"Babysitters Club 030 Mary Anne And The Great Romance" - читать интересную книгу автора (Babysitters Club)

The girls looked at each other and shrugged. Then Carolyn, Vanessa, and Haley decided to talk about their club. Half an hour later, Jessi took Matt, Haley, and Carolyn back to the Braddocks'. The kids waved good-bye to each other, a sign everyone understands.
As they left the Pikes' yard, Carolyn looked at Jessi and said, "Boy, will Daddy be proud of me when he finds out I'm learning sign language. Marilyn doesn't know a single sign, but I'm going to learn lots from Haley and Matt. I bet Marilyn will be jealous. . . . Really jealous."
Chapter 7.
"Rain, rain, go away, and never come back another day," sang Marilyn Arnold.
"That's not how the song goes," Carolyn informed her. "It's, Rain, rain, go away. Come again some other day."
"I know. Sheesh. I was just thinking how nice it would be if the sun shone all the time. And the flowers were always blooming and - "
"That couldn't happen," said Carolyn, the science expert. "Flowers can't bloom all the time, especially if it never rains. And if it never rained, we'd run out of water. We wouldn't have any to drink or to take baths in, and everything would dry up and we'd all be dead."
"Would not."
"Would too."
"Would not."
"WOULD TOO!"
"WOULD NOT//"
"Girls, enough!" I finally cried. I was babysitting at the Arnolds' house, and it was indeed a rainy day. I hadn't interrupted the girls' argument until now, because I'd been hoping they would work things out for themselves. But apparently they weren't going to.
"Well, Marilyn's being a pest," complained Carolyn, who was sitting on the floor of the Arnolds' rec room, taking things out of my Kid-Kit, one by one.
"I am not." Marilyn turned away from the window where she'd been gazing out at the rain that had been falling steadily all day. "I just want to go outside. We were stuck indoors all day at school, even during recess."
"Yeah, but we got to play Seven-Up in our classrooms," said Carolyn.
"That's a dumb game."
"You're a dumb person."
"You guys!" I cried. "What has gotten into you?"
"Nothing," they both said sullenly.
"Well, come on over here. Take a look in the Kid-Kit. There was a sale at Bellair's, and all us baby-sitters went to it and got some great new stuff. Here's a kaleidoscope. See? You can make neat patterns by looking through it." I
held the kaleidoscope up to one eye and said, "Right now, I see a thousand Carolyns moving around."
"Great," muttered Marilyn.
"And I got some modeling clay," I went on. "Oh, and well, this didn't come from the store, but it's a board game. It's called 'Mary Anne's Game of School.' You roll the dice and have to do things like take extra gym or go to the principal's office or - here, if you land on this square, you get straight A's and you can move ahead ten whole spaces. The object of the game is to make it from September all the way around the board to June. The first person to do that is the winner." I was very proud of my game, in case you couldn't tell. It was the first game I'd invented, and I thought that any kid who was old enough to go to elementary school would like it. I had even found big buttons to use as playing pieces and I had carefully lettered a stack of cards that said things like, "Forgot gym suit. Move back one space." Or, "Teacher makes a mistake and you correct him. Move ahead two spaces."
Just as I'd hoped, the twins were intrigued by the game. They even seemed to forget about their argument and we set the game up on the floor. The twins sat across from each
other, though; they wouldn't sit next to each other.
"Carolyn'11 cheat if she can see my cards," said Marilyn.
"Marilyn'11 cheat right back," said Carolyn.
(And I had thought they were through fighting.)
"Okay, how do we start?" asked Marilyn.
"We roll the dice to see who goes first," I replied.
The twins grabbed for the dice. Then they looked at me warily.
"Who gets to roll first?" asked Carolyn.
"Does it matter?" I replied.
"Yes, because I want to roll first," said Carolyn.
"So do I," said her sister.
1 solved that problem. "I'll roll first," I said. "The person on my left - that's you, Carolyn - will go next."
"No fair!" cried Marilyn.
"Yes, it is. In most games, the players take their turns going clockwise. That's to the left."
Marilyn pouted and wasn't happy until she realized she'd rolled the highest number and would get to start the game. We played calmly for about ten minutes. Carolyn was winning, but Marilyn was taking it well. All was peaceful until Marilyn landed in the square Carolyn was in. When that happened she had to draw a card. It said, "Caught talking in class. The first person on the space moves back ten spaces."
"Ten spaces!" screeched Carolyn. "Marilyn, you - you have monkey-breath."
Marilyn's face turned an interesting shade of purple, but all she said was, "I'm through with this game. I'm going to my room."
"It's not your room, it's our room," Carolyn spat out, "and I want to go to it."
"Well, you can't, because I'm going. I said so first."
Carolyn paused. Then she murmured, "I hate sharing a room with you."
"I don't know why," replied Marilyn. "You're hardly ever there. You're hardly ever home. It might as well be my room."
"Well, it isn't." .
You're probably wondering why I wasn't saying anything. It was because I was too surprised. I'd never heard the twins argue this badly before. They used to be nuisances to baby-sitters. They used to play tricks and confuse people, but they were always in on things together - even when they wanted desperately to be considered individuals. This was something new.
Then, before I could stop them, Marilyn and Carolyn (practically in the same breath) shouted, "I'm going to my room!"
They made a dash for the stairs, reached them at the same time, and struggled up them side by side, elbowing each other all the way.