Kristy and the Sister War

  I, myself, think it can’t be explained so easily. The Sister War was a complex chain of events, and only those who were there will ever really understand it. Of course, I could give myself credit for arranging the final cease-fire, but I doubt I’ll ever receive the recognition I deserve for my role in bringing peace.

  But seriously … By the time I sat for Tiffany and Maria on Monday afternoon, the Sister War had hit its peak. And Tiffany and Maria weren’t kidding around anymore with baby pranks such as lost phone messages. They’d moved on to the big stuff. Plus, they’d started to have their own competition — over Jordan Pike — which only complicated things. They’d work together for the sake of aggravating Shannon, but then the second they’d got a reaction from her they would squabble again. They weren’t arguing anymore about which of them would go to the dance with Jordan, since dates had been ruled out, but they still found plenty to quarrel about, for instance, which of them would wear a certain red sweater they both liked (which happened to belong to Shannon, though that was beside the point), or who would ask Jordan to dance first.

  That’s what they were arguing about after school on Monday. It was another of those perfect fall days when the air is crisp but the sun warms you. We decided to enjoy the weather and take a walk.

  “Kristy, don’t you think I have the right to ask Jordan first, since I’m older?” asked Tiffany.

  “I don’t know what that has to do with it,” said Maria. “I think I should have the first chance because —” She thought for a second, unable to come up with a good reason. “Just because, that’s why,” she said finally, crossing her arms and nodding.

  I held up my hands. “Don’t put me in the middle of this,” I said. “You’ll have to work it out for yourselves. But I don’t think you should be so concerned about who dances with whom. Just have a good time! That’s what dances are for.”

  “Oh, I’ll have a good time, all right,” said Tiffany, “as long as I dance with Jordan.” She pretended to swoon. “He’s so, so cute.”

  I knew that she and Maria were just fooling around with the idea of having a crush on a boy. After all, they were too young to be interested in dating. Still, I thought they’d be better off if they forgot about the subject.

  “How are things at home?” I asked. When I saw Maria’s frown and Tiffany’s grimace, I almost wished I had kept my question to myself.

  “Shannon’s avoiding us,” said Maria.

  “It’s like we’re invisible,” agreed Tiffany. “Unless she wants to yell at us for something, that is,” she added almost under her breath.

  “Why would she be yelling at you?” I asked. “You aren’t still pulling pranks, are you?” (Oh, I was so innocent.)

  “Well,” said Maria.

  “Um,” said Tiffany.

  “Guys?” I asked.

  Tiffany bent down to pick up a pinecone. “I guess we’ve done a couple of things,” she mumbled. “But she deserves it!” she added, straightening up. “It’s a Sister War, remember?”

  “That’s right,” said Maria, nodding. “We wouldn’t do those things to her if she just spent some time with us, like a good big sister should.”

  They sounded as if they were trying to convince themselves. “So, what have you done to her?” I asked casually.

  “Nothing that bad,” said Maria. “Well, except for the business with the sweater.”

  “The bucket thing was kind of mean too,” said Tiffany, reflecting. “But the one that really made her mad was the hair dye.”

  “Hair dye?” I asked, arching an eyebrow. “I want to hear about the other things too, but why don’t you start with that one?”

  This time it was Maria who bent down, to pick up a stick. I think she was avoiding my eyes. So Tiffany started to talk.

  “Well, it was just that we emptied out part of her shampoo,” she said, “and then we filled up the bottle with —”

  “With hair dye?” I asked. “Oh my lord. What color?”

  “Sort of purple,” admitted Tiffany.

  “What do you mean sort of purple?” I asked. “There’s purple and there’s not-purple. Which was it?”

  “It was mega-purple!” shouted Maria, tossing away her stick. She couldn’t help grinning. “She looked like Barney.”

  “But it was the kind that washes right out,” put in Tiffany quickly. “We were careful about that.”

  “I’m sure Shannon appreciated your thoughtfulness,” I said.

  Maria shook her head. “Nope,” she said seriously. “She went bananas. Then she washed her hair, like, nine times in a row. I think she ran out of hot water on about the sixth shampoo, but she kept doing it until all the purple was out.”

