Anastasia at This Address Read Online Free PDF Page B

and wondered how to answer his letter.
    BRRRRINNG!
    The shrill sound of a bell startled her and made her jump.
    Sam poked his head around Anastasia's door. He was smiling mischievously.
    BRRRINNNG!
    "Cut it out, Sam," Anastasia said. "Quit ringing that. I'm thinking. I have a very important letter to write."
    Sam grinned and rang the bell he was holding a third time.
    "CUT IT OUT, SAM!"
    Anastasia started toward her brother and he scurried away. She followed him down the stairs. He continued ringing the little metal bell, looking back over his shoulder to make certain that Anastasia was still chasing him and still angry. There was nothing Sam liked better than to be chased by his sister.
    On the first floor, he ducked into Mrs. Krupnik's studio, where she was working. Anastasia followed him.
    "Mom, would you
please
make him stop that?" Anastasia asked angrily, glaring at her brother.
    Mrs. Krupnik looked up from her drawing table, where she was working on some pen-and-ink sketches of the pudgy little farmer milking a cow who was wearing wedgies on all four hooves. "Stop what?" she asked. She peered down at Sam. "Sam, what is that in your hand?"
    Sam held it up gleefully and pushed hard at the metal switch with his thumb.
    BRRRINNNG!
    Anastasia and her mother both winced.
    "It's the bell off the handle of his tricycle," Anastasia explained, although her mother had recognized the sound. "He took Dad's screwdriver and managed to get it off the bike."
    "Why did you do that, Sam?" his mother asked, genuinely curious.
    "Because I want to be in a wedding, too," Sam explained.
    Katherine Krupnik stared at him. He was wearing drooping jeans, a dirty sweatshirt with a picture of Goofy on it, and bright red sneakers. There were grape juice stains around his mouth.
    "You want to be in a wedding," Mrs. Krupnik said, puzzled.
    Anastasia sighed. "It's my fault. I was telling him all about Kirsten's wedding, and how I get to walk down the aisle in my beautiful dress and everything, and have my name in the newspaper, and he said
he
wanted to be a bridesmaid, and I told him—"
    Sam interrupted. "She said I couldn't because I'm a boy, and a boy can't be a
maid,
and the only way a boy can be in a wedding is if he's a—"
    Mrs. Krupnik nodded. "I get it," she said. "A boy has to be a—"
    "Yeah," Anastasia said. "A boy can only be a—"
    "
Ringbearer!
" they all said together.
    BRRRRINNNG!
Sam rang the bell again.
    "Make him stop!" Anastasia wailed.
    Mrs. Krupnik sighed and looked at the half-finished drawing on her paper. She began to wipe the ink off her pen with a piece of cloth. Then she looked at her children, who were glaring at each other.
    "Sometimes," she said, almost to herself, "I wonder what my life would have been like if I'd opted for a full-time career instead of marriage."
    "I'm doing just that, " Anastasia reminded her. "Renouncing marriage. By the way, Mom, do you know what a sloop is?"
    Mrs. Krupnik screwed the lid tightly onto the jar of ink. "A sloop is a kind of boat," she said. She gazed fondly at Sam, who was sucking the thumb of his right hand while he turned the bell over in his left and examined its bottom.
    "You know, Anastasia, you renounce a whole lot of good stuff when you renounce marriage," she said.
    "Like what?"
    "Well, just for starters, a wedding. Your dad and I had a really neat wedding."
    Anastasia shrugged. "I get to be in other people's weddings. Like Kirsten Halberg's. I get to walk down the aisle and be in the newspaper and all that, and go to the reception and everything, but I don't have to write all those thank-you notes. Kirsten Halberg already has to say thank you for seven woks."
    Sam looked up from his bell. "Wok, wok, wok, wok, wok, wok, wok," he said. "That's seven woks."
    "And it's still four and a half weeks to her wedding. Can you imagine how many woks she may end up with? And have to write thank-you notes for?"
    Mrs. Krupnik shuddered. "That certainly is something to be considered," she