Mallory on Strike Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Letter from Ann M. Martin

  Acknowledgment

  About the Author

  Scrapbook

  Also Available

  Copyright

  Today — at exactly 2:15 PM — my entire life changed. That was when Mr. Dougherty, my creative writing teacher, told my class about Young Authors Day.

  I’m Mallory Pike. Most people call me Mal. I’m eleven years old, and I want to be a writer. Correction. I am going to be a writer. And I am going to write about everything. And illustrate my books, too.

  Anyway, Mr. Dougherty announced the event to my creative writing class, which is a special one that I was invited to join because of my writing talent. (Does that sound too conceited? I hope not.) I was so thrilled when I was picked for his class because not only is Mr. Dougherty the coolest, funniest, smartest teacher I have ever had, but he has actually had a book published. He’s a real author like I want to be. The kids in my class call him Mr. D. He seems to like it, too. He’s kind of round and jolly, with a big, bushy mustache that he twirls around his finger whenever he’s pleased with something. He always twirls it when we call him Mr. D.

  Now, where was I? Oh, right. Young Authors Day. Mr. D told us that it is a special day celebrating future writers. A famous author is going to talk to the whole school about writing and how to get a book published, and then a contest is going to be held, with prizes going to the best writers in Stoneybrook Middle School. There are lots of categories that we can enter: Best Poem, Best Short Story, Best Mystery, Best Illustration of a Story, and (the one I hope to win) Best Overall Fiction for the Sixth Grade. When I told Mr. D that was the category I wanted to enter, his eyes twinkled and he twirled the ends of his mustache. (So I know he was pleased.)

  I couldn’t wait to tell Jessi about it. She’s my best friend. Jessica Ramsey is her full name, but no one ever calls her that, except maybe her parents when they’re mad at her. Jessi is beautiful. She’s tall and thin, with wonderful long legs that are just right for a ballerina, which is what she is. And not just any ballerina, either, but one of the best at this really good ballet school she goes to in Stamford. Just to show you how great a dancer she is, Jessi’s had the lead in several major productions recently, including Coppélia, in which she played Swanilda. I go to every one of her performances, and so do the rest of my friends in the Baby-sitters Club — but I’ll tell you about them later.

  Jessi is the same age as me, eleven. We’re both junior officers in the BSC (Baby-sitters Club). We’re a lot alike except for a few things. First, I come from a huge family with eight kids. And guess what. Three of them are identical triplets. But even though they look alike, Byron, Jordan, and Adam have very different personalities — especially Byron, who’s quieter and more sensitive than his brothers.

  People often say we’re stair-step kids, which means that we were born one after the other. And they’re right. You see, I’m the oldest. The triplets, who are ten, are right behind me. My sister Vanessa is nine, Nicky is eight, Margo is seven, and last but not least is Claire. She’s five. Can you imagine eating dinner with that many people every night? It can be a zoo, sometimes. But Mom and Dad don’t seem to be bothered by it. They’re great.

  Everyone in my family has chestnut brown hair and blue eyes. And out of all ten of us, Nicky and I are the ones who wear glasses. Which I hate. I’ve begged my parents for contacts, but they say I have to wait until I’m older. I also wear braces. (The clear plastic kind.) And as long as we’re on the subject of things I hate, let’s talk about my nose. I got it from my grandfather. If I could get rid of it, I would.

  Jessi doesn’t wear braces or glasses, and her family is regular-sized (two parents and three kids, plus her Aunt Cecelia). Jessi’s eight-year-old sister is named Becca (short for Rebecca), and her baby brother is nicknamed Squirt. His real name is John Philip Ramsey, Jr., which is a very big name for such a little guy.

  Another difference between Jessi and me is that she’s black and I’m white. In fact, Jessi is the only black student in the entire sixth grade. It doesn’t mean anything to me, but it did to a lot of people when the Ramseys first moved to Stoneybrook, Connecticut. (That’s where we live.) I’m ashamed to say that some of the people in Stoneybrook were pretty rotten to them at first. But things have gotten much better for the Ramseys.

