Baby-Sitters Club 059 Page 4

  Now that Squirt can walk, he's into everything. As soon as Aunt Cecelia left, he pulled a lace runner off a side table, sending everything crashing to the floor. Jessi no sooner picked up the stuff (luckily nothing broke) than he pulled open the drawer where the Ramseys keep their phone books and began tearing pages from them.

  Jessi is a. patient person, but Squirt never let up. She even made him his latest favorite food, macaroni and cheese. When she presented it to him, he flung it away, spraying the kitchen with sticky, orange macaroni.

  Speaking of spraying the kitchen, Becca wound up making quite a mess even though she was trying to be good. She was studying nutrition in school, and her weekend home- work assignment was to make a healthy drink in the blender and bring a thermos of it into class on Monday. The kids were going to sample each drink and vote on which was the best.

  "1 think the noise of the blender is making Squirt even crankier," Becca said to Jessi as she fed a carrot into the machine.

  "Everything is making him cranky," replied Jessi, who was helping Becca with the project. She'd borrowed a health-food cookbook from Dawn. Dawn had even pointed out one of her favorite drinks. Now Jessi was reading the instructions as Becca pureed the ingredients in the blender.

  At the moment, Jessi was allowing Squirt to play on the floor with the pots and pans he'd pulled from the kitchen cabinets. It would be a pain to put them back later, but Jessi was willing to do that if they would keep Squirt happy for awhile - at least until she and Becca could finish making the health drink.

  "Do you have the can of beet juice opened?" Jessi asked. Becca nodded. "It says to pour that in while blending on a low speed," Jessi read.

  "While the blender is running?" Becca questioned.

  Jessi checked the book and nodded. "That's what it says." "Okay, here goes," said Becca. She found the lowest speed on the blender, turned it on, and slowly began to pour.

  Jessi glanced at Squirt. His lower lip was trembling. The slow drone of the blender did seem to be annoying him. He picked up two wooden spoons and banged on the pots, as if to drown out the noise.

  Finally Becca turned off the blender. "Whoaw! It's almost over the top," she commented. Gingerly, she lifted the blender off the stand.

  Bang! Clang! Squirt had climbed to his feet and was now throwing the pots and pans across the kitchen floor. "That's enough, Squirt," said Jessi. She tried to take a pot lid from his hand. "Give me that and we'll go look at some books," she added. But Squirt was not going to give her the lid.

  "No!" he cried. (That's one of Squirt's few words.) "This doesn't taste bad at all," Becca said as she sipped some of her drink from a teaspoon.

  "Dawn said it was good," commented Jessi. Then she turned back to Squirt. "No more throwing pans, okay, Squirt?" she said.

  "No!" Squirt shouted again. And this time, he hurled the pot lid just as Becca was turning to carry the full blender to the refrigerator.

  Bang! The lid hit Becca.

  "Oh, no!" she cried as the blender fell from her hands, splashing purple juice everywhere.

  Jessi closed her eyes briefly.

  "Sorry," whispered Becca.

  "It's not your fault," Jessi told her. "But look at this place!" "Look at my new sweater," added Becca.

  Jessi sighed, noticing that Squirt was tracking purple footprints across the kitchen floor and was about to go into the living room. "Stop, Squirt!" she cried, grabbing him.

  "This is impossible," she added. Jessi thought quickly. She couldn't let Aunt Cecelia come home to this mess. "1 know," she told Becca. "How about inviting Charlotte Johans-sen over. The two of you can watch Squirt while 1 clean up." "Sure," said Becca. Charlotte is her best friend, so she was happy to ask her over.

  Ten minutes later, Charlotte arrived. "Don't let him out of your sight," Jessi instructed the girls as she sent Squirt off with them. Then she set to cleaning the kitchen. This took awhile. Beet juice was everywhere! She had to do a whole load of purple-stained laundry. The tablecloth, the kitchen curtains, dishcloths, and Becca's sweater all had to be put in the washer. The drink had sprayed all over the pots and pans, so every one of them had to be washed as well. Not to mention, the floor, the cabinets, and the legs of the kitchen chairs. Furthermore, the blender had cracked up the side. What was left of the drink ran down Jessi's arm when she picked it up. Yechh.

