Kristy's Big Day Read online

  She helped Ashley over to the ticket window. Then, to save time, she collected the money from her group, gave it all to the man in the booth, and said, “One adult and three children, please.”

  The man handed four tickets to Stacey, who in turn handed them to a young woman at the entrance to the lobby, while Emma, Luke, and Ashley filed in ahead of her.

  “Go right into the theater. Hurry, you guys,” said Stacey. “The lights are about to …”

  But the kids weren’t listening to her. They were standing at the candy counter, looking like they hadn’t eaten in weeks.

  “I want Junior Mints,” said Emma.

  “I want M&M’s,” said Luke.

  “I want popcorn,” said Ashley.

  “We don’t have enough time—or money,” Stacey said. She glanced into the theater. The lights were dimming. “Besides, you just ate lunch.”

  “But we have room for a snack,” said Emma, who was on the verge of whining again. “And our moms gave us extra money for a movie treat.”

  It took five minutes to buy the candy and popcorn. When the children were ready, they tiptoed into the dark theater.

  “We need four seats together, with one on the aisle for Ashley,” Stacey whispered loudly to them.

  “Shhh!” said a woman nearby.

  They walked up and down the aisles. Finally, they found seats in the balcony.

  Toward the end of the movie, Emma spilled the last of her sticky Junior Mints over the railing. Below her, someone shrieked. Emma began to giggle and couldn’t stop. Ashley began to giggle, too, and after a while even Luke joined in.

  Finally, the theater manager came along and ushered them outside.

  Stacey stood on the sidewalk, her cheeks flaming, and was never so relieved as when she saw the Pink Clinker cruising down the street.

  She climbed into the car, her eyes blazing.

  “What happened?” I asked, not sure I really wanted to know.

  “Ask her,” Stacey said, glaring at Emma.

  Emma tried to tell me, but she began giggling again. Before I knew it, Ashley and Luke were giggling, too.

  Their laughter was contagious. Nannie and I caught it. When I dared to look at Stacey, I found that even she was laughing.

  “Oh, well,” she said as Nannie pulled into our driveway, “I can always see Mary Poppins at home.”

  That was Wednesday. I now had my wedding shoes—low with a little heel—but no idea about a gift for Mom and Watson.

  Wedding Countdown:

  Thursday—two days to go

  Thursday, June 25th

  Until today, I didn’t know that “barber” is a dirty word. But it is — to little boys. Here’s how I found out: When the mothers and fathers dropped their children off at Kristy’s house this morning, they all looked guilty. It turned out that they’d decided the boys, except for Tony, needed their hair cut before the wedding. Since the barber is only open from 9:00 until 5:00, guess what they asked us poor, defenseless, unprepared baby-sitters to do? They asked us to take Luke, David Michael, Berk, Andrew, Peter, and Patrick to poor, defenseless, unprepared Mr. Gates, whose barbershop is just around the corner from the elementary school. When we told the boys about their field trip, all six of them turned pale, then red, and began throwing tantrums….

  Well, Mary Anne may not have been prepared for the trip to the barbershop, but I’ve gone there with David Michael many times, so I had a dim idea of what could happen. You just take David Michael’s tears and whining and complaining and multiply them by six. That’s what I thought. But there must have been something wrong with my calculations, because the boys definitely caused more than six times the trouble my brother causes by himself.

  After the adults left that morning, the members of the Baby-sitters Club turned the children loose in the backyard and held a quick meeting on the porch while we kept an eye on things.

  “Six boys will be going to Mr. Gates’s,” I said, “and the seven girls plus Tony will stay behind. How should we divide ourselves up? Should three of us go to the barber?”

  “That sounds like too many,” said Dawn. “Doesn’t Mr. Gates have an assistant? Two boys can get their hair cut at once. Then there’ll only be four to watch.”

  “That’s true,” I said. “Okay, two of us will go and three will stay here. I better be one of the ones to go, since I’m related to most of those boys.”

  Mary Anne giggled.

  “Who else wants to go?” I could tell that the other baby-sitters wanted the easy job of staying at my house with the girls and Tony.

