Baby-Sitters' Winter Vacation

  I did not get my wish.

  Mary Anne was helping two of the little kids remove mittens and boots and plastic bags. Wet clothing was draped everywhere — over chairs and beds and on the windowsills.

  Luckily, Mary Anne took one look at me and saw that I was in trouble. She whisked Joey and Ian out of the room, sat me on a lower bunk, and said, “I guess we lost the war, didn’t we?”

  I nodded numbly. “But that’s not the worst part,” I managed to say. In between a lot of gulping and hiccupping, I told her about Jay Marsden.

  “Well, that is pretty bad,” Mary Anne said slowly, “but you know, you didn’t force Jay to compete. He could have said no. He just let you push him into it.”

  “I do push people around, don’t I?”

  Mary Anne paused. At last she replied, “Well, you’re a lot better about it than you used to be.”

  “Sometimes I just don’t understand myself,” I told her. “Usually I’m totally competitive — but there are times when I can force myself not to be. Like with the Krushers.” (The Krushers are a team of little kids that I coach in softball.) “I hardly ever push them around, even when we have a game coming up. I tell them that the point of a game is just to have fun. That should have been the point of the Winter War, Mary Anne. Maybe … maybe I get more competitive when I’m participating myself.”

  “Maybe,” agreed Mary Anne. Then she gave me a hug.

  “The kids all hate me,” I told her with a sob.

  “I doubt that,” said Mary Anne.

  As it turned out, she was right.

  I hoped for anything that would cancel the dance. I hoped the grand ballroom would burn down. I hoped the whole lodge would burn down. I hoped we’d all develop malaria.

  “Jessi, Jessi, I’m going crazy,” I said hysterically.

  It was after dinner on Friday, and the stupid old all-school dance was supposed to start in less than an hour. Why hadn’t the lodge burned down yet? I wondered. I’d wished hard enough for it.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Jessi.

  “What’s the matter? What’s the matter? The dance is what’s the matter.”

  Jessi looked at me blankly. I hadn’t told her or anyone else my fears about the dance.

  “It’s — it’s — I — I don’t — I can’t —”

  “Mal, for heaven’s sake, calm down. You’re scaring the children,” said Jessi.

  The members of the BSC were returning to our dorm to get ready for the dance, and the Conway Cove kids were trickling in behind us.

  I drew in a deep breath. Then I let it out slowly. “The dance. I’ve never been to one. I don’t know how to dance. I didn’t bring any good clothes with me. I’m going to make a fool of myself. Why can’t it be Saturday already? Then we’d be home. The dance would be over. Well, I don’t really want to leave Hooksett Crossing. This week has been fun. But —”

  “Mallory,” Jessi interrupted, “I’ve never been to a dance, either, but I’m looking forward to this one.”

  “That’s because you can dance.”

  Jessi made a face. “I’m a ballerina. I can assure you that no one will be doing ballet steps tonight. However, if you would relax a little, you could dance just fine. Anybody can. Here.” Jessi turned to Claud, who was looking into a mirror, carefully applying mascara to her eyelashes. “Claud, where’s your tape player? Can I borrow it for a sec?” she asked.

  “Sure,” replied Claud. She handed it to Jessi, who looked through Claudia’s tape collection, selected a tape, and slipped it into the player.

  When the music came on, Jessi said, “Okay, watch me and then imitate what I’m doing.”

  Jessi began moving around, snapping her fingers.

  I tried to imitate her, I really did, but Jessi stepped forward, put her hands on my shoulders, and said sternly, “Relax. You look like you’re being carried off to jail. This is just a dance.”

  I tried again … and again. At last Jessi said, “Much better! See? That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

  “No,” I admitted. But then I added, “I didn’t bring a dress. I don’t have anything to wear.”

  “Mallory, neither does anyone else. None of us knew about this dance until two days ago. They’ve never had an all-school dance here before.”

  I was about to say, “Then how come Claudia has mascara with her?” when I remembered that she wears it almost every day. “Oh, yeah,” was all I said.

