Ann Martin - Stacey's Emergency

The next thing I knew, an announcement was coming over the loudspeaker. "Station stop, Pennington. This is Pennington!"

Pennington! That was more than halfway to New York! I'd fallen asleep and had just wasted over an hour's worth of studying time.

I yawned and stretched. Yechh. I felt awful. No wonder I'd fallen asleep. Maybe I was coming down with something again. Boy, was I thirsty. Did I have a fever? I didn't care. All I knew was that I needed something to drink —

desperately. I was opening my change purse when I remembered that the train didn't have a snack car. Now what was I going to do? Well, I don't need to have a soda, I told myself. Water will do just fine.

I looked behind me. Thank goodness there was a bathroom on my car. A bathroom would have running water and little paper cups, wouldn't it?

Sort of. I mean, I was half right. The bathroom, which, by the way, didn't smell so hot, had a sink with nice, cold running water. It even had a bar of dirty pink soap and a stack of paper towels. But there were no cups.

I thought of this silly fold-up plastic cup that Mom used to bring along on vacations — for situations just like this. I used to tease her about that cup. Now I would have paid her for it.

I stood in the bathroom and thought. The idea of not drinking some water didn't even occur to me. It was just a question of how to drink it. Finally I decided that there was only one thing to do. Wrinkling my nose, I washed my hands with the dirty soap. I figured that washing my hands with dirty soap was cleaner than not washing them at all. When I finished, I turned off the hot water, cupped my hands under the cold water, and drank . . . and drank

. . . and drank. Ooh. At that moment, nothing — not even chocolate — would have tasted as good as that water did.

I went back to my seat.

Five minutes later I was thirsty again.

By the time I reached Grand Central Station, I had gotten up for drinks of water six more times. (And I had been to the bathroom twice.) When I saw Dad at the information booth, the first thing I said to him was, "Can I buy a soda?" My thirst was raging. I could not make it go away.

Dad looked closely at me as he took my bag. "Sweetie?" he said. "Are you feeling all right?"

"Not really," I had to admit. I didn't think I could hide it any longer.

"What about dinner?" asked Dad.

"I'm starving," I replied. "I've been starving all day — "

"Have you eaten?" Dad interrupted.

"Yes. Breakfast and lunch." (I didn't mention the package of M&M's that I'd sneaked while I was hiding in the girls' room.) "But I'm still hungry. The only thing is, I'm tired, too. I'd like to go out to dinner. I love the Sign of the Dove, but I'm just not sure — I mean, I don't know — "

Dad interrupted me again. "We'll eat at

home. We'll order something in. Let's get a cab right away." He began hurrying toward the doors.

"Can I get a soda first?" I asked.

"Can't you wait until we get home?"

I shook my head.

"All right." Dad looked even more concerned as he glanced around for the nearest concession stand. He bought me a large diet soda. I finished it before we reached his apartment.

That evening Dad ordered two kinds of salad and some sandwiches from a nearby deli. We ate dinner in the kitchen, which was much more relaxing than eating out, even at the Sign of the Dove. I changed into jeans, and Dad and I just sat around and talked and ate.

I considered calling Laine, but by nine o'clock I was so relaxed that I yawned and said, "I think I'll go to bed now."

"Now?" Dad looked surprised.

"Yeah, I'm really zonked." Thirsty, too, but I didn't say so.

It was hard to hide this from Dad, though. His apartment is not all that big. There's only one bathroom, and it's closer to his bedroom than to mine. So he heard me when I kept getting up all night for drinks of water. (At

least Dad's bathroom has clean soap and my own personal glass.)

Once during the night, Dad was waiting for me when I came out of the bathroom. "Are you okay?" he asked. "I knew we shouldn't have ordered from the deli."

"Oh, my stomach's fine," I answered. "It's just that I'm still so thirsty. I keep drinking water and then I have to go to the bathroom all the time."

Dad frowned. "We should check your blood sugar level."

"Now?" It was three-thirty. "No way. I'm falling asleep. Tomorrow." I made my getaway as quickly as I could.

But by the next morning, when I was still drinking like crazy, Dad didn't even suggest checking my blood sugar again. He just said, "I think it's time to call the doctor, don't you?"

I nodded. Something was very wrong, I couldn't deny it any longer.

Dad ran for the phone. When he couldn't reach my doctor immediately, he put me in a cab and we rode to the nearest hospital.

Chapter 7.

Saturday had been a good day for Claud. At least that's what she said the first time we had a chance to talk after I was admitted to the hospital. The cab had taken Dad and me to one of New York's finest. However, having been in a number of hospitals, I can tell you that no matter what . . . the food stinks. It makes the food in our school cafeteria look — and taste — like gourmet dishes prepared by a great chef of the world. In a hospital nowadays, everything that can be is individually wrapped — a slice of bread in a plastic wrapper, juice in a disposable plastic cup with a foil lid, etc. I would look at my plate after a meal, and it would practically be hidden by a pile of plastic and foil and paper.

What a waste.

If one person in one hospital generates this much trash, I thought, after my first "factory-fresh" meal, how can our environment possibly deal with it? How can — Oops. I am way off the track. I'll tell you about the hospital later. What I started to tell you about was Claudia and her good day. It began with a pottery class. At the end of the class, Ms. Baehr, the teacher, chose Claudia's piece (I think Claud said she was working on a vase) as "exemplary" and asked the rest of the class

to look at it before they went home. What a boost to Claudia's ego!

That afternoon, Claud studied for a spelling test. When Janine quizzed her on the words, Claud spelled seventeen out of twenty correctly (although you'd never know it from her notebook entry).

And then Claudia headed for the Johans-sens'. After such a good day, she wasn't too worried that Charlotte would want to be a Martian chef again, but it had crossed her mind after reading my last notebook entry. However, the first thing Charlotte said when her parents left was, "Let's play Memory, Claudia, okay? I have a new Memory game!"

"You do?" said Claudia.

"Yup." Charlotte pulled Claud into the living room. "Here. Sit on the floor," she said. "The game's in my room. I'll go get it."

Charlotte dashed up the stairs and a few moments later reappeared with a box of square cards, which she dumped onto the floor between her and Claudia.

Claud glanced at one of the upturned cards. "This looks different," she commented.

"I told you it was a new game." Charlotte grinned. "See, instead of matching up pairs of things, like two beach balls, you match animal mothers with their babies. A cat with her kitten, a goose with her gosling. Get it?"

"Yup," replied Claud. "This should be fun."

"It is/' Char exclaimed. "I beat Mommy twice today."

"Really? That's terrific."

"Thanks. Now let's spread out the cards."

Charlotte and Claudia needed several minutes to mix up the cards, turn them all facedown, and then arrange them on the rug in a neat square of rows.

When that was done, Charlotte said grandly, "You may go first, Claudia. You're a new player, and I've already won some games."

"Okay." Claudia randomly turned over two cards.