Kristy and the Worst Kid Ever

  No David Michael.

  “Hmmm,” I said. “David Michael hid very well, Emily. Do you see him anywhere?”

  Emily shook her head uncertainly.

  “Well, we’ll keep looking then.”

  But we couldn’t find David Michael. I looked around the yard again. Had he somehow gotten into the toolshed, even though it was locked? Then I noticed the trash cans.

  “I bet I know where he is, Emily. Come on.”

  But David Michael wasn’t hiding in the trash cans. They were full of garbage bags.

  “Bleh,” I muttered at the smell.

  Emily had let go of my hand and was drifting back toward the playhouse. I followed her. “I think David Michael won hide-and-seek, Em. What do you think?”

  “Play,” said Emily. She stepped carefully onto the plywood floor, bumped against one of the stools, and fell on the blanket.

  “Ooof!” said the pile of blankets.

  Emily’s face split into a big grin and she banged her hands happily on the blankets. “Davie! Davie!”

  David Michael crawled out from under the blanket. He was grinning, his face red. “I almost fooled you!”

  Emily held up her hands. “Davie!”

  “Okay,” said David Michael. He draped the blanket over Emily’s head.

  “Where’s Emily Michelle? Emily Michelle!” he called loudly.

  She threw back the blanket and shrieked with laughter.

  “It’s your turn to hide now, Kristy.”

  I looked around the yard. But before I spotted a good place, Linny came tearing across the lawn to us.

  “He’s coming. He’s coming!”

  “Who?” said David Michael.

  “The foster kid. This afternoon!”

  “You’re getting a brother?” asked David Michael.

  That stopped Linny, but only for a moment. “We’re not sure yet. But I bet we are. The people called today and said it would be this afternoon.”

  “That’s great news, Linny,” I said.

  “Can we come over?” asked David Michael.

  Linny started to nod, then stopped. “I don’t know.”

  “It’s probably not a good idea on your new brother’s — or sister’s — first day. We’ll watch from the porch and wave, okay, Linny?”

  “Okay, Kristy,” said Linny breathlessly. “Listen, I have to get back.” And he was gone, at top speed, across the street to his house.

  “How about a snack while we wait?” I suggested. “Oatmeal cookies and milk?”

  A few minutes later we’d settled on the front steps with our cookies and milk. And sure enough, not long after that, an official-looking car pulled into the Papadakises’ driveway. (Well, it wasn’t official-looking, exactly. But it was dark blue and square and could have been.) A woman got out of the driver’s side of the car. She was tall and wore a suit and carried a purse that looked like a small briefcase (or maybe it was a briefcase). I couldn’t tell from where we were sitting, but I thought she looked a little pinch-lipped, as if her shoes were too tight, or something was bothering her. I was pretty sure she was the kid’s social worker. She started up the walk to the Papadakises’, then stopped and turned around. She faced the car and made a beckoning gesture.

  Nothing happened.

  Finally she walked back to the car and pulled the door on the passenger side open.

  Still nothing happened.

  At last she leaned down and reached in. She stepped back, holding onto the hand of a child who looked about Karen’s age.

  “Wow!” said David Michael. “He’s a boy!” He stopped and squinted, then looked at me. “Isn’t he?”

  The kid was dressed in jeans and a shirt and a loose sweater, with short, spiky hair slicked back on the sides, and a square chin that was being stuck out defiantly.

  “I’m not sure,” I said to David Michael. “I think so … maybe …”

  They’d reached the front door now, which was flung open before the social worker could even ring the bell. Then Mrs. Papadakis was smiling and bending over, looking for a moment as if she were going to hug the boy or girl — who stepped quickly back.

  For a moment, the three of them just stood there. Then Mrs. Papadakis straightened up, and said something to the child. The new kid folded his arms. Then the social worker said something. Suddenly the kid wheeled around and marched back toward the car. When he reached the front fender, he kept right on marching — straight over the hood of the car, up the windshield, and across the roof!

  Mrs. Papadakis and the social worker looked too stunned to move. I know my mouth dropped open. The next second the new kid had leaned over, and somehow swung off the roof and in through the still-open car door. A moment later, he slid out, holding a small suitcase and a backpack. Leaving the car door open, he marched back to the house and inside, past the two women on the steps.

