Kristy and the Mother's Day Surprise
Page 9
I stood at the table next to Dawn, who was stirring the cookie batter. She was humming a vaguely familiar song under her breath.
“What is that song?” asked Charlie.
“It’s — You know, it goes, ‘Lucy in the sky-y with di-i-amonds’.”
“Oh,” said, Charlie. “That old one.”
Dawn nodded. She continued singing it softly. “…the girl with colitis goes by.”
“What?” I said.
“What?!” cried Sam. He let out a guffaw.
Dawn looked puzzled.
“It’s ‘the girl with kaleidoscope eyes’,” he informed her.
Dawn and I glanced at each other and shrugged.
“Either way it’s a weird song,” I said.
We finished our cookies. The sign-makers finished their sign.
“Did someone make me a sign when I was born?” asked Andrew.
I hugged him again. Then I sat down and pulled him onto my lap. “I will always love you,” I whispered into his ear. “No matter what. Even if we adopt sixteen more kids, I will always love you because you’re Andrew. And so will Karen and your daddy and my mom and David Michael and Sam and Charlie and everyone else.”
Andrew smiled a tiny smile. He looked relieved.
“Where should we put the sign?” asked Claudia.
We ended up stringing it across the kitchen. (We were pretty sure Mom and Watson would bring Emily in through the door from the garage to the kitchen.)
Then we piled the cookies into a neat mound on a platter and set the platter on the kitchen table.
“Well, now what?” asked Sam.
“Now,” I began. I paused. “They’re here! They’re here!” I screeched. “I heard the car pull into the garage! I swear I did!”
“Oh, lord!” cried Claudia.
“What should we do? What should we do?” Mary Anne was wringing her hands.
“Let’s stand under the sign,” I suggested, “next to the cookies.”
We posed ourselves — the six Thomas and Brewer kids in the front, and my friends in the back, even though Mary Anne didn’t show up because she’s short and was standing behind Charlie.
We were ready. Emily’s first sight when she came into her new home, would be of her special sign, her welcome-home cookies, and her brothers and sisters and friends.
The door opened. Mom came in first. Watson was behind her. He was carrying Emily Michelle Thomas Brewer in his arms.
She was fast asleep.
Mom looked at the sign and the cookies and then at Emily. I could tell she felt bad for us. But we didn’t feel too bad. Emily would see everything later.
Mom put her finger to her lips, and we all crowded silently around Emily. I knew we wanted to say things like, “Ooh, look!” Or, “She’s so cute!” Or, “I can’t believe she’s my sister!” But we just stared.
Emily’s hair is dark and shiny. It falls across her forehead in bangs. Her skin is smooth, and her mouth and nose are tiny, like any two-year-old’s. I wished I could see her eyes. You can tell a lot about a person by looking at her eyes.
Emily Michelle. She’s my sister, and David Michael’s and Sam’s and Charlie’s. She’s Andrew’s and Karen’s. She’s the one person in our family who isn’t a Brewer or a Thomas. Her mother is Mom and her father is Watson, but she isn’t their baby; if you know what I mean.
She’s just ours. She belongs to Watson and Andrew and Karen, and she belongs to Mom and my brothers and me. She would bring us together. She would unite us. That was what Mom and Watson’s wedding was supposed to have done. But it hadn’t exactly worked. Emily just might do the trick.
Mom made motions to let us know that she and Watson were going to take Emily upstairs to her crib. I nodded. Charlie and I followed. The others stayed behind. They could see Emily later.
Charlie and I stood in the doorway to Emily’s room. We watched Watson lay our new sister in her crib. We watched Mom take Emily’s shoes off, then cover her with a blanket. Emily stirred and made a soft, sleepy noise but didn’t wake up.
When Mom and Watson left, so did Charlie, but I tiptoed over to Emily’s crib and looked down at her.
Hello, there, I thought. You are a very special little girl. I guess you are lucky, too. You found a family. And we are lucky. We found you. Do you know how much we want you? No? Well, you will when you’re older, because we will tell you.
You have a lot of brothers, by the way. You have two sisters, as well. And a mom and a dad and a cat and a dog. Someday you’ll know all this.
I tiptoed out of Emily’s room — my new sister’s room. Emily, I decided, was the best Mother’s Day present ever.
* * *
Dear Reader:
In Kristy and the Mother’s Day Surprise, Kristy is thrilled when Emily Michelle joins the family. It’s been a long time since there was a baby in my family. I was two years old when my sister Jane was born. I’ve been told that when my parents brought Jane home from the hospital, my mother knelt down and opened up her arms to me. She hadn’t seen me in a week. I started running, then shot right past her to my father, who was holding my new baby sister.
I might have ignored my mother then, but I never forgot her on Mother’s Day. Here are ways you can honor someone special on Mother’s Day: Cook an easy meal. Do chores around the house. Make her a card. Or give her the day off, just like the members of the Baby-sitters Club did.
Happy reading,
* * *
About the Author
ANN MATTHEWS MARTIN was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane.
There are currently over 176 million copies of The Baby-sitters Club in print. (If you stacked all of these books up, the pile would be 21,245 miles high.) In addition to The Baby-sitters Club, Ann is the author of two other series, Main Street and Family Tree. Her novels include Belle Teal, A Corner of the Universe (a Newbery Honor book), Here Today, A Dog’s Life, On Christmas Eve, Everything for a Dog, Ten Rules for Living with My Sister, and Ten Good and Bad Things About My Life (So Far). She is also the coauthor, with Laura Godwin, of the Doll People series.
Ann lives in upstate New York with her dog and her cats.
Copyright © 1989 by Ann M. Martin.
Cover art by Hodges Soileau
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, THE BABY-SITTERS CLUB, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
First edition, April 1997
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e-ISBN 978-0-545-63068-9