  By the time Aunt Cecelia returned, the kitchen was clean. And Jessi was extremely happy to see her aunt. Becca and Charlotte had managed to keep Squirt out of trouble. They'd accomplished this by allowing him to throw his blocks all over the rec room. Poor Jessi. She felt obligated to pick them up, too. After all, she'd been left in charge.

  "I was exhausted," Jessi told me. "I don't know what was wrong with Squirt." I didn't say anything to her then, but I was beginning to develop a theory about Squirt. Also about Jamie Newton, Robbie Mara, and my brothers. What did they all have in common? That they were big pains? Yes. And also that they were boys.

  Chapter 6.

  It's amazing how fast time flies when you don't want gym class to come again. But, in a flash, it arrived. Before 1 knew it, it was Wednesday. Time for Gym Class 2. The honor continues.

  And boy was it horrible! The night before, my mother nearly fainted when she saw me ironing my gym shorts. I thought it would make a big difference. The only difference it made was that in class the next day, 1 no longer looked like a rumpled gangly scarecrow with bony knees and elbows. Instead, I looked like a neat scarecrow with bony knees and elbows. Not a huge improvement.

  So, there I was once again, standing out on this gigantic court with kids I barely knew, ready to be mocked, humiliated, shouted at, and possibly stepped on. I'm sure you can understand this put me in a pretty bad mood.

  Bad is not the word. Foul, livid, murderous: those are probably more accurate words.

  And my theory about boys being major pains - much more so than girls - was beginning to seem very true. I now saw that it was a wise person who orginally decided to separate boys and girls during gym classes. Boys are crazed when it comes to sports. Take that day, for example. They were throwing the ball around, grunting and shouting. And the game hadn't even started yet. They reminded me of a bunch of toddlers who had somehow gotten their hands on too much sugar.

  Once the game did start, they were out of control. They didn't care who they knocked over, or elbowed out of the way. They hit that ball as if they were trying to hurt somebody.

  During the first game, came the moment feared by everyone on my team - especially me. It was my turn to serve. Just in case I wasn't already nervous enough, Ms. Walden wandered over to terrorize me with her less-than-helpful advice.

  As I was about to serve the ball, she shouted: "A fist, Pike! Hit it with your fist. Not open-handed!" She rattled me so that I let the ball roll out of my hand and had to go chasing it through the gym. Talk about your embarrassing moments! Everyone looked impatient when I returned. So, just to get rid of the stupid thing, I served the ball quickly.

  1 served it into the net.

  "Don't tap the ball, Pike! Hit it hard!" (In case you couldn't guess, that was the ever-helpful Ms. Walden.) My next serve went under the net.

  "Straight arm, Pike! Your arm is wobbling all over the place," Ms. Walden shouted.

  You can't imagine how much I wished Ms. Walden would go away. If 1 could have, I would have paid her all my baby-sitting money to shut up and leave.

  "Pike, this is your last serve. You better make it count." It counted, all right. For the other team. I shot the ball up in the air, and watched it bounce right back down at my feet.

  "When Gallway serves, watch her," Ms. Walden advised me.

  "Okay," 1 muttered as 1 rotated out of the serving position and up to the front line, making room for Helen Gallway to serve the next time my team got the ball.

  "You watch her closely," Ms. Walden added as she moved on to harass someone else on another team. "Gallway has a mean serve." Well, 1 was very happy for Helen Gallway, but ha
ving a mean serve was not exactly my ambition in life. What did Ms. Walden think? That they were going to put that on my grave? Here lies Mallory Pike. She had a mean servel Not! It didn't matter to me, so I didn't see why everyone had to make such a big deal over it. I couldn't imagine some editor saying to me: "Yes, Miss Pike, we love this children's book you've written, but I'm afraid we can't publish it. You see, we've heard that you can't play vol-leyball. We don't publish non-volleyball-play-ing writers." That wasn't too likely to happen.

  So, in the big picture, none of this mattered. But right now, I was trapped inside the little picture. Trapped with a maniacal gym teacher, and a bunch of half-crazed volleyball players. Most of whom were boys.

  Don't get me wrong. A lot of the girls were good players, but (except for Helen Gallway) they weren't out of their minds. If the ball came to them, they hit it over the net. They didn't knock anyone out of the way to get to it. And they didn't try to maim their opponents with the ball.