  I told Jessi my news about Young Authors Day and the writing contest as we headed home after school. Since it was Friday, we were feeling pretty great. When I told her that I had a chance at winning the Best Overall Fiction award for the entire sixth grade, Jessi gave me a hug. The two of us stood on the street corner, where we usually go our separate ways, squealing with excitement. We didn’t even care that Justin Forbes and Howie Johnson, two eighth-graders, heard us. I was too happy to be embarrassed. And Jessi, my best friend, was happy for me.

  “Just think!” I said, pushing my glasses up on my nose. “I have the whole weekend to work on my prize-winning short story.”

  “Do you have any idea what you’re going to write about?” Jessi asked.

  I shook my head. “I’m planning to hole up in my room and use the next two days to come up with the perfect award-winning idea.”

  “You could write a horse story,” Jessi suggested. “Everyone loves them, especially the ones by —”

  “Marguerite Henry!” we both said at the same time. She’s our favorite author.

  “I’m going to have to check my journal,” I said after we stopped giggling. (I’m not sure why we were giggling so much. Maybe just because it was Friday and we were happy.) “I’ve written a lot of ideas in there. I think I’ll take a look at it and then decide.”

  I keep my journal under my mattress in my bedroom, which I share with Vanessa. Not that I need to hide it from her. She’s a poet and understands a writer’s need for privacy.

  “First I am going to finish all my homework this afternoon, so I can focus my complete attention on my story.” Then I groaned when I realized my homework was mostly math and science, my two hardest subjects. That was going to take a lot of concentration, which was hard because I was feeling so excited.

  Jessi checked the little gold watch she was wearing and reminded me, “You better get started on your homework right away. We have a BSC meeting in exactly two hours.”

  “Two hours? Yikes!” I waved good-bye to Jessi and shouted, “See you at Claud’s!” (Claudia Kishi is the vice-president of the BSC, and we hold our meetings at her house.)

  Then I hurried home. Our house is medium-sized for such a big family. In fact, sometimes it seems tiny. My brothers, Nicky and the triplets, have one bedroom (two sets of bunk beds); my two youngest sisters, Claire and Margo, share another; and Vanessa and I share a third. My parents have the master bedroom. You can imagine with that many people in such a small space, something’s always happening. Today was no exception.

  I opened the front door and was about to hang my jacket in the hall closet when Claire wrapped her arms around my legs and shrieked, “The boogiemen are after me!”

  “Boogiemen?” I repeated. (Usually there is only one boogieman, and he lives in a closet. Everybody knows that.)

  Claire pointed at the living room, where the triplets were crouched like cats ready to pounce. Byron was wearing a catche
r’s mask; Adam was wearing a diving mask, with big flippers on his feet; and Jordan was carrying Dad’s tennis racquet in his hand, a ski mask pulled over his face. At first glance they really were kind of scary.

  “Moozie is gone,” Claire cried, her lower lip quivering. (That’s what Claire sometimes calls Mom — Moozie.) “They napped her.”

  “Napped?” I repeated. “You mean, kidnapped?”

  Claire let out a sob. “Yes.”

  The three boys ignored her cry and leaped up on the couch with a loud growl.

  “Now, cut that out!” I ordered. “You’re scaring Claire.”

  “We’re not trying to,” Jordan said, lowering his tennis racquet. He looked disappointed. “We’re just playing Mutant Invaders from Outer Space.”

  “Well, play outside,” I said, gesturing toward the backyard. “I have to finish my homework, and I’m going to need complete quiet.”

  “She’s no fun,” Byron mumbled, as he led Adam and Jordan through the hall and into the kitchen. “Let’s go see if any other invaders have landed.”

  After the boys had gone, I made a move for the stairs but forgot that Claire was still holding onto my knees. “Claire, you can let go, now,” I said, prying open her fingers. “The boogiemen are gone. Where’s Mom?”

  “I told you,” Claire murmured, rubbing her eyes with her fists. “They napped her.”

  “Where’d they take her?”

  Claire pointed up, so I took her by the hand and led her to the foot of the stairs. “Let’s see if we can find her.”