  “So are you ready to get dressed?” asked Jessi. “Wear your red-and-white sweater with your jeans. That’s a nice outfit.”

  “All right,” I agreed.

  The rest of my friends were trying to get ready, too, but it wasn’t easy. Not with sixteen children hanging around. Most of them were watching us. The others were dancing to the music, which was still playing on Claud’s tape deck. They were copying what they’d seen Jessi show me — and they weren’t bad!

  That was what gave me the idea. I suddenly thought, I bet the little kids would enjoy the dance. Then something else occurred to me. I ran over to Kristy (since she is the president of the Baby-sitters Club) and I said, “Hey, Kristy, what are the little kids going to do while everyone else is at the dance? We can’t leave them alone.”

  “Wow, I can’t believe I didn’t think of that,” said Kristy, although I could believe it. She’d been totally distracted ever since Jay broke his ankle.

  “I guess Miss Weber or Mr. Dougherty will take care of them.”

  “I — I think the kids would rather go to the dance,” I ventured.

  “You do? But —”

  “I’d be happy to watch them,” I rushed on.

  From nearby, Jessi frowned at me. She knew exactly what I was doing. If I had to watch the kids, then it wouldn’t matter if no one asked me to dance. I could just tell myself it was because I looked too busy. Besides, the kids would probably have the time of their lives. They could drink punch and eat cookies. Everyone at the lodge thinks they’re adorable anyway.

  Of course, Kristy didn’t know what was going through my head, so she said, “Sounds good to me. Ask Ms. Halliday and Miss Weber and Mr. Dougherty if it’s okay with them.”

  So I did and it was. Their teachers even said I could be in charge. I think they were looking forward to the dance themselves. (Well, Ms. Halliday was. I had a feeling the other two just wanted to go to bed early. They’d looked tired ever since they’d come back from the hospital.)

  As soon as I had the teachers’ permission, I ran back to our dorm. “Guess what,” I announced to the Conway Cove kids, “you guys are going to the dance, too!”

  “We are?” they exclaimed.

  “All right!” cried Ginnie.

  “Will there be food?” asked Bryce.

  “Definitely,” I replied.

  “We better get dressed!” said Pinky.

  “Oh, you look fine the way you are.”

  “No, we want to look good,” said Ian.

  So the kids went about making themselves look good. From out of nowhere appeared hair ribbons and plastic necklaces. Joey had even brought a clip-on bowtie. (I got the feeling he had not done his own packing.) Then followed a flurry of hair brushing and shoe polishing.

  “Are you guys ready?” Dawn asked when things had died down.

  “Yup,” replied Ian. “And,” he added, eyeing his classmates critically, “we look good.”

  “Yeah. Good enough for a grown-up dance,” said Pinky.

  “Then let’s go!” said Claud.

  “Wait!” cried Mary Anne. “I want a picture of you kids.”

  “Okay!” they said eagerly.

  Mary Anne posed the kids in two rows against a backdrop of bunk beds. Click went her camera.

  Then Pinky said, “How about a picture of you guys? Our baby-sitters. We don’t have a camera with us, but if I used your camera, Mary Anne, could you send us the picture later?”

  Well, I could just about see Mary Anne melt. She nearly became a puddle on the floor of the dorm. And I didn??
?t blame her. Pinky wanted a picture of us. She must have been getting over her homesickness.

  Anyway, Mary Anne handed the camera to Pinky, Joey busily posed us BSC members, and click went the camera for a second time.

  Then we were off to the dance.

  My knees were actually shaking as we walked into the ballroom. Then I remembered that I had a job. The kids. I tried herding them over to the refreshment table, but the punch and cookies didn’t hold their attention for long.

  “Let’s dance,” said Ginnie to Kara and Amber. “Everyone else is.”

  That wasn’t quite true. But with so many kids and teachers in the grand ballroom, it looked like the whole world was dancing. Before I knew what was happening, my charges were all out on the dance floor. Ryan danced with Ms. Halliday. Valerie danced with Rick Chow, the captain of the Red Team. Renée, Corey, Kathie, Frankie, and Ian danced in a group.

  I looked around helplessly.