  It was while I was in the middle of some of these thoughts that disaster struck. Actually, it was a volleyball that struck. It struck me, right in the face.

  Whap! Ow! I didn't even see it coming. I felt as if I were in one of those cartoons in which the characters see stars when they get clobbered. The ball hit me in the left eye area. My nose, my eye, my left cheek! They stung like crazy.

  "Are you okay?" asked Tom Harold, who had served the ball for the other team. "I didn't mean to hit you." "No, I'm not okay!" I exploded, still holding my face. "My nose feels like it's broken!" In a second, my pal Ms. Walden was back on the scene. "Pike, calm down. What's the matter?" "That idiot smashed the ball right into my face," I shouted. I had completely lost my cool.

  "Okay, there's no need to call names," Ms. Walden said to me crossly. "It was an accident. And maybe if you hadn't been daydreaming it wouldn't have happened." I couldn't believe what I was hearing. She wasn't in the least concerned that my cheek might be fractured, or my nose broken. No, she was scolding me for getting hit.

  She was crazy.

  They were all crazy.

  "Why don't you try getting slammed in the head with a volleyball!" I shouted at her.

  Ms. Walden's face turned pink, then red, then crimson. "That's enough of your mouth, Pike!" she cried. "You are benched! I want you over there on the bleachers for the rest of the game!" By now, as you might imagine, everyone - and I mean everyone - in the gym was looking at me. No one was playing volleyball. Even Mr. De Young was watching.

  I tossed Ms. Walden an angry, defiant look as I walked toward the bleachers. The gym was dead quiet. I felt as if I were going to the gallows or something, the way everyone was so hushed and attentive. (At least I'd ironed my uniform for this big moment.) Then, thankfully, Mr. De Young blew his whistle and the games resumed.

  I sat in the bleachers and concentrated on not crying. I wasn't sure if the pain or the public humiliation was worse. From time to time, I caught sight of Jessi looking my way sympathetically. I couldn't return her gaze, though. If I did, I'd have cried for sure. And crying would have been too awful. Things were bad enough as they were. If I cried, I would have to change schools, because I could certainly never show my face at SMS again. No, crying was definitely out.

  Staring at the ceiling was a good way not to cry. I did that until, eventually, the urge to cry passed. It was replaced by a feeling of great annoyance. Who did Ms. Walden think she was, anyway? Some sort of great gym goddess? You are benched! I mean, big deal, really. It wasn't exactly the worst torture on earth.

  Ironically, this was what I had wanted. Clearly, I loathed volleyball. So to punish me, Ms. Walden tells me I can't play volleyball. It didn't make a whole lot of sense.

  After about a zillion years, gym ended. "I'll be looking for a better attitude next class, Pike," Ms. Walden said to me as the kids emptied into the locker rooms. "How's your face?" Like she really cared.

  "Fine," I said in a voice I hope was cold. Truthfully, my cheek still stung, but I didn't feel like telling her that.

  I had almost reached the locker room when Jessi caught up to me. "Are you okay?" she asked, putting her arm around my shoulder.

  Biting my lip, I nodded. That awful crying feeling was coming back. I couldn't let it get the best of me.

  When I got home from school that afternoon, all I wanted was to be alone. But that wasn't meant to be. No sooner had I walked through the door than my mother intercepted me. "Mal, could you hold the fort here for a little while?" she asked. This wasn't a real question. Both of us knew it. It was an order disguised as a question. My mother was pulling on her coat as she spoke. "I have to go get Margo at school." "How come?" "The nurse's office called. She threw up at about two-thirty and they didn't want to let her walk home feeling sick." "Poor Margo," I said.

  "It's probably just a bug of some sort," said my mother as she hurried to the door.

  The door had barely closed when I heard a banging, pounding sound. It was coming from the kitchen. With a sigh, I ran upstairs to see what was going on.

  "Pass to me! Pass to me!" I heard Adam shout.

  A basketball thudded off the wall in front of me. "What are you doing?" I yelled.

  "What does it look like?" asked Jordan. The triplets and Nicky were breathless from playing ball.

  "It looks like you're playing basketball in the house, which you're not allowed to do," I snapped.

