Ann Martin - Mallory And The Mystery Diary

"And I don't arrive until four," I said. "Yeah, that is good. It'll be clear that you're the baby-sitter and I'm the tutor."

"You should probably work in Buddy's room at his desk with the door closed."

"Right," I agreed. "That'll be like school. Maybe Buddy needs help with things like con-

centrating and sitting still. A quiet room with a desk should be good."

Our plans were made. I was sure that tutoring would be a snap. Sometimes I play spelling and writing games with Claire. She's always an eager student. So promptly at four that afternoon I rang the Barretts' bell, feeling excited. Inside, I could hear Jessi call, "Buddy, there's Mallory. That's for you. Can you answer the door, please?"

I was standing on the Barretts' steps, all smiles, ready to introduce Buddy to the wonderful world of reading.

But the door was opened by a boy with a scowl so big that my smile faded immediately. I tried to appear bright and perky, though.

"Hiya, Buddy," I said. "Are you ready to get to work?"

"No," he replied sullenly. "I just got home from school. I don't want to do more work."

But he let me in anyway.

I walked inside, called hello to Jessi and the girls, whom I could see in the kitchen, and led Buddy upstairs and into his room.

We closed the door.

"Now," I began, "first of all, we're going to sit at your desk, just like in school."

"You don't sit at my desk in school," said Buddy.

"Well, you do," I replied, "and I'm going to pull up your other chair and sit next to you. You can pretend I'm your teacher. Who's your teacher?"

"Mr. Moser. I hate him."

"Oh. Well, I guess I don't look much like him anyway. I'll just be Mallory then."

Buddy shrugged his shoulders as if to say, "Whatever. I don't care."

"Okay," I went on. "Your mom said your teacher sent home a box of flash cards. Let's start with those."

Buddy groaned. "I hate flash cards. Almost as much as I hate Mr. Moser."

"Well, let's try them anyway. Where are they?"

Buddy slapped his hand to his forehead. "Darn!" he cried. "I forgot and left them downstairs." He flew out of the room and took a long time coming back. But at last he returned with the flash cards.

"Here they are," he said grimly.

I opened the box.

"Oh, wait!" cried Buddy. "I forgot something else, too. I — I need a drink of water."

I let Buddy leave to get some water. He must be a camel. He was gone for an awfully long time.

When he returned, I resolutely closed the door to his room, cleared his desk of toys, sat him in the chair, and pulled the other chair up next to him.

I opened the box of flash cards. As I did so, I got an idea. I remembered the movie Mary Poppins, and how Jane and Michael's wonderful, magical nanny would make fun games out of boring things.

"Buddy," I said, "as we go through these flash cards, we'll put the words you know right away in one pile, and the hard words in another pile. For all the words you know — or learn today — I'll give you a minute of free time at the end of the afternoon, okay?"

Buddy looked mildy interested. "Okay," he agreed.

The cards in the box were all mixed up. On some were easy, short words. On others were hard, longer words.

I held up the first card.

"Easy," said Buddy. " 'At.' "

"Good. One minute of free time." I laid the card on the table and held up the second one.

Buddy stared at it. " 'Check'?" he guessed.

"Almost. The word is 'chicken.' " I laid it next to the first card.

"Do I lose my minute?" asked Buddy, dismayed.

"No, you just don't get a second one yet. That's all."

"Oh." Buddy still looked disappointed.

"Try this one," I said, showing him the next card.

"Ball," said Buddy. "Simple."

"Good. Now you have two free minutes."

We worked our way through about half the deck of cards. Buddy began to slump in his chair. He sat with one hand under his chin, as if his head might drop off if he didn't support it.

"Mallory," he whined, "I hate these cards. They're stupid. Sometimes I don't know a word all by itself, but if I see it in a book with a lot of other words around it, then I can figure it out." (Well, that made sense.) "Besides, look at the piles. There's a huge one of words I didn't get right away. The other pile is short. How many free minutes did I earn?"

I counted the cards in the small pile. "Seven," I told him.

"Seven! That's nothing."

Buddy looked like he was going to cry, so

I put the cards back in their box. "I guess we've spent enough time on flash cards. Do you have any homework?"

Buddy nodded. He told me what it was.

"Then how about reading in your reading book and doing the homework pages in your workbook?"

Buddy let out a huge sigh. Then he slapped his hand to his forehead again. "Darn! I forgot my reading book. I left it downstairs, too. I'll have to go get it."

"While you're at it, get your workbook," I said slyly. I just knew Buddy would "forget" it otherwise, and have to make yet another trip downstairs.

Buddy left, took his time finding the books, but finally returned with them. He was scowling again.

I ignored the scowl. "What did you say your workbook pages are?" I asked him.

"Sixty-seven and sixty-eight."

"Okay. Open to page sixty-seven."

Buddy did so.

"Now read the instructions out loud."

"Mallory," said Buddy, "I am not Cinderella. You can't order me around."

"Buddy," I replied, "I'm not your wicked stepmother, but I am your tutor, and it would

help if you followed directions."

"Oh, brother. All right." Buddy stared at the page. Then he stared out the window for awhile. I let him.

When he didn't give any indication of going back to the workbook pages, I said. "You just used up two minutes of your free time."

"What?!" Buddy shot me a look that I'm sure he usually reserved for Mr. Moser.

"Please read the instructions."

"O-kay." Buddy paused. Then he began reading. " 'On the page . . . below . . . are — are puh-puh . . .' "

I think Buddy was waiting for me to tell him the word. "Sound it out," I said.

"Pars?"

"Almost."

"Oh, pairs. 'Pairs of ... wuh-words. Some . . . words ruh-ruh . . .' "

The word was "rhyme." How would he ever sound that out? "I'll give you a clue," I told Buddy. " 'All' and 'tall' are words that ..."

"Rhyme!" cried Buddy, actually sounding pleased. He returned to the directions. " 'Some words rhyme and some words . . . donut.' I mean, 'don't. Cir-circle the rhyme words.' "

"The what?" I said.

" The . . . rhymfng words/ "

"Good."

Buddy heaved another sigh and picked up his pencil as if it weighed a ton. He looked at the first pair of words, then at me, then at the words again. Maybe I was making him nervous. "I think I'll take a two-minute break," I said, "since you got one." I sat on Buddy's bed while he worked halfheartedly on the page. When I returned to the desk, Buddy had completed one column of words — and most of them were wrong. I made him go back, read the words to me, and do a lot of erasing. When the dreaded page was finally finished, Buddy said, "What time is it?"

"Five-fifteen," I replied.

"Five-fifteen? It's only five-fifteen?"

"Sorry," I said.

"I want to play with our video game."

"At five minutes of six you can do whatever you want."

"No fair," muttered Buddy, but he returned to his work.

What was I doing wrong? I wondered. I'd thought I would enjoy this. I'd thought Buddy would see what fun reading could be.

Nothing was going as I'd planned.

At long last I looked at my watch and said,

"Five of six, Buddy. You can stop working now."

"All right!" Buddy closed his reading book with a flourish. Then he took the books and the flash cards and stashed them under his bed — I guess so he wouldn't have to look at them.