Anastasia Has the Answers Read Online Free PDF Page B

that he could grab the rope.
    Okay, thought Anastasia. This is it. First my nonathletic thirty-eight-year-old mother climbs the rope. Then my nonathletic, slightly overweight, nicotine-addicted forty-eight-year-old father climbs the rope. Then my grief-stricken fifty-something-year-old uncle climbs the rope. If my three-year-old brother climbs that rope, I will have to leave home. I'll change my name and go to work in a leper colony somewhere and never return.
    But Sam just dangled for a moment and then yelled "Help!" His mother lifted him back down.
    Whew.
    Later, when they had all gone off to do other things, Anastasia made certain that the garage door was closed so that no one would see. And then she tried.
    And tried.
    And tried.
    ***
    "Sometimes I wish Sam would just disappear," Anastasia said grouchily to her mother that night. "Sometimes I wish Sam had never been born."
    They were doing the dishes together after dinner. "Well," her mother responded cheerfully, "I can understand that. He's a pain in the neck sometimes."
    Rats. Anastasia attacked a freshly washed pot angrily with the dish towel. Her mother was supposed to
argue
with her. Then
she
could say what a pain in the neck Sam was. If her mother agreed right off, then there wasn't any argument, and what was the point of—
    "You know what?" her mother said. "George is ten years older than your dad, the same as you're ten years older than Sam. On the plane, coming back from California, they got to talking about old times. And George said pretty much the exact same thing. He thought your dad was a pain in the neck when he was little. He wished he had never been born."
    "No kidding?" Anastasia walked to the pantry to put the pot away. "I can't imagine Dad being a pain in the neck, not even when he was little."
    Her mother was laughing. "George said, 'Myron, you were such a pompous little show-off.' Apparently your dad was always trying to get attention. But no wonder. You know, he was the youngest of five boys. He probably would have gotten lost in the crowd if he hadn't been a pompous little show-off!"
    "Sam's sort of a show-off, too, and he doesn't even have an excuse. He's the only boy. He gets plenty of attention."
    Mrs. Krupnik put the last dish away and sat down at the kitchen table. "Are you feeling as if you're not getting enough attention, Anastasia? It has been kind of hectic around here, with Rose's death..."
    Anastasia pulled out a chair and sat down beside her mother. "No, it's not that. It's that dumb rope. I hate it that I can't climb that rope. When you climbed it, Mom, I was so jealous of you. And I feel that way about every single girl in my gym class, even my best friends."
    Mrs. Krupnik reached over and stroked Anastasia's hair. "I think the practicing will do it. I bet you'll be out there some afternoon in the garage and all of a sudden, when you least expect it, ZOOM! There you'll be, up at the top of the rope, amazed at yourself."
    Anastasia grinned. "That's what Ms. Willoughby said."
    "Who's Ms. Willoughby? Your gym teacher?"
    "Yeah." Anastasia felt very shy, even in front of her own mother, who had known her ever since she was born. She wanted to tell her about something, but she felt too shy.
    Suddenly she decided that maybe the dishes in the pantry needed rearranging, so she went to the pantry and began to move them around. She moved the cups from one shelf to another; then she unstacked the plates and restacked them in a different place.
    "Mom," she called, from the pantry, "I know this girl at school, and guess what? This is really weird—"
    "What? I can't hear you. Why are you clanking all the dishes?"
    Anastasia leaned around the doorway. "I know this girl at school," she said. "She's just my age, thirteen?"
    "Yes? What about her? Is it someone I know?"
    Anastasia's head disappeared. "No," she called. "You don't know her. You never met her. You don't even know her name." Quickly she moved two plates off their stack and put a soup bowl