Ann Martin - Hello, Mallory

The afternoon didn't get much better. The next thing that happened was that I tried to pour a glass of milk for Gabbie and spilled it all over the kitchen counter. Then the glass slipped out of my hand and broke. Claudia had to take the girls out of the kitchen while I cleaned up the glass shards. Just as I was finishing, I heard Chewy scratching at the back door, so I let him in. After all, he'd been inside when 1 arrived.

Chewy tore into the house, tail whipping back and forth, and crashed his way into the living room, where he knocked three picture frames off a table with one sweep of his tail. Luckily, they didn't break.

"Mallory!" Claudia exclaimed. "What on earth?"

"Yikes! Chewy's a wildman!" Myriah shrieked.

"He was scratching at the door, so I let him

in," I said lamely. I made a grab for Chewy and missed his collar by inches.

"Mr. Perkins said to leave him outside," Claudia reminded me.

"Oh, yeah." Chewy rocked back on his haunches, stretching his front legs out, and barked playfully at me. "Come here, boy," I said. Chewy jumped away.

"I'll get him," said Myriah.

"And I'll help you," Claudia added. They dashed after Chewy as he headed into the dining room.

Gabbie and I looked at each other. Now what?

"Are you excited about seeing your mommy tonight? And your new sister?" I asked her.

Gabbie's eyes filled with tears and her chin quivered. "I miss Mommy," she said.

I sat on the couch and pulled Gabbie into my lap for a hug.

"What happened?" asked Claudia. She struggled into the living room, holding a wiggling, wagging Chewbacca by the collar.

"I said, 'Are you excited about seeing your mommy and your sister?' " I told Claudia, "and she started to cry. She misses her mother."

Claudia closed her eyes for a moment, as if I had made her so discombobulated that she had to stop and recover before she could do

anything else. "All right," she went on. "Let me just take Chewy outside. Then I'll come back and straighten things out."

She would straighten things out?! No way. I could do it myself. First I tickled Gabbie and made faces until she began to giggle. Then 1 called Myriah into the living room and told the girls they were going to have a pajama party in the middle of the day. Claire and Mar go like to do this sometimes.

I helped the Perkins girls into their night-clothes, and then the three of us gave each other new hairstyles and sang some songs.

Claudia looked somewhat happier.

Still, before the afternoon was over, I tripped while I was giving Myriah a piggyback ride and we fell down, and later I popped my Laura balloon, frightening both Gabbie and the cat.

I couldn't get home fast enough.

Chapter 7.

"Please come to order," said Kristy primly, adjusting her visor. She looked around at the other people in the room. Mary Anne, Dawn, and Claudia were sitting side by side on Clau-dia's bed. I was sitting in the desk chair, the outcast.

It was Friday afternoon, five-thirty, the beginning of another meeting of the Baby-sitters Club.

"Have you all been reading the notebook?" asked Kristy.

"Yes," chorused Mary Anne, Dawn, and Claudia.

"How's the treasury?"

Dawn flipped through the record book. "Fine. This week's dues helped. If we don't spend anything for awhile, then no problem."

"Okay," said Kristy. "In that case, the next — and most important — order of business is

Mallory's test. AndMallory herself." She glanced at me.

1 glanced back and tried to smile. I know my smile was wobbly.

"Mallory/' said Kristy, "you flunked the test." She said it flat-out like that, but she didn't sound mean. She sounded disappointed and a little sorry for me.

"It was a hard test," I said.

"We know. It was supposed to be. Babysitting is serious business."

"But the test wasn't fair."

"Fair?" cried Kristy. "Wait a second. We're not talking about fair here. We're talking about children. What if you were baby-sitting and one of the kids was in a bicycle accident and was bleeding really, really badly?"

"I'd dial nine-one-one. I'd call for an ambulance or the police."

"And then what? What would you do while you were waiting for help?"

"I — I'm not sure. I'd have to see what was going on."

"And really," said Claudia. "Your drawing of the divestive system was terrible."

"Digestive system," I corrected her.

Claudia blushed. I actually felt good that I'd made her do that.

"Furthermore," said Kristy, "what if you were sitting for a seven-month-old baby who was crying and crying and you did everything you could think of — maybe even gave it soy formula for colic — when the real problem was that the baby was teething? Only that didn't occur to you because you think babies don't cut their first teeth until they're eight months old?" ,

"But I wouldn't give a baby soy formula if the mother didn't tell me to!"

Luckily, thevphone rang then. The girls forgot about me and the test as Mary Anne took the call and made a sitting appointment for Dawn. The caller must have been a new client because Mary Anne kept telling her (or him) things like, "Yes, we meet three times a week — Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoons from five-thirty until six. . . . No, our going rate is a little higher than that. . . . We're available weekends, evenings, and afternoons."

But as soon as Mary Anne hung up the phone, Kristy turned to Claudia and said, "On a scale of one to ten, how would you rate Mallory's job with the Perkins girls yesterday?"

"On a scale of one to ten?" Claudia repeated.

"Yes. One being lousy, five being average,

and ten being so incredibly wonderful you almost can't believe it."

"Mmm ... a three," said Claudia.

"A three!" I exclaimed.

"Well, let's face it Mallory, you spilled milk, broke a glass, and had a complete disaster with the dog."

"But those were accidents," I protested. "Most of them."

"Then there was the business with the snack."

"What was that?" asked Dawn.

Claudia told the story about the apples and her stupid banana-men.

"You made me nervous!" I finally accused her. "You watched me like a hawk and you criticized everything I did!"

The phone rang again. Dawn answered it. Mr. Perkins was calling. They talked for several minutes, lining up appointments.

"How's the baby?" Kristy called from the director's chair.

"How's the baby?" Dawn asked Mr. Perkins. "Oh, good. . . . Thanks! I'll tell Claudia. She'll be glad to hear that. Yeah, she had fun yesterday, too."

What about me? I thought. Dawn was talking as if only Claudia had baby-sat. I was there with her. Didn't she think I counted? I guess

not, since I'd been responsible for all those accidents.

As soon as Dawn hung up the phone, the girls began talking excitedly about babies.

"Remember when Lucy Newton was born?" asked Claudia. "Remember her colic?"

"Yeah, that was terrible," said Mary Anne.

"She cried endlessly," added Kristy.

"Claire had colic," I spoke up.

"Oh, yeah. You mentioned that," replied Claudia. "I don't think the Newtons gave Lucy soy sauce, though, like you did."

"I hope not!" I exclaimed. "Soy sauce!"

"Huh?" said Claudia.

At last, I thought. Something I really knew about — that the girls didn't know much about at all.

"Soy sauce," I said, "is a salty, um, condiment. For your food. Soy formula is a very gentle formula to give to babies who have trouble with milk. I should know."

The girls were looking at me. I felt like saying, "Nyah, nyah-nyah, nyah, nyah. I know something you don't know."

"Oh," said Claudia in a small voice.

Silence reigned.

Then Kristy said, "When are Mrs. Perkins and the baby coming home?"

Dawn cleared her throat. "Tomorrow," she replied.