Anastasia read aloud what she had written. She glanced at the gerbils. They were both asleep in the nests they had built. She looked at Frank Goldfish. He swam in a circle, opening and closing his mouth. She could tell that he was amused.
"Quit being so arrogant, Frank," she said angrily. "Just wait till you're thirteen. Then you won't be so well adjusted."
4
"Is it Saturday, Mom?" asked Sam anxiously as he ate his breakfast cereal. "Promise me that it's Saturday?"
"I promise," said Mrs. Krupnik. "It's Saturday. All day."
"Good," said Sam, as he took another bite of Rice Krispies. "I love Saturday. Because on Saturday I don't have to go to nursery school."
Anastasia was sitting on the kitchen floor, lacing up her hiking boots. She'd had to unlace them completely to put them on because she was wearing two pairs of thick wool socks; it was suddenly very cold outside for mid-October. "Why?" she asked her brother. "I thought you loved nursery school. You like those blocks with the letters on them."
But Sam shook his head gloomily. "My friend Nicky takes the blocks and throws them. I'm scared of Nicky. My friend Nicky punches me and kicks me."
"Some friend," said Anastasia, tugging at her boot laces.
"Nicky does what?" Mrs. Krupnik put her cup of coffee down on the table and stared at Sam.
"Punches," said Sam. "And kicks."
"Myron, did you hear that?" asked Mrs. Krupnik. "Myron, stop reading the paper for a minute. Did you hear what Sam just said?"
Reluctantly, Dr. Krupnik lowered his newspaper. "Have you read this article about the possibility of a nuclear disaster here in Massachusetts?" he asked.
"No," said Katherine Krupnik. "I have enough problems right here in this house. Did you hear what Sam just told us? There's a child in his nursery school who beats him up!"
"Nicky," said Sam cheerfully. "Nicky punches and kicks. And bites, too. Look!" He pulled up the sleeve of his striped jersey. On the side of his arm was a small pink semicircle of teeth marks.
"Myron! Look at this!" Mrs Krupnik examined Sam's arm with dismay.
Dr. Krupnik adjusted his glasses and took a look. "It didn't break the skin," he said. He began to pick up the newspaper again.
"What is Nicky's full name, Sam?" Mrs. Krupnik asked angrily. She was reaching for the telephone book.
Sam thought about that, wrinkling his forehead as he munched on his cereal. "Big fat ugly Nicky," he said, finally.
Anastasia giggled. "Mom meant last name, Sam," she explained. "Like your last name is Krupnik. What's Nicky's last name?"
Sam thought. "Coletti," he said. "Nicky Coletti."
Anastasia stood up and stamped her feet to make sure her boots were just right. "Sounds like Mafia to me," she said. "Definitely underworld. If you call Nicky's mother, Mom, probably thugs will come to the house and break both your legs."
Sam grinned.
Mrs. Krupnik was running her finger down the page of C's in the telephone book. "Cohen," she murmured. "Colby. Coleman—"
Dr. Krupnik put the newspaper down again. "Don't call her, Katherine," he said.
"Is that an order?" asked his wife angrily.
"No, it's a suggestion. Don't you remember what happened when Anastasia was about seven, and she came home one day crying because her friend—What was that little girl's name, Anastasia?"
"Traci," said Anastasia. "It was Traci Beckwith, that little fink."
"Right," said her father. "Traci Beckwith had pushed Anastasia off a swing in the playground, if I remember correctly."
"Yes, she did. I got all this gravel in my knee."
"And you called Mrs. Beckwith, Katherine, remember? You were furious."
"I had every right to be furious. That child could have killed Anastasia. Imagine, pushing a seven-year-old off a swing!"
Dr. Krupnik lit his pipe. "And Mrs. Beckwith, you'll recall, became very aggressive?"
"I had no idea that woman was a criminal lawyer," said Mrs. Krupnik. "But it wouldn't have changed things if I had known."
"And she began making countercharges," Dr. Krupnik went on. "She said that Anastasia had taken scissors during Art period, and had cut the ends off of Traci's pigtails."
"Well," said Anastasia hurriedly, "that was no big deal. She had these very long pigtails. And her desk was right in front of mine, so her stupid pigtails were always dangling on my desk and flopping into my finger-painting. There wasn't any need to make a federal case out of it."