  At last Mary Anne spoke up. “I’ll go with you, Kristy,” she said. “I’ve been stuck here with Beth and Tony all week.”

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” I asked her.

  “Positive,” she replied, sounding entirely unsure of herself.

  “All right,” I said just as uncertainly.

  You’ve probably never taken a ten-year-old, a seven-year-old, a six-year-old, a four-year-old, and two three-year-olds to the barber. I certainly never had. Mary Anne and I waited until the kids had eaten lunch before we rounded the boys up. After lunch, the kids were full and the younger ones tended to be sleepy.

  When the trash had been cleared away and the picnic tables wiped off, I stood bravely in the backyard and announced, “Okay, barber time.”

  “No-no-no-no-no!” shrieked Andrew.

  Peter and Patrick joined in. “No-no-no-no-no!”

  Luke, David Michael, and Berk were too old for no-no’s. They climbed a tree instead.

  “We’re not coming down!” David Michael shouted.

  “Fine,” I said. “Mary Anne, will you get Nannie on the phone, please, and tell her to bring the Pink Clinker over here? Tell her the boys are—”

  “Wait! Wait! Here we come!” cried Berk. The boys jumped out of the tree.

  Nannie is a terrific grandmother, but she expects kids to do what they’re told, and when it’s time for discipline, she is very firm about things.

  “Thanks,” I said to the older boys.

  They didn’t answer. David Michael scowled at me. At last he said, “You want me to look like an owl, don’t you? That’s what I looked like after I went to Mr. Gates the last time. An owl. A horned owl. My hair just got normal, and now you and Mom are going to make me look like an owl again.”

  “David Michael, for heaven’s sake, calm down. After all, it’s Mom’s wedding. She wants you to look good. If she thought Mr. Gates was going to make you look like a horned owl, I’m sure she wouldn’t send you to him.”

  “No barber,” Peter spoke up piteously.

  “Sorry, guys,” I said. “Haircuts all around. Let’s get going.”

  “I’ll go find a wagon,” Mary Anne offered. “Peter and Patrick and Andrew can ride in it.”

  As the boys filed out of the yard, the girls watched them.

  Nobody said a word for the longest time. Finally, Emma couldn’t stand it any longer.

  “Ha-ha. Ha-ha. You guys—”

  Ashley hobbled forward and clapped her hand over Emma’s mouth.

  Emma tried to bite her.

  “Ow! Quit it!”

  “Well, leave me alone!” exclaimed Emma.

  Mary Anne whispered to me, “The girls may be harder to handle than the boys!”

  We loaded the little guys into the wagon, and in no time were ushering the boys into Mr. Gates’s place.

  Now, if I’d been Mr. Gates and had seen six unhappy boys come in for haircuts, I might have had a nervous breakdown. But not Mr. Gates. He simply finished up the customer he was working on, then turned to Mary Anne and me. “Well, what have we here?” he asked pleasantly.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” murmured Luke.

  Mary Anne shot Luke a hideous look and he quieted down.

  I stepped forward. “Hi, Mr. Gates,” I said. “My mom’s getting married on Saturday—”

  “Well, congratulations!”

  “Thanks. And my brother’s going to be in
the wedding, and the rest of these guys are going to be at the wedding, and they all need their hair cut.”

  “But not too short,” said David Michael. “Not over my ears,” said Luke. “Not too long at the sides,” said Berk. “Leave my part alone,” said Andrew.

  “I don’t want a part,” said Peter.

  “Do you have lollipops?” asked Patrick.

  “One at a time, one at a time,” said Mr. Gates calmly. “Do you know Mr. Pratt? He’s the other barber here.”

  A skinny, jumpy-looking man stepped in from the back room, and right away I sensed trouble. He must have been new. I didn’t remember seeing him before. He laughed nervously.

  “Mr. Pratt,” said Mr. Gates, “these young men need haircuts.”

  “All of them? Heh-heh.”

  “That’s right.” Mr. Gates turned back to the boys. “Okay, which two will be first?”

  “Not me!” said six voices.

  Mary Anne made a quick decision.

