Anastasia's Chosen Career (13 page)

"Well, shoot, how could I forget someone who's been my best friend for a whole week? And I've got your phone number."

Anastasia nodded. "And I won't forget
you,
for sure! I'll probably be seeing you on magazine covers and stuff, when you're a famous model. But I'll call you next week, before you're famous."

"Yeah," Henry said matter-of-factly. "I'll probably be on—what's that one called?
Vogue.
You gimme a year or two to get my act together, then I'll be on
Vogue.
"

"But don't forget college. Promise you'll go to college."

"Shoot, that's a hunnert years from now," Henry laughed. "My looks'll be gone by then, anyway."

A man leaning against a wall near the bus stop looked Henry up and down as the girls walked past. Then he gave a long, low, admiring whistle.

Henry whirled around and glared at him. "Stick it in your ear, turkey," she said.

***

Sitting wearily on the bus during her ride home, Anastasia thought about what Henry had said to the man. It was such an assertive thing to say.
Flagrant
—that's what it was; flagrant.

Anastasia wished she could say stuff like that. It wasn't that she couldn't pronounce the words. Heck, the words were easy. "Stick." "It." "In." "Your." "Ear." "Turkey." Each one was a word she had said a million times. But somehow, all put together, with the right inflection—and staring the person straight in the eye, the way Henry had done—well, then it took on a whole new feeling.

"Stick it in your ear, turkey," she murmured to herself, practicing. There. She had said it just right: scornfully, assertively, flagrantly.

Now if the right occasion would just come along. If someone were rude to her, the way that man had been to Henry. Surely it would happen. People were rude to Anastasia all the time.

Why, just the week before her very own father had been rude to her. He had falsely accused her of messing with his precious Billie Holiday records. And she hadn't; her brother, Sam, had been the guilty one.

Anastasia envisioned the scene. Her father had bellowed, "Anastasia Krupnik, I've told you a million times to keep your mitts off my Billie Holiday records, and you never
listen!
"

She envisioned herself looking her father straight in the eye and saying, "Stick it in your ear, turkey."

Gulp. No, that wasn't the right occasion. You couldn't say that to your own father, no matter how rude he was.

Well, what about the time—also just the week before—when she had been whispering to Sonya about nude photographs, and Mr. Earnshaw had embarrassed her in front of the whole study hall by saying, "I want to see you after class—fully clothed," with that sarcastic tone?

She pictured herself marching up to Mr. Earnshaw's desk, looking him right in the eye, and saying, "Stick it in your ear, turkey."

Thinking of it, she cringed. No. That wasn't the right occasion, either.

The bus stopped at Anastasia's corner. "Move it," the driver said angrily to the two boys getting off in front of Anastasia. One of them had dropped a package and was trying to pick it up. "I haven't got all day."

Well,
that
was sure rude. If he says anything like that to me, Anastasia thought, it will be the right occasion.

She moved forward toward the door of the bus. At the top of the steps she stumbled. She grabbed the rail to steady herself.

"Come on, come on," the bus driver grumbled. "Let's get this show on the road, sister."

Anastasia turned and looked him right in the eye.

"I'm sorry, sir," she mumbled.

She was still mad at herself when she got home. She didn't greet her parents or her brother. She dropped her jacket angrily in the back hall and stomped up the stairs to her bedroom.

Unassertive twerp, she said to herself, and slumped onto her bed.

From inside his bowl, Frank Goldfish looked out at her with his bulgy eyes. Great; she'd forgotten to feed him that morning. Anastasia sighed and tapped some fish food into the bowl. Frank swam hastily to the surface and gobbled it up. Then he came to the side of the bowl and stared at her. His mouth opened and closed. He was probably demanding a second helping.

Anastasia stared him straight in the eye.

"Stick it in your ear, turkey," she said.

Boy,
that
felt good.

Anastasia Krupnik

My Chosen Career

One of the things that I find most appealing about My Chosen Career, bookstore owner, is that you can do it sitting down, most of the time. From your sitting-down position you can reach for the phone or the cash register or even to the bookshelf to take out a book if it isn't up on a high shelf.

Therefore, Bookstore Owner is a good choice of career for people who tend to have an ungraceful walk.

You would have to get up from your sitting position in order to be assertive sometimes, like if someone wanted to return a book with coffee stains and you wanted to say something extremely rude to them. But you could just stand up and look them in the eye while you said it very distinctly. You wouldn't need to walk gracefully across the room, or anything. Then you could sit back down and watch while they slunk away, ashamed of themselves.

"And let's see, what else? What did I get out of this week? Well, I got a terrific haircut," Anastasia said, staring into the camera. She wasn't quite as nervous as she had been on Monday.

"And I got advice about clothes, even though I can't afford to buy them.

"And I had a lot of fun." She grinned.

"And last, but maybe most important, I made some new friends. And especially my friend Henry Peabody." Anastasia kept looking at the camera, but she could see, from the corner of her eye, Henry Peabody give her a thumbs-up sign.

"The end. Thank you."

Uncle Charley turned off the camera and nodded at her. "Good," he said.

Anastasia went back to her seat and looked around. She had been third. Bambie, as usual, had said, "Me first!" Bambie hadn't wanted to do the assignment—to talk about what they had gotten out of the course. She had insisted on doing her boring Juliet monologue again. Afterward, when Uncle Charley had shown Bambie's "Before" and then her "After," they had all laughed. Bambie hadn't changed at all. She still looked exactly the same; her monologue had been exactly the same, with the same stupid gestures in the same places.

But Bambie didn't care. She thought she was terrific
before.
And she thought she was terrific
after.

