “At Marshalls’. Back at . . . at five, no at thirtyfive. No, urn. . . back for meeting.”

     
Mimi is Claudia’s grandmother, and we all love her. She had a stroke last summer and it affected her speech. Also, she is getting a little slower, and. . . I don’t know. She just seems older. I wish people didn’t have to change.

     
But they do.

     
“Go on upstairs?” Mimi said to me, as if it were a question.

     
“Is that okay?” I replied.

     
Mimi nodded, so I kissed her cheek and ran to Claud’s room. I found the notebook and record book and set them on the bed. Then I put on my visor. I stuck a pencil over my ear and sat in the director’s chair. I was ready for the meeting. The only thing I needed was all the rest of the club members.

     
Claudia arrived first. The others trickled in after her. By 5:29, the six of us had gathered. I was so excited that I rushed through our opening business and then exclaimed, “I’ve got an idea!”

     
“This sounds like a big one,” said Dawn.

     
“It’s pretty big,” I agreed.

     
“Bigger than the Kid-Kits?” Mary Anne wanted to know.

     
“Much.”

     
“Bigger than the club?” asked Mallory, awed. “Not quite. This is it: I was trying to come up with a Mother’s Day present for my mom,” I began. (I couldn’t look at Mary Anne while I talked about Mother’s Day. I just couldn’t.) “And I was thinking that her present should be really special. That it should have something to do with saying thank you and with being a

mom. And I thought, what would a mom like more than anything else? Then the answer came to me — not to be a mom for awhile. You know, to have a break. And then I thought, maybe we could give this present to a lot of the moms whose kids we sit for.”

     
“Huh?” said Claudia.

     
“I guess I’m a little ahead of myself,” I replied. (I’m usually a little ahead of myself.)

     
My friends shifted position and I looked at them as I tried to figure out how to explain my great idea. Mallory, with her new short haircut, was sitting on the floor, leaning against Claud’s bed. She was wearing jeans with zippers up the bottoms of the legs, and a sweat shirt that said STONEYBROOK MIDDLE SCHOOL across the front. In her newly pierced ears were tiny gold hoops.

     
Jessi was wearing matching hoops (I think she and Mal had gone shopping together), a purple dance leotard, and jeans. Over the leotard she was wearing a purple-and-white striped shirt, unbuttoned.

     
On the bed, in a row, sat Mary Anne, Dawn, and Claudia, watching me intently. Mary Anne’s hair was pulled back in a ponytail and held in place with a black-and-white checkered bow that matched the short skirt she was wearing. Around her neck was a chain and dangling

from it were gold letters that spelled out MARY

ANNE.

     
Dawn was wearing a necklace, too, only hers said I’M AWESOME. Honest. Where had she gotten it? California, probably. And in her double pierced ears were hoops of different sizes. See what I mean about Dawn being an individual? Also she was wearing a fairly tame dress, but on her feet were plaid high-top sneakers.

     
Then there was Claudia. She was wearing a pretty tame dress, too — with a red necktie! Then, she had on these new, very cool roll socks. When she pushed them down just right, they fell into three rolls. The top roll was red, the middle one was peacock blue, and the bottom one was purple. She looked as if she were wearing ice-cream cones on her feet. In her hair was a braided band in red, blue, and purple, like her socks. And dangling from her ears were — get this — spiders in webs. Ew. (But they were pretty cool.)

     
And me? I was wearing what I always wear — jeans, a turtleneck, a sweater, and sneakers. Okay, so I’m not a creative dresser. I don’t have pierced ears, either. I’m sorry. That sort of thing just doesn’t interest me much.

     
“My idea,” I began, “is to give mothers a

break in their routine. I thought that as a present to the mothers whose kids we sit for — you know, Mrs. Newton, Mrs. Perkins, Mrs. Barrett, some of our own mothers — we could take their kids off their hands for a day. We could do something really fun with the kids so they’d have a good time, and while they were gone, the mothers could enjoy some peace and quiet.”

     
All around me, eyes were lighting up.

     
“Yeah!” said Claudia slowly.

     
“That’s a great idea,” agreed Jessi.

     
“Awesome,” added Dawn.

     
Mal and Mary Anne were nodding their heads vigorously.

     
“Good idea?” I asked unnecessarily.

     
“The best,” said Dawn.

     
I breathed a sigh of relief. Sometimes I get so carried away with my ideas that I can’t tell whether they’re good or stupid.

     
The phone rang then, and we stopped and arranged a sitting job for Jessi.

     
“I was thinking,” I went on as Mary Anne put down the appointment book, “that we could take the kids on some kind of field trip. I mean, an outing. I don’t know what kind exactly, but we’ll come up with something. And maybe we could do this on the day before Mother’s Day. That way, the present will be close to the actual

holiday, but we’ll still be able to spend Sunday with our own moth —“

     
I stopped abruptly. How could I be so thoughtless? I glanced at Mary Anne, who was looking down at her hands.

     
“With — with, um, our families,” I finished up. I prayed for the phone to ring then, to save my neck and Mary Anne’s feelings, but it didn’t.