  “Luke and David Michael,” she said. It was a good idea. They were the two oldest.

  “No,” said both boys.

  I took them aside. “There’s a phone in the corner,” I told them, pointing to it. “And I’ve got change in my pocket. I can get hold of Nannie easily.”

  “Okay, okay,” said Luke.

  “David Michael, you go with Mr. Pratt. And be good.”

  Meanwhile, Mary Anne had taken the four younger boys to some chairs by the front door. She was trying to get them to sit down, but they were climbing over everything like monkeys.

  “Come on,” Mary Anne urged them.

  “I’m Rocket Man!” cried Peter.

  “Not in here you aren’t.” Mary Anne picked Peter up and sat him in her lap.

  I didn’t know whether to help her or to watch Luke and David Michael. I decided I better keep an eye on the boys, and especially on my brother and Mr. Pratt.

  David Michael climbed into the barber chair as if he were on his way to a funeral.

  “Well, heh-heh,” said Mr. Pratt.

  “Don’t make me look like a horned owl,” said David Michael rudely. He caught sight of me glaring at him in the mirror and stuck his tongue out.

  Mr. Pratt thought it was meant for him.

  “Oh, goodness, heh-heh.” He patted his pockets, searching for something, then walked into the back room.

  Luke leaned over from the next chair and whispered to David Michael, “He probably forgot his brain.”

  “Now, now,” said Mr. Gates. “Hmm. It seems to me I’ve got a box of lollipops over by the cash register. But I only give them to my well-behaved customers.”

  “I’m too old for lollipops,” said Luke.

  “Me, too,” said David Michael, who had asked for two the last time he’d had his hair cut.

  That did it.

  “Excuse me a sec, Mr. Gates,” I said. I stepped between the chairs and said to the boys, “You two are being plain rude. Who taught you to speak this way to adults? I can’t believe it. I want you to know that I am now walking over to that phone and calling Nannie. I guess I just can’t take care of you guys after all. My friends and I tried to make things fun for you, but you’re too much to handle. I’ll have to turn the job over to Nannie.”

  “No, Kristy! Please don’t!” David Michael cried. “We’ll be good. All of us. I promise.” He turned to his cousin. “She means it, Luke. She’s my sister. I know her.”

  “All right,” said Luke sulkily.

  Luke and David Michael’s haircuts went fine after that. They even seemed reasonably satisfied with the results. David Michael made no references to owls.

  Then came Berk’s and Andrew’s turns. They protested as they climbed into the chairs but behaved nicely after Mr. Gates promised them lollipops.

  Peter and Patrick were last. Peter tried to kick Mr. Pratt in the shin, and Patrick cried the entire time. I sang seventeen verses of “Old MacDonald” to him, but it didn’t help much, and Mr. Gates looked pained.

  However, by the time we left, the barbershop and both barbers were still pretty much in one piece.

  “We did it!” Mary Anne exclaimed as we were putting the littler boys in the wagon. “Somehow we did it!”

  “I know! Now if I could just think of a wedding present to give Mom and Watson, this would be a perfect day.”

  “How about a toaster oven?” asked Mary Anne.

  “Too expensive. Besides, Watson’s got three.”

  “A tray,” Luke suggested.

  “We’ve got dozens.”

  “A picnic basket,” said Berk.

  “We’ve got one and Watson’s got one.”

  “A fire engine,” said Peter.

  “A robot,” said Patrick.

  “Do I have to give them a present, too?” asked David Michael.

  “It would be nice,” I replied.

  “Help me think of one, Kristy.”

  Oh, brother. Two presents?

  Wedding Countdown:

  Friday—one day to go!

  Firday, June 26

  Unfiar! Today it rained! all day! I guess we baby sitters shouldn’t complain to much since this was the first rainy day all weak. But still it was a yucky day. Wether wise. The kids are not to bad though.

  Hey Kristy how come we have to write in the diary this weak? Were all sitting so we all know whats going on right? I guess its just the rules right? Anyway it cant hurt.

  Anyway the morning went okay but by the time lunch was over we were running out of things to do then I got this really fun idea ….