"My point," said her father, puffing on his pipe, "is only that before we knew it, the two mothers were talking about law suits, and yelling at each other over the phone. But in the meantime, Anastasia and Traci were the best of friends. They were out riding their bikes together."
"I don't see how that relates to Sam," said Mrs. Krupnik grumpily. But she had closed the telephone book. "Who gave that Coletti kid the right to gnaw a whole chunk out of Sam's little arm?"
"Yeah," said Sam mournfully. "A whole big chunk." He gazed at the small pink mark on his arm.
"Why didn't you bite Nicky Coletti back, Sam?" asked Anastasia.
Sam's eyes grew wide. "Nicky Coletti is big," he said. "Nicky Coletti is a giant."
They all stared for a moment at the tiny pink teeth marks.
"Well," said Dr. Krupnik, "I think it's best to let the kids work it out between themselves."
"Maybe so," said Mrs. Krupnik reluctantly. "But I found their name in the book: Coletti, on Woodville Avenue. Just in case I ever need to call."
There was a knock on the kitchen door.
"Oh, no!" cried Anastasia. "That's Sonya and Meredith. We're going to a garage sale on Bennington Street. Oh, rats! They're five minutes early!"
"So what?" asked her mother, puzzled. "Go let them in.
"Mom," said Anastasia, "you're wearing your bathrobe!"
Her mother looked down at her plaid wool bathrobe. "It's clean," she said. "Surely they've seen bathrobes before."
"Mom," said Anastasia hastily, "just do me a big favor, okay? Hide. Go stand in the pantry. It'll only be for a few minutes. And Dad?"
Her father looked up from the paper. "I'm dressed," he pointed out.
"Hide your pipe. Sonya's father is a doctor. I don't want her to know that you smoke. And Sam! Quick. Somebody comb Sam's hair, okay? And wipe your face, Sam; there's a Rice Krispie stuck on your chin."
Anastasia's parents and brother all stared at her in astonishment. None of them moved. Dr. Krupnik continued to puff on his pipe. Sam chewed silently on a mouthful of Rice Krispies.
There was another knock at the back door.
Anastasia threw up her arms in disgust. She grabbed her jacket from the doorknob where it was hanging. "All right, then!" she said. "Humiliate me! See if I care! I won't even ask them in!"
She slammed the back door behind her as she went out. "Hi," she said to her friends. "I thought you guys would never get here."
It was much more fun being with her friends than it was being at home with her family, Anastasia thought. Her friends never acted stupid or anything. Tall, slim, pale-blonde Meredith Halberg was full of fun; and Sonya Isaacson, chubby and freckled, was good-natured and bookish.
And they knew how to dress. The three of them were all dressed alike, in jeans and hiking boots and jackets. Last week a girl in seventh grade had come to school wearing a jumper and a ruffled blouse, and everyone had hooted and laughed and teased her until she almost cried. Her mother had made her dress that way, the girl explained, because they were going to the airport after school, to meet her grandmother who was flying in from Chicago.
It was the kind of thing Anastasia's mother might do, too. Thank goodness she didn't have a grandmother in Chicago.
"It's really getting cold," said Meredith as the three girls headed down the street. T hope it snows soon. If it snows before Thanksgiving, my whole family's going skiing over vacation. We always go to this ski lodge in New Hampshire."
"I don't even know how to ski," said Anasta
sia. "But if I did, I can't imagine going with my family. My parents would act weird. My father would recite poetry about snowfall, and my mother—well my mother is such a klutz she'd probably fall all the time. And then she'd laugh. My mom's big on laughing, for pete's sake. It's so embarrassing."
"My mother laughs, too," said Meredith. "And she does it with a Danish accent, so it's even worse. But I just pretend that I don't know her. Her or my father. My sister and I just take off, at the ski lodge. The only time we have to see our parents is at dinner. And sometimes my sister even eats at a different table."
"How old is your sister?" asked Anastasia. "She's pretty old, isn't she?"
"Kirsten? Seventeen. Why?"