  "Bug off, Mallory!" said Jordan.

  "You bug off!" I yelled back.

  With the ball in my hands, I disappeared into my bedroom. Behind me I could hear the boys grumble, but I didn't care.J'd come to a decision. The only thing I disliked as much as sports was boys! Chapter 7.

  I've always tried to learn from my mistakes. On Thursday, Friday, and over the weekend, I considered everything that had gone wrong in gym on Wednesday. And I came up with a realization.

  If I kept getting benched, I would never have to play volleyball.

  There it was. The solution to my volleyball problem. It was so simple. I should have seen it immediately.

  Of course, I know why I didn't see it. I'm generally considered to be a "good" kid. Being the oldest of eight has made me cooperative to an extreme. Being disruptive and ornery isn't my nature. I'm never in trouble in school. That day in gym was the first time I'd been singled out for a punishment.

  But I'd survived. And it had been a lot less awful than playing volleyball with a bunch of boys.

  I was onto a good thing, and I knew it.

  All it would take was nerve. Lots of nerve.

  Did I have enough nerve? I wasn't sure. When Monday gym class rolled around, I still wasn't sure. I changed into my gym outfit and wandered onto the court, still debating whether I should just try to play the dumb game or if I should get myself benched.

  The answer came to me in the form of Robbie Mara.

  "Hey, Mallory, how's your face?" he asked as I tied on my pinny.

  "It's all right." "It doesn't hurt anymore?" "No." A big, goofy grin swept across his face. "That's strange," he said. "Because your face is killing me!" Two guys nearby laughed and looked at me for my reaction. "That's very humorous, Robbie," I said dryly. "I think I first heard that joke in kindergarten." He hadn't made me mad, just kind of disgusted. He was a moron. This game was for morons. And I wasn't going to play it. I simply turned and walked toward the bleachers, untying my pinny on the way.

  "Pike!" Ms. Walden barked, following me across the gym. "What are you doing?" "I'm benching myself," I told her.

  "I don't think so," she said. "Get back onto that court." "Sorry, Ms. Walden," I told her firmly. "I'm not playing." Ms. Walden's eyes narrowed, but her cheeks only colored to that pink level of anger. "If you're not back on that court by the time Mr. De Young blows the whistle, you can count on detention." "Fine," I said.

  With that, Ms. Walden returned to the game. For a moment I almost caved in and ran onto the court. But the moment passed. Mr. De Young blew his whistle and still I sat on the bleacher.

>   Detention.

  I'd never had it before. Naturally, I was old enough to know it wasn't the end of the world. Some kids spent half their lives in detention. They didn't seem to care after awhile.

  Still, it was a blemish on my perfect no-detention record. In my usual, over-imaginative way, I wondered if this was the beginning of my slide into a life of crime. I could see the movie of my life story opening with me sitting in detention. The next scene was me sitting in a police station. Really, though, once you stopped caring about getting into trouble, where did you draw the line?

  I'd have to worry about that later. Right now, this was working out very well for me. No volleyball was the best reward anyone could give me.

  It turned out that detention wasn't bad, either. I did my homework while I was there. Being "bad" was a breeze.

  "Your parents will be receiving written notification of your detention," said Mr. Ziz-more, the detention monitor, just as we were about to leave.

  Written notification! Maybe detention wasn't a total breeze.

  Suddenly I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. My parents would be shocked. And upset. I wouldn't be able to bear their worried, concerned faces. I didn't want to hear their lecture, either. Especially since I couldn't promise it would never happen again. I fully intended to avoid volleyball until the end of the unit. When something works, you stay with it.

  As I stepped out of the detention classroom, I was deep in thought, worrying about this. That's why I almost ran right into Ben.

  "Hi. What are you doing here?" I asked.

  "Waiting for you," he said. "I thought maybe you'd be feeling bad. You know, like you might want to talk to someone or ... you know. I heard what happened from a guy in my math class." "It's big news, huh," I said sourly.

  "Not really. It's just that he knows you and I are friends, so he mentioned it. Are you okay?" "I guess so," I said as we walked down the hall. "But it has been a pretty rotten day. Now I have to worry about my parents finding out. The school is sending them a letter." "Will they be angry?" he asked.