  I have to admit, Claudia’s idea was one of her better ones. As she mentioned, we used up all our regular ideas in the morning. The little kids watched Sesame Street and Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. The older kids played board games. Claudia set up some art activities, Dawn read aloud, and Mary Anne even plopped the babies in the playpen and helped Stacey’s group bake cookies.

  But by the time lunch was over, our ears were ringing with the sounds of: “What can I do now, Kristy Dawn Stacey Mary Anne what’s-your-name-again?”

  “I don’t wanna read another book.”

  “There’s nothing good on TV.”

  “We played that already.”

  “Hey, let’s give the babies a bath!” (That was Emma.)

  “No!” cried Mary Anne.

  Things were on the verge of getting out of hand. Ten of the fourteen children were crowded into our rec room. (The babies, Patrick, and Maura were asleep on a blanket in the living room.) Ashley was lying on the couch, moaning that her leg hurt and her head ached. Emma was tearing through the room after Katherine, who clearly did not enjoy being chased. Andrew and Grace were jumping up and down around Claudia, complaining that they didn’t know what to do. In one corner was Karen with Berk and David Michael. She was talking to them earnestly and furtively (she kept glancing at Dawn), and from time to time I could hear the word Martian. Peter was using the couch as a trampoline. And Luke was lining up coffee cans on the floor. When I saw him bring a skateboard in from the garage and head for his obstacle course, I knew we were in trouble.

  Stacey saw Luke at the same time and talked him out of his activity.

  At that point, I pulled the baby-sitters aside. “We’ve got to do something—fast!” I said. I looked outside. It was pouring.

  “We need to separate them, first of all,” said Dawn. “We should divide them into their groups and go off in different rooms. This is too much.”

  “Go off and do what, though? That’s the problem,” said Stacey. “They’ve done everything already. They’ve been through every Kid-Kit, played every game, read every book, sung every song—”

  “Okay, okay,” said Dawn. “I still think we need to separate them.”

  “What would be fun,” said Mary Anne thoughtfully, “would be a project for the whole group that the smaller groups could work on separately.”

  “You mean like putting on a show?” asked Claudia.

  “Exactly,” said Mary Anne
.

  “How about a talent show?” Dawn suggested. “Even the littlest kids could be in it.”

  “That would be fun,” I said. “You know, we only have to occupy them until about four o’clock. Then we should start getting them dressed.”

  “Oh, yeah! I almost forgot,” said Mary Anne.

  The rehearsal dinner was to be held that night, and everyone, including the kids and us babysitters, had been invited. Actually, the Baby-sitters Club had been asked more to watch the kids than to be guests (although I would have gone anyway, of course), but it was still a good opportunity to get dressed in our very best clothes.

  When Mom first told me about the special evening, I had to ask her what a rehearsal dinner was. It turns out that on the day before a wedding, the minister (or rabbi or priest) and the bride and groom and anyone who’s going to be in the wedding get together to rehearse the ceremony, just as if it were a play. Afterward, the families, the people in the wedding, and a few special friends are invited to a big dinner, which is usually given by the groom’s family.

  In our case, what with the fourteen children and the crazy last-minute preparations for the wedding, the schedule for the evening was wild. Finally, the adults had decided that things would go much more smoothly if my relatives didn’t have to drive the kids all the way to their motels to dress for the dinner and then drive all the way back to Stoneybrook. So guess what? They asked the Baby-sitters Club to dress the children and have them ready for the evening when they were picked up at five o’clock.

  After that, the members of the club (except for me) would go home, change quickly, and somehow get themselves to Watson’s house. Meanwhile, the rest of us would go either to the rehearsal or to Watson’s to help get ready for the dinner.

  The children had shown up at my house that morning each carrying two bags. One bag was lunch, the other was clothes—a complete outfit. I had peeked in Maura’s bag and seen a dress, a slip, a pair of tights, a change of underwear, party shoes, and barrettes. I hoped the other bags were as complete. Dressing fourteen kids for a fancy party had all the makings of a disaster.

  But I couldn’t worry about that then.