Ann Martin - Dawn And The Impossible Three

"Homework's done," she announced. "Can I have a snack, Dawn?"

"Sure," I replied. "Claire and Margo and I will have one, too."

The four of us sat around the Pikes' kitchen, eating granola bars.

"So, Dawn," said Mallory, "how's your new-old house?"

Claire and Margo giggled. Mallory had christened our house "new-old," and the little girls think it's funny, but Mallory's right. I do live in a new-old house. It's new to Mom and Jeff and me, but it was built in 1795.1 love it, even though it's dark inside, and the stairway is narrow, and the doorways are low because people were a lot shorter in 1795.1 like to think that I live in a house that so many other people have lived in — people who saw the War of 1812 and the Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation and the Gay Nineties and the first airplane and the Depression and the first rocketship. If s exciting.

I bet our house has a secret passageway somewhere. Maybe it was even part of the Underground Railroad. Mary Anne and I are going to explore it thoroughly one day. We'll tap on walls and press the wood paneling,

hoping for something to spring out or swing open. We plan to explore the attic, too. Maybe we'll find an old diary or something.

I smiled to myself, thinking that Mom would want to be in on a search of the house. She loves things like that. She thinks they're romantic, and Mom is a very romantic person. That's one reason Mr. Spier liked her so much when they were in high school. Guess what she did? She saved the rose tied with a white ribbon that he gave her the night of their senior prom. She pressed it between the pages of her yearbook. It's still there. Mary Anne and I found it.

"The new-old house is fine," I replied.

Mallory grinned at me and raised her eyebrows. "And how's your mom?" she asked meaningfully. Mallory knows about my mother and Mr. Spier, and loves to hear about them. She likes most of all to hear about when they were in love in high school and what had happened to drive them apart. I'd told her as much as I knew, which wasn't much. Several times I had asked Mom why she and Mary Anne's father ended their relationship. It had something to do with Mom's parents not approving of the Spiers because they didn't have much money (Mom's parents have tons of money), but I didn't know the whole story.

"Honey," she said, "it's not really very interesting."

"I think it is. You two were in love, but you went off to college and never saw each other again. I think it's romantic . . . and sad."

"Our paths just never crossed. Our vacations usually came at different times. During the summers, I stayed inCalifornia and worked. And at Christmastime, Granny and Pop-Pop would take me to theBahamas ."

"Didn't you think about Mr. Spier, though?"

"Sometimes, yes. But we were young. We had new lives and new interests. We were both busy with school. And then I met your father, and Mr. Spier met Mary Anne's mother — and you know the rest of the story."

I sure did. The rest of the story is that my mother and father got married, got unhappy, and got divorced. They just weren't right for each other. Dad is super-organized. And Mom is a crazy person — not nasty crazy, just an absentminded-professor type.

Jeff and I are actually used to finding the mixing bowls carefully put away in the linen closet, or finding her mending clothes we outgrew two years earlier. And although we've been living in our new-old house for several months, there is still a gigantic pile of unpacked cartons in the dining room. Every now and

then I start to go through one, and each time Mom runs in and says, "Dawn, you don't have to bother with that, honey. Let me do it." And then she doesn't do it.

My mom is really terrific, but her habits are what drove her and Dad apart. I'm not saying the divorce was her fault. I'm just saying that she's disorganized and Dad couldn't live with that.

I didn't tell Mallory all that, though. What I said was, "Mom's okay. She's still going out with Mr. Spier."

"Yea!" cried Mallory.

"And she's started looking for a job. She's always off on interviews — "

We were interrupted by a thump and a wail that seemed to come from the front porch. Mallory and I looked at each other. "What was that?" I asked.

We raced to the door. There was Nicky Pike with a boy about his age, and a round-faced, pigtailed little girl who was crying.

"Suzi!" Mallory exclaimed. "It's Suzi Bar-rett," she informed me. "And this is Buddy, her brother."

"She fell coming up the steps," Buddy said. "I think she skinned her knee."

I braved the cold weather to dart outside and roll up Suzi's pants legs. Sure enough, one

knee was bleeding, but it didn't look bad. "I'm Dawn, Suzi," I told her. "Why don't you come in and I'll wash your cut and find you a Band-Aid."

"Thanks," said Suzi tearfully.

"We have Band-Aids with dinosaurs on them," Nicky said helpfully.

We found one and I put it carefully over Suzi's scrape. She liked it so much that she rolled up the leg of her pants and left it that way so everyone could see the Band-Aid.

Suzi and Buddy stayed at the Pikes' the rest of the afternoon. Suzi watched Sesame Street with Claire and Margo, and Mallory helped Nicky and Buddy make a dinosaur village. (I never did figure out what that was.)

When Mrs. Pike got home it was 5:15 and time to make tracks to the Baby-sitters Club meeting. I said good-bye to the children, got on my bike, and rode off in a hurry, deciding to go to Mary Anne's house and pick her up beforehand.

When I reached the Spiers', I guided my bicycle into the driveway and pulled to a stop. While I was fiddling with the kickstand, Mary Anne burst through her front door and dashed across the lawn.

"Hey, guess what!" she cried. "Great news!"

Chapter 2.

Mary Anne's brown hair flew behind her as she ran to me.

"What? What is it?" I asked excitedly.

"Dad just called. He said not to expect him for dinner tonight."

"So?" I prompted.

"He said not to expect him because he's taking your mom out!"

"Another date!" I squealed. "Fantastic! This is really exciting."

Mary Anne closed her eyes and sighed. "Yeah. The date was spur-of-the-moment, too, which is a good sign. Dad never used to just haul off and do things. He'd plan them for weeks. But he said he got the idea about five minutes ago, called your mother, asked her to join him for a quick dinner, and then called me. I can't believe it."

I checked my watch. "It's almost five-thirty," I said. "We'd better get to Claudia's."

Mary Anne started across the street with me, but she didn't say anything, just sighed again. It was a sigh of pleasure.

I knew one reason Mary Anne was so happy about her father and my mother. It was because my mother took Mr. Spier's mind off Mary Anne. Mr. Spier used to make all these rules for Mary Anne: She had to fix her hair in braids and wear the clothes he bought for her; she couldn't talk on the phone after dinner; she had to be in by nine; she had to put half of her baby-sitting money in the bank; etc. etc. It was awful.

He was already beginning to change when he "re-met" Mom, but now he's a completely different father. He let Mary Anne get contact lenses to replace her reading glasses. He allows her to spend her baby-sitting money if she saves her allowance, and since he no longer buys her clothes, you should see what Mary Anne gets with her money. She doesn't look like Claudia or Stacey, who wear these really wild outfits such as tight black pants and Day-Glo shirts, but, well, for instance, at that very moment as we walked across the Kishis' lawn, Mary Anne had on her first sweat shirt and her first pair of jeans ever. She looked terrific!

"You know what I'm going to start doing?" Mary Anne asked me with a giant grin.