Then Henry had gone next. She stood self-confidently in front of the camera and spoke about her hopes for a career. Henry's appearance was not such a colossal surprise anymore, though it still threw the group into awed silence. But now she was less smart-alecky, more poised, more cheerful. It had only been a week, Anastasia realized in amazement. It was probably the best $119 Henry Peabody had ever spent.

At the end of her speech, after she said, "I'd like to thank everybody here who helped me see that I could be successful," Henry couldn't resist adding, with a big wink, "and
rich.
"

Everyone applauded.

Robert Giannini and Helen Margaret were back. They were sitting beside each other, and Robert had announced that they would go before the camera last. Helen Margaret hadn't spoken to anyone, but she looked much calmer than she had the day before.

"Robert? Are you ready?" asked Uncle Charley, and Robert nodded.

He leaned his briefcase against his chair and went to stand in front of the camera. "Are you in focus? Should I start?" he asked.

"Go," said Uncle Charley.

Robert cleared his throat. "I got a lot out of this week," he said. "For one thing, my new hair style, I think, makes me look more mature."

Mature my foot, thought Anastasia. Oh, well; that was just old Robert. If he thinks he looks mature, what the heck.

"And I've also made new friends. I've known Anastasia Krupnik for a long time, but I've enjoyed meeting Bambie and Henry, and I wish them both great success in the future."

Yawn yawn yawn YAWN, thought Anastasia.

"Most especially," Robert went on, "I've gotten to know Helen Margaret Howell, who is a very special person. She and I spent the afternoon together yesterday, and we'd like to tell you about it together."

Henry nudged Anastasia, and they both watched, surprised, as Helen Margaret got up and went to stand beside Robert.

"Helen Margaret, honey," Aunt Vera said, "you don't have to do a videotape if you don't want to."

"I want to," Helen Margaret replied in a shy voice.

Robert cleared his throat again. "When I went looking for her yesterday, I finally caught a glimpse of Helen Margaret walking across the Common."

"Running," whispered Helen Margaret. "I was running."

"Well, yes, actually she was running. But I saw her and I followed her all the way down to Commonwealth Avenue. She didn't see me."

"I was crying," Helen Margaret said. "I didn't see
anything,
because I was crying."

Robert nodded. "I followed her on Commonwealth Avenue until she went into a building. I knew she didn't live there because her address was Somerville—"

Helen Margaret said, "I live with my aunt and uncle in Somerville."

"I went into the building behind her," Robert went on, "and I could see that she went into a doctor's office. It was a psych—" He turned to the girl beside him. "Do you mind if I tell them this?"

Helen Margaret smiled. "I'll tell them," she said in her quiet voice. "It was my psychiatrist's office."

Aunt Vera interrupted. "Kids, we really don't need to get into any heavy stuff here. I'm just glad that Helen Margaret's okay. The tape's long enough. Thanks, Robert and Hel—"

"No,
wait!
" Robert said angrily. "Let us finish. That's the whole trouble—people get embarrassed about other people's problems, so they don't want to know about them. And then if you don't have anybody to talk to—because they won't
listen
—then the problems
stay.
That's what a psychiatrist is
for
—to listen to people's problems."

"I'm sorry, Robert," Aunt Vera said quietly. "Go on. We're listening."

"Well, I know about it firsthand because when I was younger I went to a psychiatrist myself. My parents took me because I was a bed wetter."

Oh, no, thought Anastasia. She looked at the floor. She felt awfully relieved that Helen Margaret was back and seemed to be okay, and she felt grateful to Robert for helping Helen Margaret recover from whatever had gone wrong the day before, but the last thing in the world she wanted to hear was about Robert Giannini being a bed wetter, for pete's sake. Talk about
embarrassing.

She glanced at Henry so that they could make faces at each other. But Henry was watching Robert, listening intently.

She looked over at Bambie. And Bambie was watching Robert, too, and listening with a sympathetic look.

Nobody looked embarrassed. They looked understanding. Probably every one of them had had problems at some time, and nobody to tell them to. Anastasia knew that
she
had, for sure.

So she looked at Robert and listened. She tried to feel sympathetic instead of embarrassed. And after a moment, the embarrassment was gone.

"Well, anyway," he was saying, "that was a long time ago and I don't have that problem anymore. But I remember what it was like when other kids used to make fun of me, and I didn't have anyone I could talk to.

"So I waited for almost an hour while Helen Margaret was in the doctor's office. And I was there when she came out. I was freezing by then because I was just wearing my Harris tweed jacket—you remember that yesterday I was wearing my Harris tweed jacket with the side vents—and I was sitting on cement steps, and the jacket doesn't cover my buttocks—"

Oh,
no.
Just when Anastasia had gotten over being embarrassed, Robert Giannini had said "buttocks."

Helen Margaret started to giggle. She poked Robert. "Quit it, Robert. You're starting to sound like a jerk. Get to the point. Or let me tell the rest."

Robert looked a little insulted for a second. Then he chuckled. "Okay," he said. "You go on."

Helen Margaret took a deep breath. "The reason I live with my aunt and uncle is because my parents are dead," she said.

She looked straight ahead at the camera and talked steadily and quietly. "I used to live in Wisconsin," she said. "Last fall there was a fire in our house. My parents were both killed."

Aunt Vera gasped. "Oh, honey, I'm sorry," she said. "You don't need to go on."

"No, it's okay. I
want
to," Helen Margaret said firmly. Anastasia noticed that she was clutching Robert's hand, but her voice was very firm.

"They were both killed in the fire, along with my brother. And I was badly burned. I was in a special hospital here in Boston until last month.

"And I'm really okay now. I told Robert all about it yesterday, sitting on the steps of my doctor's building—"

"Freezing," Robert added.

"Yeah, freezing. Finally we went to Brigham's and ordered hot chocolate. And while we were there I told him about the rest. Even though I'm fine now, I still have a lot of scars. Not on my face."