Anastasia stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, her shoulders slumped inside her jacket. "Oh, terrific!!" she wailed, in a voice that meant it wasn't terrific at all. "I thought it was only when you were thirteen that you felt this way about your family! You mean it lasts till you're seventeen?"
Meredith thought it over. "I don't think it's the same," she said. "Kirsten doesn't even notice our parents. She goes off by herself because she wants to pick up guys when she's skiing."
"That's Stage Two," said Sonya, who had been listening intently. "Stage Two of Adolescence. We're still in Stage One. My father told me that."
"Doctors," scoffed Anastasia. "They always think they know everything."
Sonya shrugged. "He says it's all hormones."
"Hormones schmormones," said Anastasia. "My mother said the same thing. But I think it's a lie. I think grownups got together and made up this hormone theory. I don't even believe in hormones," she added gloomily.
"When my father said that, about the hormones," Sonya went on, grinning, "my brother said he knew a joke. And the beginning of the joke was: How do you make a hormone? But then my father got mad and said, 'None of that at the dinner table!' So I never got to hear the punch line."
"I don't think there's anything funny about hormones, anyway," Meredith said. "I hate the idea that there are all these things inside me. What do you suppose they look like? Insects or something?"
"Blecchhh," said Anastasia.
"Here's Bennington Street," said Sonya. "And there's a sign up there in the middle of the block—that must be the garage sale."
They turned the corner and headed toward the large Tudor house with the sign in the driveway.
"You know what?" asked Anastasia. "I told my parents that I wanted to go to a psychiatrist. But they said no. They said I didn't have any problems. Do you believe they said that? NO PROBLEMS?"
Sonya and Meredith sighed sympathetically and shook their heads.
"I read in the paper about a girl our age," said Meredith, "who was undergoing psychiatric evaluation at the state hospital."
"How come?" asked Anastasia. "Did her hormones get out of control?"
"She stole fourteen cars," Meredith explained. "And she didn't even have a driver's license. She even stole her own grandfather's car."
They had reached the driveway and turned in toward the garage. Its door was open, and a few people were prowling around through the assorted objects. Suddenly Meredith started to laugh. "Anastasia," she said, "you're going to go to a psychiatrist whether your parents like it or not!"
She pointed. On the side entrance of the house, a small bronze sign said: CALVIN MATTHIAS, M.D. PSYCHIATRY. PATIENTS' ENTRANCE.
"Oh, I knew that," said Sonya. "Dr. Matthias died—that's why they're having the garage sale."
"How did he die?" asked Anastasia.
"Are you sure you want to know? It's sort of gross," Sonya said. "It wasn't in the paper or anything, but my father told me about it."
"Of course we want to know," said Meredith.
"Well," Sonya explained, "a regular patient came in—a man—and they said hello to each other and everything, and then the patient lay down on the couch the way he always did, and Dr. Matthias sat in a chair, the way he always did, and the patient started to talk, and he talked for a whole hour until his appointment was over. And Dr. Matthias didn't say anything for the whole hour, but the man didn't notice because Dr. Matthias never said anything. And then the patient got up to leave, and went to say good-bye, but Dr. Matthias was dead. He'd been dead the whole hour."
"You mean," Anastasia asked, "the guy had been talking to a dead body for an hour?" It made her feel queasy, just thinking about it.
"That's what the medical examiner said," Sonya explained matter-of-factly. "Apparently he had died of a heart attack, just after he sat down in the chair."
"Gross," said Anastasia. "Maximo grosso."
"Did the guy demand his money back?" Meredith asked.
"I dunno," said Sonya. "I never thought about that. But when my father was telling us about it, at dinner, he said it probably didn't make much difference because if Dr. Matthias never said anything anyway, so what if he was dead?"
"I'd demand my money back," said Meredith. "I demanded my money back when I found a dead beetle in a bag of popcorn at the movies. It seems like the same thing to me."
"After my father told us about it, my brother said he knew a joke about a psychiatrist. And it started: Once a man went to a psychiatrist and said, 'Doctor, you have to help me because everything I see reminds me of breasts.'"
"What did the psychiatrist say?" asked Anastasia.
Sonya shrugged. "I don't know. Because my father said, 'None of that at the dinner table.'"