  My mouth dropped open. Jessi was dancing with a seventh-grade boy!

  Then — to my astonishment — Curtis swayed by. In his arms was a waitress from the dining room. Curtis was looking at her lovingly. At that moment I knew for sure that Curtis was no killer. He was just a regular old cook … and he was in love.

  I stood by the punch bowl for what seemed like hours. Yes, this was the dance nightmare of the century. Everyone else looked so uninhibited — the Conway Cove kids, the teachers, my friends, the people who worked at the lodge. Why couldn’t I —

  “Excuse me, do you want to dance?”

  I was startled back to reality. A boy was standing in front of me. I recognized him. He was in my math class. Or maybe I’d just seen him in the cafeteria. Anyway, I was pretty sure he was in my grade. But he couldn’t possibly be talking to me. I turned around. No one was behind me.

  “I meant you,” said the boy.

  “Me?”

  He nodded. “I’m Justin Price. We have math together.”

  I tried to smile. “Oh…. Right. I’m —”

  “I know. You’re Mallory Pike. Come on, let’s dance.”

  I let Justin pull me into the crowd. I tried to remember everything Jessi had shown me, but pretty soon I realized that it didn’t matter much. The room was so crowded that no one was paying attention to anyone else.

  Justin and I spent the rest of the evening together. I stepped on his feet four times and he didn’t mind at all.

  Why had I ever worried about the dance?

  I’m not sure how it feels to be in love with a boy. Do you feel like you want to be with him every second? Like you and he are the only two people in the world? Like you’ve known each other all your lives, even though you just met?… Like your heart will break if you have to say good-bye to him?

  If the answer to these questions is yes, then I was in love with Pierre, and had been since I first met him. It was a wonderful feeling, but scary, too. As soon as I “had” Pierre, I was afraid I’d lose him.

  One of the nice things about Pierre was that I could talk to him the same way I could talk to my friends in the Baby-sitters Club. We could tell each other about our feelings — about times when we had been hurt or we were frightened, or about our feelings for each other. So I knew Pierre was wondering if he was in love with me, just like I was wondering if I was in love with him. We’d talked about it. But we didn’t have any answers.

  Who would have thought that falling in love could be so hard?

  Anyway, Pierre and I knew that Friday night would probably be the last time we’d spend any meaningful moments together. We’d get to say good-bye on Saturday, of course, but that wouldn’t really count. It would be a hectic mess, and besides, tons of people would be around. Then the buses would leave, and Pierre would go back to Vermont and I would go back to Connecticut. There would be hours between us. We knew there wasn’t much chance that we’d see each other again. We wouldn’t even be returning to the lodge the next winter.

  I couldn’t decide whether to look forward to the dance. On the one hand, it would be our last chance to be together. On the other hand, it would be our last chance to be together. Is that what is meant by “bittersweet”?

  I made myself look as nice as possible for the dance, considering that my wardrobe consisted mostly of pants and ski sweaters. Luckily, I had some makeup and jewelry with me, though. I managed to end up looking passable, particularly after I borrowed some fancy hair clips from Claudia. Anyway, Pierre hadn’t seen me in anything dressy all week, so what did one more night matter?

  * * *

  Well, I suppose I ought to cut to the dance now and get to the juicy parts. By the time my friends and I led the Conway Cove kids down to the grand ballroom, the dance had already started. Most of the other kids were there, and Pierre was hanging around the entrance, waiting for me.

  “Hi,” I said softly.

  “Hi,” he replied. And before I knew it, we were in each other’s arms, dancing across the floor.

  We really wanted to spend the entire evening that way, but we knew it would be rude to look too exclusive, so we tried to trade partners every now and then. We also tried hard not to think about the awful thing that was going to happen the next day.

  When we’d been at the dance for about an hour I said, “Pierre? Can we take a break? I’m getting tired. And thirsty.”

  “Sure,” he answered.

  We made our way to the punch table, which wasn’t easy since the room was so crowded. As we squeezed between couples and dodged arms and legs, I noticed a few interesting things. I pointed them out to Pierre after he had gotten some punch for us and we were standing near the table, just watching people and enjoying being together.