  “Her hair looked kind of like straw after that,” said Tiffany, remembering. “And Mom was miffed because she’d used up all the towels.”

  “I can imagine,” I said. We were walking by a low stone wall. I sat down on it — the stones were warm from the sun — and patted the spots on either side of me. “Now that you’ve told me about the dye incident, why don’t you fill me in on the other things you’ve done to Shannon?”

  Tiffany sat on my right, Maria on my left. Maria pretended to brush some dust off her jacket sleeve while Tiffany acted fascinated with the surface of the stone wall.

  “Come on, let’s hear it,” I said. “It can’t be that bad.”

  “It isn’t!” said Maria. “But Shannon acts like we’re criminals or something.”

  “She’d probably be happy if we were thrown into jail,” agreed Tiffany. “But it’s not as if we’ve done anything really illegal.”

  “Ahem,” I said. “Why don’t you let me be the judge of that? Start with the sweater.”

  “Well, we were just trying to be helpful,” said Maria. “You know how we are.” She looked up at me through her eyelashes, all innocence.

  “So we did some laundry for her,” added Tiffany. “How were we supposed to know that wool shrinks?”

  “She has this brand-new white sweater,” said Maria. “It looked really good on her, but now it won’t even fit my old Cabbage Patch doll.”

  “I thought you were supposed to wash everything in really hot water,” explained Tiffany, “if you want it to be clean.”

  “At least, that’s what you told Shannon,” I said. “I have a feeling you might have known just a little more about it than that. Besides, anyone can read the label in a sweater — or the directions on the detergent box. Doing laundry is not rocket science.”

  Tiffany looked down at her hands. Maria stared off at a lamppost.

  “So what?” asked Tiffany finally. “I mean, even so, it was only a sweater. Shannon made, like, a federal case out of it.”

  “She made us take an oath swearing we’d never touch any of her clothes ever again,” said Maria.

  “Hmm,” I said. “And you did?”

  “Of course,” said Tiffany. “We had no choice.”

  “Yet you’re arguing over who’s going to wear her red sweater,” I said. “It doesn’t sound as if you take your oath too seriously.”

  “I had my fingers crossed,” admitted Maria.

  Tiffany held up one foot. “Toes,” she said. She giggled a little, but I shot her a Look and she stopped.

  The girls were having just a little too much fun with the Sister War, I thought. Even though they were making Shannon angrier and angrier, it seemed as if they were swept up in the pleasure of torturing her. Yet all they wanted, more than anything, was her attention. I knew there had to be a better way. Meanwhile, I still had to find out one more thing. “Okay,” I said. “Let’s have the whole story. What did you do with that bucket?”

  “Bucket?” repeated Maria.

  “What bucket?” asked Tiffany.

  “Guys,” I said warningly.

  “I read about it in a book,” said Tiffany. “It’s one of the oldest practical jokes in the world.”

  “You didn’t —” I began.

  “We did,” said Tiffany. “We ba
lanced a bucket on top of her door so when she opened it — well, you know the rest.”

  “Except we made the trick even better,” said Maria, kicking her heels against the stone wall happily. “We didn’t put water in the bucket. That would have been too boring.”

  “Right,” I said. “Really boring. And Shannon would hate that. So what did you fill the bucket with?”

  Tiffany giggled. “I’ll give you a hint. It was red. And wiggly.”

  “That’s two hints!” cried Maria. “I want to give one too. It had to be in the refrigerator for a while first.”

  I couldn’t believe my ears. “Not Jell-O!” I said. “You must be kidding.”

  “Nope,” said Maria. “Not kidding.”

  “So Shannon ended up covered in cherry Jell-O?” I asked, seeing the awful picture in my mind’s eye.

  “Raspberry, actually,” said Tiffany with a touch of pride.

  “Hoo, boy. No wonder Shannon’s trying to avoid you two.” I glanced at my watch. “Speaking of Shannon, she’s probably home by now and wondering where we are. We better go.” The three of us headed home without talking much more. I was trying hard to figure out a way to convince the girls to give up the Sister War. They were probably busy plotting their next prank.

