Ann Martin - Shannon's Story

"Great," said my mom. "Look, Shanny."

She put a box down on the coffee table, opened it, and pulled out a dress.

"Is that for you?" I said. "It's nice, Mom." It really was. A sort of Laura Ashley spring dress, with a lace collar and a drop waist and lots of tiny flowers. The kind of dress that looked good on my mom and would look good on Tiffany, too, I thought.

My mom whipped another dress out.

"Here," she said, beaming. "For you, Shanny."

I took the dress with a sinking heart, feeling all my resolve fly out the window. My mom

had gone shopping and she had bought mother-daughter dresses for me and her, as if I were a little kid. Or a doll.

And she hadn't bought anything like the kind of dress I wore now. But then, I thought hatefully, how would she know? She never listened to me these days, or paid attention to what I asked.

"Do you like it?"

What could I say? I didn't like it for me. My mom must have known I wouldn't. How could she not? She'd just set herself up — and me, too.

She was looking at me so eagerly that I couldn't say what was on my mind. I felt trapped and angry all over again.

But I said, "It's a very pretty dress, Mom."

Did she notice the lack of enthusiasm in my response? How could she not?

I jumped up. "I'll go hang it in my closet and then after dinner, maybe I can try it on."

I made my escape and that's exactly what it was. An escape. I hung the dress in my closet, resisting the impulse to push it as far to the side as I could. I lay down on my bed and stared at the ceiling.

Not long after, Maria came home. Her hair was dry, but it was slicked back like a seal's.

"Heard you did pretty good," I said, sitting up.

Maria shrugged, but she was smiling.

"So?"

"So, we won," said Maria. She looked up and down the hall, then said, "Can I come in? Your room, I mean."

"Sure," I said.

Maria closed the door behind her and sighed.

"What's up?"

"It's Mom," she said. "I mean, I'm glad she comes to the swim meets and all that, but she . . . she talks to the coach all the time. Coach Williams is a great coach and she's nice to Mom, but none of the other parents do that."

"What does she talk to Coach Williams about?" I asked sympathetically.

"I don't know. But I wish she wouldn't. It's weird. You know?"

"Maybe you could talk to Mom about it," I said.

Maria made a face. "Maybe. But it's like she's not listening, you know?" She sighed heavily and got up. "Oh, well. See you at dinner."

I lay back down and resumed my study of the ceiling of my room. Poor Maria. I knew how she felt. Hedged in. Trapped.

In Paris, I'd be on my own. (Except for the chaperones, of course.) I hated to admit it, but

one of the appealing things about Paris these days was just how far I'd be from Mom.

I woke up Sunday morning still brooding over the dress in my closet. It fit. I couldn't even make that excuse for never, ever wearing it.

But I never, ever would.

Maybe I could take it to Paris with me and lose it.

The thought cheered me up. Until the Sunday newspaper incident.

"You should fold the newspaper back when you finish reading it," said Mom. "Other people might want to read it."

"Everyone else has already read it," I said, digging through for the comics.

"You don't know that," said Mom.

"Yes, I do. I asked you. I asked Dad."

"What about Tiffany and Maria?"

"They don't read anything but the comics!"

"Shannon, I think you should put the paper back in order," said Mom.

"Fine," I said through clenched teeth. I put the paper back in order, then marched pointedly through the house and dropped it into the recycling bin. Then I went on marching, out the door. "I'm going over to Kristy's!" I shouted as the door slammed shut behind me.

"Shanny . . ." called my mother.

I didn't answer. I kept going.

"What's wrong?" asked Kristy the moment she opened her door.

"You can tell?"

"Yeah."

"My mom's driving me crazy! She treats me like a baby, she doesn't listen to anything I say and she's . . . she's acting like a big baby herself."

"A big baby, huh? Sounds like a job for the BSC," joked Kristy as she led the way to her room.

"Ha," I said sourly. "Do you have the Sunday paper? I didn't even get to read the comics."

"Sure." Kristy detoured through the kitchen, grabbed the comics and a stack of newspaper sections off the top of the pile of newspapers scattered (out of order) on the kitchen table, and kept going.

We went upstairs and scattered sections of newspaper all around the room.

"Nothing about Paris in the travel section," Kristy announced.

"That's okay. I've read a million books about Paris," I told her. "I can hardly wait."

"You are sooo lucky, Shannon. Are you going to get one of those hats?"

"A beret. Yes. Definitely."

Kristy grinned. "Ooh, la, la."

We both laughed and scattered some more newspaper sections around in comfortable silence.

And I wondered if the mothers in France ever drove their kids crazy, too.

Chapter 5.

"The unofficial meeting of the BSC will now come to order," Kristy said, and we all laughed. The time had come to plan the BSC Mother's Day Surprise Extravaganza. So we'd all gone to Kristy's house and, of course, to keep our energy up, we'd just raided the BSC treasury and sent out for pizza.

"A business expense," said Stacey, counting out the money. "Tax deductible."

"We have to keep our strength up," said Claudia. She had come prepared, and since we appreciate the motto, "Life is uncertain, eat dessert first," we were eating out of a bag of Gummi Worms Claud had brought along — except for Stacey, who was eating an apple.

"We always fix our mom breakfast in bed," said Mallory. "For Mother's Day, I mean."

"That's a nice family tradition," said Stacey.

Mallory grinned. "You should see the Pikes getting Mom's breakfast ready!"

The idea of all of the Pike kids in the kitchen at once cooking breakfast for just one person was an awesome one. I had a vision of them passing pancakes down a line, like firefighters in those old movies, passing buckets of water along to put out a fire.

"I bet a lot of kids make Mother's Day breakfasts," said Mary Anne, who was making notes in the club notebook. "We could help kids plan the menus, maybe."

"Mmm. I don't know. It's a good idea, but I don't think it has the 'oomph' we're looking for," Kristy said.

"Oomph?" teased Claudia.

"What about a Saturday Make Your Own Mother's Day Giftathon?" suggested Jessi. "That'd be a lot of fun."

Claudia said (somewhat Gummi Wormily), "Yeah. We could even help them make wrapping paper and cool gift decorations."

"Or the kids could grow a special plant or flower," I suggested, thinking of Tiffany and her garden. Maybe I could get Tiffany involved that way. She'd have other gardeners to talk to (sort of) and get positive reinforcement for her garden.

"So what does our schedule look like, Mary Anne?" asked Kristy briskly. "Can we have this Giftathon soon?"

Mary Anne flipped open the club record

book and ran her finger through the pages, and we settled on a Saturday when we could all get together. We decided on Mary Anne's house, since her backyard is big and we could move to the barn if the weather got bad.

We were idling along on that idea, talking about the supplies we'd need to get and the kinds of presents the kids could make (like a special decorated menu to go with a special Mother's Day breakfast). We discussed whether to let the kids take the gifts home with them then, or arrange to distribute them right before Mother's Day, and congratulated ourselves on how much fun the Giftathon would be, when Kristy got her "Kristy's Great Idea" look on her face.