  After a moment, they followed.

  “Wow,” murmured David Michael.

  “You can say that again,” I said.

  “Wow,” said David Michael.

  “Déjà Vu.” It’s a weird old song from a sixties LP (a record — not a CD, not a tape) that my mother and Watson listen to sometimes.

  The name of this golden oldie refers to the feeling that you’ve been somewhere before, that whatever is happening right now is something you’ve experienced before. Which is the way I was feeling on a crisp, sunny Saturday afternoon, just cool enough outside for jackets. I was in the backyard, baby-sitting for Karen and Andrew and David Michael and Emily Michelle and Shannon …

  Hadn’t I been here before? Very, very recently?

  Well, yes. But some things were a little different. For one thing, Nannie was at a bowling tournament instead of hitting the gardening center sales with Watson. Watson and Mom were at a flower show at the civic center, Sam and his friends had gotten up a game of football at the park, and Charlie was changing the oil on the Junk Bucket — with Andrew solemnly helping him.

  For another, the crowd of baby-sittees was a little bigger. Nancy and Hannie, the other two Musketeers, were already here with Karen, carefully sorting through a collection of wallpaper and shelfpaper leftover from their families’ decorating schemes of the past. Linny and David Michael had set up a row of old toy plastic milk bottles and were practicing soccer drills, dribbling the ball in and out between the bottles and trying to keep from knocking any over. Emily was standing next to me, her head turning back and forth from the wallpaper samples to the black-and-white flash of the soccer ball. And Mary Anne had just arrived to keep me company.

  Lou McNally had joined us, too.

  “Who’s she?” Mary Anne whispered. She paused then said, “He?”

  “She,” I answered, “is Louisa McNally. The Papadakises’ foster child.”

  “Wow! What’s she like?”

  “Mrs. Papadakis told us her father died a little while ago. She has an older brother who’s with another foster family. And her mother, as far as they know, is still alive somewhere. She took off when Lou was a baby.”

  Mary Anne looked solemn. “Poor Louisa,” she said softly, and I knew she was thinking about her own mother. Mary Anne may not remember her, but she still thinks about her and wonders what she was like.

  I couldn’t help but think about my father, just for a moment. He acts as if we’re barely alive. But that doesn’t make me feel like “poor Kristy.”

  I said quickly, “Yeah, well. Anyway, I don’t think she’d answer to Louisa. It’s just Lou.”

  Mary Anne tilted her head slightly and studied Louisa McNally. After a long moment, Mary Anne said, “You know, I think you’re right.”

  Lou was short for Louisa, of course, so the mystery of the foster kid’s gender was solved. But there were still plenty of other mysteries about her.

  For instance, I wouldn’t exactly say she’d joined us. The Three Musketeers had invited Lou to help them with their playhouse schemes, but Lou had shaken her head brusquely. Now she was standing across the backyard
from Emily Michelle and Mary Anne and me, scrutinizing the noise and motion with what could only be called suspicion. She had folded her arms across her chest, wrapped a scarf around her neck almost up to her nose, and pulled a baseball hat low across her eyes.

  Lou was wearing faded overalls and a red turtleneck sweater, but no jacket. I’d asked her when she’d arrived with Hannie and Linny if she wanted to borrow one of Karen’s jackets.

  “I don’t need a jacket,” she’d answered in a gravely little voice before walking stiffly across the yard to take up her position. She hadn’t moved from it or spoken since. She was just an eight-year-old kid, and not very big for her age, but maybe you can see why she seemed mysterious and, well, tough.

  Beside me, Emily Michelle said, “How.”

  I checked the scene to see what the question was about. “How?” I prompted.

  “How,” she insisted.

  I looked in the direction she was looking — the playhouse. “House,” I offered.

  “How,” agreed Emily Michelle and her head swung back toward the soccer drill.

  “Ball,” she said. She leaned forward, and then launched herself across the grass toward David Michael and Linny.

  Mary Anne started giggling. “She is sooo cute,” she said. “I love the way two-year-olds walk — like half of them is going to get there before the other half.”