  Shannon’s backpack was on the kitchen table when we returned to the Kilbournes’, but she — and Astrid — were nowhere in sight. “They must have gone for a walk,” I said. “Well, how about if you guys start in on your homework while I’m here to help?”

  The girls agreed, so we trooped upstairs. They changed, then sat down at their desks to work. I helped Tiffany with some math first, then went into Maria’s room to help her with spelling. I thought I heard Tiffany slip downstairs while I was helping Maria, and I knew that Maria had gone to the kitchen earlier. I figured they were helping themselves to snacks.

  After half an hour, I heard the front door slam, and Astrid came bounding up the stairs to look for Tiffany and Maria. But Shannon didn’t follow her. I was just about to head downstairs to say hi to her when I heard a bloodcurdling scream from the kitchen.

  I ran to the door of Maria’s room and looked out into the hall. “What was that?” I cried. “Tiffany, are you okay?”

  Tiffany poked her head out of her room. “I’m fine,” she said. “Who yelled?”

  I heard a stifled giggle behind me and turned to see Maria with her hand over her mouth. “Take a guess,” she told her sister. Tiffany started to giggle too.

  “What have you two been up to?” I asked, putting my hands on my hips. “This isn’t funny anymore. That scream sounded serious.” I raised my voice. “Shannon, are you okay?”

  There was no answer.

  “Shannon?” I called, a little louder.

  Then I saw her. She’d appeared at the bottom of the stairs.

  She did not look happy.

  In one hand she held her backpack, the one I’d seen on the kitchen table. In the other she held a limp, knotted, slimy tangle that looked like fat white worms.

  Spaghetti. Cooked spaghetti in her backpack. The girls had outdone themselves.

  “Oh my lord,” I said. I turned to glare at Maria and Tiffany, but they’d disappeared.

  Shannon started up the stairs with a purposeful look on her face. I had a very bad feeling about what she might do or say to her sisters, if she could catch them.

  “Shannon,” I said, putting out a hand as if to stop her. “Wait —”

  “Wait for what?” she asked. “I’ve just about had it with their pranks. And I’m going to tell them so.”

  I gulped. I knew a confrontation right now was not a good idea. Not with Shannon this angry, and the girls so pleased with themselves. The Sister War had gone far enough. If I could just help Shannon cool down a bit before she yelled at them, maybe the three of them could talk things over and make up. “Don’t you think —” I began, but Shannon interrupted me.

  “Whose side are you on, here, anyway?” she asked. “And, by the way, what kind of baby-sitter lets two little kids go around pulling pranks like this?” She held up the spaghetti and shook it in my face.

  I stepped back as if she’d slapped me.

  “Kristy, I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean that. It’s not your fault that my sisters have turned into the hugest pests this side of a giant cockroach.” She sat down on the stairs and, with a big sigh, put her face in her hands.

  That was when she realized she was still holding the spaghetti.

  “Oh, ew,” she said. She glanced up at me. For a second she looked as if she were about to start crying. Instead, she began to laugh.

  I joined her. Soon we were both laughing so hard we couldn’t stop. My stomach hurt. Tears were rolling down my face. I had to sit down next to Shannon on the stairs. Every time I looked at her I started cracking up all over again.

  Then, suddenly, she stopped laughing. She looked extremely serious. I noticed that she was looking — or, rather, glaring — at something behind me. I turned my head just in time to see Maria and Tiffany duck back into their rooms. When I looked back at Shannon, she was just starting to stand up.

  “Uh, Shannon,” I said quickly. “How about if we go downstairs for a cup of cocoa?”

  She glanced at me. “In a minute,” she said.

  I touched her arm. “Let’s talk first,” I said pleadingly.

  She glanced at me again. Then she nodded. “Okay,” she said. “Let’s talk.”

  She followed me downstairs, and I could almost swear I heard two loud sighs of relief behind us. I hoped Tiffany and Maria appreciated that I’d just saved their skins.