  As we climbed the carpeted stairs, I checked the mantel clock in the living room. Fifteen minutes had already passed since I’d left Jessi on the corner, and I’d barely gotten through the front door. That meant I was going to have to work really fast on my homework.

  We peeked into my parents’ room. Margo was sitting at my mother’s dressing table. Two bright blue stripes were painted over her eyes, two red circles on her cheeks, and her lips were smeared with orange lipstick.

  Claire saw Margo and clapped her hands. “Look how pretty she is! I want to do that!”

  “Oh, no, you don’t!” I said. “I don’t think Mommy would like you to use her makeup. In fact,” I added for Margo’s benefit, “she’s not going to be very happy when she sees what Margo’s done to her face.”

  Margo smiled at her reflection. “It’s all right. Mom said I could.”

  “She did?” Mom is usually pretty easygoing, but when it comes to big messes, she draws the line. As a precautionary measure I said, “Margo, you look really pretty, but I think you should put the makeup away now.”

  Then I led Claire to my bedroom, aware that the minutes were ticking away. I found Vanessa lying on her bed, holding a flowered journal in one hand and her lavender pen in the other. She wore that dreamy look she always gets when she’s working on a poem.

  “Vanessa, I need your help!” I pleaded. “Could you take Claire for me? Mom seems to have disappeared, Margo has just painted her face with makeup, and the triplets are in the backyard, looking like a weird ad for Sports Illustrated.”

  Vanessa blinked her big blue eyes at me. “Hmmm?” she asked.

  “Earth to Vanessa!” I said, waving my hand in front of her face. “Take Claire. And find Mom.”

  Vanessa seemed to tune in this time and got off her bed. “Where is Mom?”

  I rolled my eyes at the ceiling. My sister is very smart, but she can be a real space cadet. “If I knew where she was,” I replied, “I wouldn’t be asking you to find her. But she’s probably around here someplace.”

  That seemed to be good enough for Vanessa. She obediently took Claire’s hand and went off in search of our mother.

  “At last!” I said, shutting the door after them. I flopped down on my bed, fluffed up two pillows behind my back, dug into my book bag (which I had been lugging all over the house with me), and opened my math book to page ninety-eight. I took a piece of paper and a pencil out of my bag and sighed. “Peace and quiet.”

  I spoke too soon. The door flew open and banged against the wall. It was Nicky, and he was holding his finger.

  “Frodo bit me!” he cried, running up to the edge of the bed. Frodo’s our hamster.

  “What?” I closed my math book. “Let me see.”

  Nicky held out his finger to show me the bite. It was the same finger he had once broken playing volleyball. It was slightly crooked but other than that, nothing was there. No blood, no hamster teeth marks, nothing. But I’d done enough baby-sitting to know that when a kid is upset, it doesn’t matter if the bite is real or imagined. It’s real to the child. I got off the bed and said, “Nicky, that must really hurt.”

  “It does,” Nicky said, clutching his wrist.

  “Why did Frodo bite you?” I asked.

  “I don’t know.” Nicky puffed out his lower lip. “I was being really good to him. I was sharing my candy bar with him and he wouldn’t let go of it. When I tried to take it back, he bit me. And then he ran away.”

  I ran for the door. “Frodo’s loose?”

  Nicky nodded. I put my hands to my head. It was starting to ache. “Come on,” I said. “Let’s go find him.”

  I spent the next half hour on my knees, searching for a little furry hamster. Every time I’d almost catch him, behind a shoe in the closet or under the boy’s bunk beds, Nicky would shout, “I’ll get him!” and Frodo would dart across the floor to another hiding place. We finally managed to nab him when Frodo ran straight into Nicky’s book bag.

  By the end of that episode, my head was really starting to throb. I had just settled onto my bed again when a voice shouted from downstairs, “Mallory! Mal, honey, are you upstairs?”

  It was Mom. And she was calling me honey. She probably wanted me to do something for her.

  “Mal, the boys are having some sort of argument in the backyard. Would you handle it for me? I just ran into Margo and Claire in the kitchen. I told Margo she could play with my Chapstick, and she thought that meant all of my makeup.”