  “A lot of times it works that way,” I said, laughing, too. Then I realized that Emily wasn’t slowing down. “Oh, lord.”

  Emily Michelle was traveling full tilt into the soccer drill.

  I swooped across the yard and scooped her up before she could create a soccer drill traffic jam. “Whoa, Emily M!”

  Emily’s face scrunched up. “Balllel,” she cried.

  “Emily, they’re playing with their soccer ball, see? Want me to go get one of your balls?”

  Emily shook her head violently. “Balllel!”

  “Or one of Shannon’s? We could play ball with Shannon.” (I hoped we could. Shannon, at the moment, was very involved with her special bone, which David Michael had given her to keep from rushing into the soccer drill after the ball, too.)

  “Ballellll,” cried Emily, going into hyper-wail.

  “But Emily,” Mary Anne began reasonably. Only it is unreasonable, of course, to think you can reason with a crying two-year-old.

  “She means ‘bottle,’ ” a gravely voice interrupted, and I realized Lou McNally had spoken. She was standing in the same place, arms folded, only she seemed to be studying us now. My eyes met hers and she looked away.

  “Bottle?” I said, as much to Lou as to Emily. The wails began to subside.

  “Ballel,” said Emily.

  Oh. Well. “Let’s ask Linny and David Michael if they’ll let us have one of the milk bottles, okay?”

  I didn’t even have to ask. Linny, who’d heard the whole thing, bent down and scooped up the bottle at the end of his drill. He passed it to me as he dribbled the ball back to David Michael.

  “The famous bottle pass,” Linny intoned, flashing me a grin.

  “Bravo,” I said. “Thanks, guys.” I put Emily Michelle down and gave her the bottle. She immediately sat on the ground and began to fill it with dirt.

  Mary Anne and I exchanged glances, and then walked around the soccer drill to stand next to Lou.

  “Hi,” I said.

  She didn’t reply.

  “Good call,” I added. “I was sure Emily Michelle had her heart set on that soccer ball. Thanks.”

  Lou shrugged.

  “You haven’t met Mary Anne yet, have you? Lou McNally, this is Mary Anne Spier. Mary Anne is one of my friends. She’s a baby-sitter, too. The secretary of the Baby-sitters Club.”

  “Hi, Lou,” said Mary Anne, smiling at her. “I’m glad to meet you. Everyone’s been excited about your coming to Stoneybrook.”

  That earned Mary Anne a quick sideways look, and not a particularly friendly one. In fact, it was a little unnerving.

  But Mary Anne, who is very shy in some cases, didn’t seem bothered at all. She can be as stubborn as she is shy.

  “You know,” Mary Anne persisted, “Louisa May Alcott was one of my favorite writers. Have you ever read Little Women? Or Little —”

  “My name is Lou,” said Lou. She didn’t say it fiercely, or challengingly. She said it in a sort of no-nonsense monotone. It was pretty effective.

  And I’d been right about her not wanting to be called Louisa!

  “Well, Lou, welcome to Stoneybrook,” said Mary Anne.

  Lou shrugged. Again.

  I was beginning to feel a little peeved. I opened my mouth and was (I think) about to put my foot in it by telling Lou she was being rude, when Mary Anne intervened. “It must be sort of a change, living with the Papadakises. Five people might feel like a big family.”

  “I don’t live with the Papadakises,” answered Lou. “It’s temporary. They’re not my family.”

  Just then Karen turned and waved. “Hey, Lou!” she called. “Come on! We’re going to put up wallpaper and paint the outside of our house a beautiful pink.”

  “Pink,” muttered Lou scornfully.

  “Not pink,” we heard Nancy argue.

  “Come help!” Karen called.

  “No,” said Lou.

  “No, thank you,” I couldn’t help suggesting, in a firm but encouraging way (I hoped).

  Lou stared at me. Her brown eyes were as flat as her voice. “Why should I thank someone for something I don’t want?” she asked. Before I could answer she had turned and walked away from us.

  I stood there with my mouth open. “Good grief,” I finally managed to say.

  “Pink?” Nancy’s voice rose, carrying across the yard. “Pink is for inside a house. For a bedroom.”

  “It can be outside, too,” Karen argued in her loudest outdoor voice.