"SONYA!" wailed Anastasia and Meredith together.
"I only know the beginnings of jokes," Sonya said wistfully. "I don't know one single punch line."
"Now listen," said Sonya seriously as they stood in the driveway, "let's make a pact. This time we won't buy junk."
"I like junk," giggled Meredith.
"I do too," said Anastasia. "But Sonya's right. I wasted five whole dollars last time. I bought that ashtray shaped like a pair of hands. And I don't even smoke."
"Yeah," Meredith admitted. "And I bought that shower curtain. My mother made me throw it out, because there was mold on it. But it had those neat swans all over it."
"I'm only going to look for books," said Sonya. "Really good books. No trash."
"I suppose I could look for a birthday present for my sister," Meredith mused.
"Does she smoke?" asked Anastasia.
"Yeah. But don't tell my parents."
"For three dollars I'll sell you this ashtray shaped like a pair of hands."
"How about two dollars?" asked Meredith. "I didn't charge you anything for the gerbils, and I gave you their cage and everything, and the book about how to take care of them."
Anastasia pondered that. "That's true," she said. "But don't forget that your mother said that if you didn't get rid of them she was going to put them down the garbage disposal. So I really did you a favor by giving them a good home."
"Well," said Meredith, "let me look through this garage. If I don't find anything, I'll buy the ashtray from you. What are you going to buy?"
"I'm not sure," said Anastasia. "I always have to wait until something sort of, you know, strikes me."
Sonya had wandered off, into the garage, and was looking through a large shelf of books. They caught up with her.
"I found Wuthering Heights," she said blissfully. "My very favorite book."
"Don't you already have Wuthering Heights?" asked Meredith, who was leaning over a box full of fishing tackle.
"You can never have too many copies of Wuthering Heights," said Sonya, clutching the dusty volume.
"Do you think Kirsten would like a fly-tying kit for her birthday?" asked Meredith. She held up a musty box.
"No," said Anastasia. "She'd like an ashtray shaped like a pair of hands."
"Here, Anastasia!" said Sonya, who was still looking through the bookshelf. She pulled out a thick blue book. "The complete works of Freud! Just the thing for you!"
"I read it the other night," Anastasia said. She moved around to the end of the bookshelf and knelt to examine a
box full of kitchen utensils on the garage floor. Suddenly there was a shifting noise; she glanced up and saw Sonya attempting to return the blue book to the crowded shelf. Like dominoes, all the books began to tilt and lean; finally they fell to their sides, one after another. Above Anastasia, at the end of the shelf, where it had been placed as a bookend, something large and cream colored—something very solid looking—wobbled and fell.
Anastasia jumped aside, but not quickly enough. The object whacked the corner of her forehead—she winced with the sharp pain—and then crashed to the floor.
"Ow," muttered Anastasia. She rubbed her forehead, and could feel a bump starting to rise. "Am I bleeding?"
Sonya examined her. "No," she said. "It's okay, I think. You should put ice on it when you get home. I'm really sorry."
They looked down at the object on the floor. It was the head of a man, a plaster bust of an old-fashioned bearded man with solemn eyes. And no nose. His nose was lying beside him on the floor of the garage.
The price tag taped to the man's head said $4.50.
"Well," sighed Sonya. "There goes Wuthering Heights. I guess I just bought myself a noseless man."
Anastasia picked up the nose and held it against the serious plaster face. "Hello," she said. He stared back at her with blank eyes.
"I kind of like him," she told Sonya. "You know what? I think I'll buy him—then you won't have to, even though you broke him. I think Elmer's glue will reattach his nose."
"Really? You really like him? You're not just saying that because you feel sorry for me?"
Anastasia tucked the man under one arm and headed for the person who was collecting money in the nearby corner. "Nope," she said to Sonya. "It was like I said to Meredith. Something would strike me."
She gave a five-dollar bill to the woman sitting at a card table with a box of change. She pocketed two quarters in return.
"Young lady," said the woman, who had gray hair and large horn-rimmed glasses, "you got a great bargain. You just bought yourself Sigmund Freud."
"Mom? Dad?" called Anastasia as she went in through the back door, clutching Freud under one arm. "I need ice cubes because I got whacked on the forehead."