  “I know.” I groaned as I got off my bed and walked to the top of the stairs. I rubbed my temples with my fingers while Mom listed the series of disasters that had happened in the last thirty minutes.

  “Claire got some silly idea that I had been kidnapped, when all I told her was that I wanted to take a little nap later this afternoon. Then, while I was down in the basement getting some cans of tomatoes for dinner, the boys tried to frighten her.”

  “I’m telling!” Jordan bellowed from the backyard. “You’re going to get it!”

  “No, you are!” Adam replied.

  “Are not!”

  “Are too!”

  A loud crash sounded from the kitchen, and my mother put her hands to her face. “My casserole!” She looked up at me and pleaded, “Mallory, please do something about the boys!”

  I wanted to tell Mom the great news about Young Authors Day, and how I planned to win the contest. I also wanted to tell her that if my sisters and brothers didn’t leave me alone, I’d never finish my homework and then I’d never get a chance to start my story. But my mom looked worse than I felt, so I held my tongue.

  I checked the mantel clock again as I came downstairs and saw that it was nearly 5:15. I had just enough time to quiet the triplets and get over to Claudia’s house.

  So I opened the back door — and the triplets plowed right into me. Then Nicky ran up behind me, shouting, “Mallory! Frodo got loose again!”

  I felt this tight lump forming in my throat, and suddenly I wanted to cry. Seven brothers and sisters is just too many! I hate to admit this but sometimes I wish they would disappear so that I could have a normal life. Like Jessi and the rest of my friends …

  At 5:20 I grabbed my bike and pedaled as fast as I could away from my four brothers, my three sisters, and my unfinished homework. I ducked my head down low and made a beeline for Bradford Court, where Friday’s meeting of the Baby-sitters Club was about to begin. I guess now would be the best time to tel
l you about the members of the BSC, since the club is one the most important things in my life (along with Young Authors Day now).

  Kristy Thomas is our president. She is really energetic and has a ton of great ideas. The best one, of course, was dreaming up the Baby-sitters Club. Kristy has brown hair and brown eyes, is the shortest girl in the eighth grade, and doesn’t care much about clothes. She usually wears jeans, running shoes, a turtleneck, and a sweater, and she doesn’t need a bra yet. She can usually be found wearing this old baseball cap with a picture of a collie on it.

  Kristy loves sports. In fact, the walls of her bedroom are covered with posters of gymnasts and football players and even a few Olympic posters. I guess you can tell that she’s pretty much a tomboy. Kristy’s also got a big mouth, which sometimes gets her into trouble, and she can be pretty bossy at times. But she’s a lot of fun, and she’s terrific with kids. In fact, she coaches a softball team called Kristy’s Krushers. The Krushers sometimes play Bart’s Bashers, who are coached by none other than (the extremely cute) Bart Taylor. He’s sort of Kristy’s boyfriend and lives in her neighborhood but goes to a private school. (All of the regular BSC members go to Stoneybrook Middle School.)

  My family, which at this moment is driving me crazy, is huge and so is Kristy’s. But her family is all mixed up like a crazy quilt. (You know those quilts that are made of funny shapes and colors pieced together with no real design?) She has two older brothers in high school named Sam and Charlie. Then there’s David Michael, who’s much younger. He’s seven.

  Right after David Michael was born, Kristy’s father walked out on the family, leaving Mrs. Thomas with four kids. Then guess what. Mrs. Thomas met Watson Brewer — a genuine millionaire! They got married, and the entire family moved from their smallish house (Kristy used to live on Bradford Court across from Claud) to Watson’s mansion on the other side of town.

  Now here’s where things become mixed up like a crazy quilt. Watson has two little kids from his first marriage, Karen and Andrew, who are seven and four. They stay with the Brewers every other weekend, and Kristy adores them. But then Kristy’s mom and Watson adopted Emily Michelle, a Vietnamese girl. She’s two and a half. And since the family was getting so big, Nannie, Kristy’s grandmother, moved in to help run the house and take care of Emily. (Nannie is not what you’d picture — prim and proper like some old ladies. She wears pants and goes bowling.) So when everyone is there, the house is pretty full.