  We headed into the kitchen. I filled up the kettle with water and set it to boil on the stove. When the cocoa was ready, I handed a mug to Shannon.

  “Thanks,” she said. She blew on the top of her cocoa to cool it, then took a sip. “Mmm, good,” she said.

  I’d been thinking while I was making that cocoa, and I’d made a decision. Just this once, I thought, I’d keep my mouth shut and listen.

  It wasn’t easy. I had to think about how to listen. Mary Anne would have been perfect at a time like this, since listening comes naturally to her.

  It does not come naturally to me.

  Fortunately, there was plenty to listen to. Once she started, Shannon had a hard time stopping. It only took one little question from me and she was off and running. All I said was, “Shannon, is everything okay?”

  She bit her lip and shook her head. “Not really,” she admitted. She looked down and smoothed her skirt. (She was still dressed in her school uniform.) “Not at all,” she added.

  I could see she was having a hard time keeping the tears from falling. “What’s going on?” I asked. (Okay, so I asked two little questions.)

  “I just feel so tired all the time,” Shannon said. “And overwhelmed. I guess I’ve just taken on too much, but I don’t know what to do about it. I mean, I like all the things I do. French Club, Honor Society, the school play, the dance committee — all of it. It’s fun to be involved.” She paused to sniff a little and wipe her eyes.

  “I don’t want to give anything up,” she went on. “But something’s not right with the way things are going.”

  “Not right?” I repeated.

  She took another sip of cocoa and sighed. “No,” she said, shaking her head. “Not right. I mean, I can’t remember the last time I sat down to watch some dumb TV show, or the last time I read a book just for enjoyment.”

  “Sounds like you don’t have much time to relax,” I said.

  “Exactly,” she agreed. “No time at all. And, as I’m sure you’ve noticed,” she gave me a rueful look, “I haven’t had time to be a BSC member lately, much less take on any jobs. I miss sitting.” She paused for a second. “Hey, do we have any graham crackers? I’m hungry all of a sudden.”

  “Not only do you have graham crackers,” I said, jumping up from my seat, “you have chocolate-covered graham crackers.” I opened a cupboard, took out a box
, and plunked it down in front of Shannon. “Funny how I know the contents of your family’s cabinets better than you do.”

  “Funny, but not so funny either. It’s not just the cabinets you know better.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Shannon frowned. “Tiffany and Maria,” she said. “I think you have a better idea of what’s going on with them than I do.”

  “Well …” I began, not knowing what to say. “Tell me what you think is going on.”

  “I have no idea,” said Shannon. “All I know is that they’re driving me nuts. Normally I’d say I miss spending time with them, but these days I’m not so sure. They’ve been such pains lately. Why would I want to be around them? I just don’t understand why they’re pulling all these pranks on me, especially now, when the last thing I need is any more complications in my life.” She looked over at me. “Maybe you can explain.”

  Finally! She was asking my opinion. Or at least she was asking me to talk. That I could do.

  “I know it seems as if they’re out to make you crazy,” I began carefully. “But I’m not so sure that’s their motivation.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Remember in third grade when some kid would be acting all obnoxious in class?” I asked. “And your teacher would say, ‘Johnny just wants attention’?”

  Shannon nodded. “I always thought that was pretty strange,” she said. “Like, the teacher would tell us to ignore him. Well, if he was doing that stuff for attention, how was ignoring him going to help?”

  I made one last monumental effort and didn’t say a thing.

  After a few seconds, a light went on in Shannon’s eyes. “Ohhh!” she said. “You mean they’re doing it for attention?”

  I nodded. “I think maybe they are,” I said. “I think they miss you.”

  “That’s ridiculous! I’m right here.” Then she thought for a second. “Oh. Maybe I’m not. I guess that’s what I’ve just been saying.” She was quiet for a little while, and I could practically see the wheels turning in her mind.

  We finished our cocoa in silence while Shannon thought everything over. I had a definite feeling that the Sister War would not last much longer. (Note to Nobel Peace Prize Committee: That’s Kristy Thomas, T-H-O-M-A-S, and I can be reached at 1210 McLelland Road, Stoneybrook, CT 06800.)