  Hannie, who had been riffling through the pages of a magazine, held it up. “Here’s a blue house.”

  “Pink,” said Karen stubbornly.

  “Uh-oh,” I said to Mary Anne.

  “Maybe we better check things out,” she replied.

  I glanced at Emily Michelle, who so far hadn’t moved and was intently filling her milk bottle for about the umpteenth time. Then Mary Anne and I approached the playhouse.

  “Which do you like, pink or blue?” demanded Karen, pushing her glasses up on her nose.

  Nancy said, “Kris-teeee. Tell Karen houses can’t be pink on the outside.”

  “Nannie’s car is pink,” said Karen.

  “This is not a car, this is a house,” retorted Nancy.

  “Lou!” called Mary Anne. “Lou, where are you going?”

  For a moment I thought Lou had decided to run away and I had visions of tackling her and scooping her up just like I had done with Emily Michelle. Only I didn’t think it would be quite as easy.

  Fortunately, Lou slowed down long enough to call, “The mail just came,” over her shoulder.

  “I’ll watch her across the street,” Mary Anne said to me and followed Lou to the front yard.

  They returned a minute later, Lou with her hands in her pockets, head down, shoulders scrunched up. “Sometimes they don’t deliver as much mail on Saturday,” I heard Mary Anne say.

  Why was I not surprised when Lou didn’t answer?

  Lou took up her position again, and this time, at least, David Michael looked up and said, “You want to do a drill?”

  Lou shrugged, but stepped up to the soccer ball and, head still down and shoulders still hunched, but with her hands out of her pockets and balled up into fists, began to dribble the ball.

  “I wonder who she’s expecting a letter from,” I murmured as Mary Anne rejoined me.

  “Maybe her brother,” suggested Mary Anne. “Or maybe her mother …”

  “Kris-teeee,” said Nancy.

  “Right,” I said. “Well. There are pink houses. In certain cities. And at beaches, sometimes.”

  “See!” cried Karen triumphantl
y.

  I took a deep breath. “But Victorian houses used to be painted three or four colors. Why not have a pink and blue house? Maybe a blue house with pink trim?”

  “Or a pink house with blue trim,” said Hannie.

  “Or …” began Karen, but just then the soccer ball scooted past Lou and took a long hop through the front door of the playhouse. Lou trotted over to pick it up.

  “We’re going to paint our house,” said Nancy. “You want to help?”

  “It’s not even a real house,” said Lou scornfully. She dropped the ball, punted it back toward David Michael and Linny, and ran after it.

  Nancy looked puzzled, Karen looked indignant, and Hannie looked angry.

  “What’s wrong with a playhouse?” asked Nancy.

  “Nothing!” said Karen loudly. “And we can mix blue and pink together and get …”

  “Purple!” shouted Hannie.

  “Or lavender,” said Mary Anne.

  “Like jelly beans,” said Nancy.

  “Home sweet home,” I teased them. But I couldn’t help thinking, just for a second, about what Lou would call a real house — and a real home.

  It was the day after Mary Anne had met Lou at my house. I was spending that afternoon with Bart and a giant bag of popcorn at the movies, and Mary Anne was back at the “big house” sitting for David Michael, Karen, Andrew, and Emily Michelle. And the usual crowd had gathered: Linny, Hannie, Nancy — and Lou.

  Mary Anne decided to give Lou a little space, so she didn’t rush over and start talking to her right away. Besides, Emily Michelle was in overdrive that day, scooting around the yard with her milk bottle (again). She was also pulling a wagon, which she was filling up with anything she could find (she’d graduated from filling up the milk bottle, I guess). When she couldn’t pick something up, she’d stop and look at Mary Anne. It took Mary Anne a moment or two to understand the first time, but after that, Emily Michelle had her pretty well trained.

  David Michael and Linny were playing catch today. Shannon was sacked out by the door, rolled over on her back with her feet in the air. The Three Musketeers had decided their playhouse was finished and it really was time to decorate it. Mary Anne had found some old mismatched plates and cups in the barn at her house, when she and Dawn had been sifting through it looking for items for the auction, and had brought those over to donate to the playhouse.