The One Hundredth Thing About Caroline Read Online Free PDF

gained fifteen pounds, none of her clothes fit, and all of the men
she had met at the Gourmet Eating Club had ended up dating each other.
    Then—after a diet to lose the fifteen pounds—she had joined the New York Scrabble Players Society. Actually, Joanna Tate was pretty good at Scrabble. She
always
beat Caroline. And she had enjoyed the weekly Scrabble tournaments. More important, she had met a man. He seemed to have an okay job—he was a stockbroker or something—and he wasn't bad-looking, although he wore glasses so thick that his eyes always looked huge, as if you were seeing them through a magnifying glass.
    He knew eighty-two two-letter words. That was the problem. He took Scrabble very seriously. He took Caroline's mother out for dinner one night, after taking her for coffee several evenings after Scrabble tournaments. Caroline waited up until her mother got home at eleven-thirty, just to find out how the evening had gone.
    "Boorring," said Caroline's mother.
    "Why? What did you talk about?"
    "Ut," said her mother, kicking off her shoes. "Ai. Jo. Re. Ti. Li."
    "Mom, why are you talking so weird?" Caroline had asked.
    "I'm not. That's what we talked about. Two-letter Scrabble words. He wants me to memorize this list. He wrote it up especially for me." She groaned and handed Caroline a neatly typed list on a piece of yellow paper.
    "And that's all?"
    "Of course not. There are seventy-six others. Xi. Pi. Eh. Ah. Fa..."
    And she groaned again, picked up her shoes, and went off to her bedroom, muttering two-letter words. Caroline didn't blame her for never going out with him again.

    Her mother put the parsnips into the refrigerator, sighed, and poured herself a cup of coffee.
    "Better wear your raincoat if you're going to the museum," she said. "It looks like rain. Your brother said his barometer is falling or rising or something."
    Caroline made a face and got her raincoat out of the hall closet. She loaded her bookbag with paper and pencils for her museum research and left the apartment. Much as she hated to admit it, J.P. was right: the sky was dark with storm clouds, and a wind had come up, scattering litter across the streets and sidewalks in puffy gusts.
    The museum wasn't a long walk. Caroline headed east to Central Park, and then south to 79th Street, where the enormous building covered the entire block.
    In front of the museum, next to the huge statue of Theodore Roosevelt, a boy was unwrapping a candy bar. He dropped the wrapper on the museum steps.
    "Excuse me," Caroline said to him politely and
pointed to the nearby sign: LITTERING IS FILTHY AND SELFISH. SO DON'T DO IT.
    The boy looked at her for a moment. Then very carefully he reached into his pocket, removed a wadded-up tissue, and dropped it ostentatiously next to his candy wrapper. He grinned nastily and sauntered off.
    Caroline looked around for a policeman. But there were only two nuns, a taxi driver leaning against his parked cab, and a couple of mothers with a troop of Brownies.
    She thought about making a citizen's arrest. But the boy was bigger than she—he looked at least fifteen—and besides, he was already down at the corner of 78th Street.
    She sighed and picked up his trash with two fingers. It was almost as bad as touching parsnips. She dropped it into a trash can angrily and headed up the steps into the museum.
    "Hello, Mr. Erwitt," she called into the office inside the front door. Mr. Erwitt looked up from his desk and waved.
    "Hello there, Caroline," he called back. "Great exhibit in Meteorites, Minerals, and Gems this afternoon!"
    "Thanks anyway, Mr. Erwitt," she said. "I have work to do on the fourth floor."
    She showed her membership card to the woman at the admissions booth, took the little blue button that
indicated she hadn't sneaked in, and attached it to her raincoat. Then she walked past the postcard counter and the gift shop, down the hall to the elevator.
    The fourth floor was absolutely her favorite