  “Look,” I said. “There’s Mallory, and she’s dancing. With a boy!”

  Pierre had barely spent any time with my friends, but he knew all about them because we had talked so much.

  “Her first dance with a boy?” Pierre asked me.

  I nodded. “She was so nervous tonight that she almost didn’t come.”

  I kept watching the crowd. “There’s Pinky,” I said.

  “Which one?”

  “The little kid dancing with Jessi. A few minutes ago she was dancing with Mr. George. She sure loosened up.”

  “I hope those kids had fun this week,” said Pierre.

  “You know, I think they did — once they got over the shock of the accident. I mean, they’ve been pretty active. They’ve been skiing and skating and traying. And I think they built every single snowman that’s out on the lawn.”

  Pierre smiled. Then he frowned and leaned forward, peering into the crowd.

  “What? What is it?” I asked.

  “There’s a kid on crutches dancing with one of your friends.”

  “Where?”

  “There.” Pierre pointed.

  “Oh, my gosh. That’s Kristy and Jay!” I explained to Pierre who Jay was. “Kristy felt awfully guilty this afternoon.”

  “Jay looks like a goofball,” Pierre commented.

  “Oh, he isn’t,” I answered, giggling. “He’s nice. It took guts to go out there and dance on crutches, and even more guts to do it in order to show Kristy that he doesn’t blame her for — uh-oh.”

  Now it was Pierre’s turn. “What? What?”

  “There’s Guy and his whole family. Even the baby. Oh, I hope Claudia doesn’t see them. She’ll — Oops. Too late. She just saw them. And Guy saw her. Oh, he’s handing the baby to his wife. Now he’s walking over to Claudia.”

  “He’s cutting in on that boy she’s dancing with,” added Pierre.

  “Now Claud and Guy are dancing. Aw, that’s nice. Claud looks like she’s died and gone to heaven.”

  Pierre and I finished our punch and began dancing again. We could hardly believe it when the lights dimmed so that the room was almost dark, and Mr. George spoke into a microphone:

  “This will be the last dance,” he announced. “Mrs. George and I hope you’ve enjoyed the evening and your stay at Leicester Lodge.?
??

  Everyone cheered and clapped loudly, then grew silent as a dreamy slow number began. Pierre and I swayed back and forth, and I felt happy and safe with his arms around me.

  “This is it,” Pierre whispered to me, and his breath tickled my ear.

  I knew what he meant. It was our last dance together. Time to say good-bye. But I wasn’t sure I was ready for that.

  “Do we have to say good-bye?” I asked, hoping I wasn’t whining.

  “No.” His breath was tickling my ear again.

  “Then let’s not.”

  “Okay. Are we going to write to each other?”

  “Maybe. Do you think there’s any point?”

  “Of course I do!”

  I smiled and pulled myself even closer to Pierre. “Okay. Then let’s exchange our addresses tonight. Tomorrow will be too hard. I’d hate to do it in a big crowd of people who are all exchanging their addresses, too.”

  “Yeah,” Pierre agreed.

  A few minutes later I wrote my address on the back of Pierre’s hand, and he wrote his on mine. Then he kissed me gently and walked away.

  I decided I would never wash my hand again.

  As I mentioned in the book for Logan, we arrived home safely. The roads were clear by Saturday, and the weather was sunny and bright, so there were no incidents on the way home — unless you count the boys on our bus singing a very mean song one too many times and causing a teacher on board to yell at them so loudly his dentures fell out. The boys were singing a song that is supposed to go like this:

  “Alice, where are you going?”

  “Upstairs to take a bath.”

  Alice, with legs like toothpicks

  and a neck like a giraffe.

  Alice got in the bathtub.

  Alice pulled out the plug.

  Oh, my goodness! Bless my soul!

  There goes Alice down the hole!

  “Alice, where are you going?”

  “To … the … floor!”

  However, the boys were singing about Ethel Tines, this fat girl on the bus, and they’d changed the words to the song:

  “Ethel, where are you going?”

  “Upstairs to take a bath.”