The Worry Web Site Read online

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  DELL YEARLING BOOKS are designed especially to entertain and enlighten young people. Patricia Reilly Giff, consultant to this series, received her bachelor's degree from Marymount College and a master's degree in history from St. John's University. She holds a Professional Diploma in Reading and a Doctorate of Humane Letters from Hofstra University. She was a teacher and reading consultant for many years, and is the author of numerous books for young readers.

  To Katie, Rhiannon and Alice

  HOLLY'S WORRY

  Type in your worry:

  OK.

  I think I'm going to get a stepmother.

  There are lots of stepmothers in my favorite book of fairy tales. Don't go, “Yuck, boring!” Fairy tales are seriously cool, much scarier than any R-rated video you've ever secretly watched at a sleepover. Snow White's stepmother is the scariest of all.

  She doesn't look scary. She looks beautiful in the picture in my book—though her long queen's robes are spoilt because Hannah tried to color them with purple wax crayon. I was FURIOUS. I felt like snapping the book shut and smacking Hannah round the head with it, even though she's only little and didn't mean to spoil the picture.

  I minded so because it's such a special book. It used to be our mum's when she was a little girl. She gave it to me. Snow White's mum died when she was born so she got this stepmother who looked so lovely that her magic mirror said she was fairest of them all. But she was evil and mean and dead jealous when the mirror said Snow White was the fairest now, so the stepmother tried to have her chopped into bits and then she poisoned her with an apple and she fell down dead and was kept in a glass coffin until a handsome prince came by (yawn!) and brought her back to life. The wicked stepmother was so maddened that she boiled with rage and her shoes stayed so red hot she couldn't take them off and she had to dance until she died.

  She must have had awful blisters. I've got one where my old sneakers are rubbing. Dad doesn't always get it together when we need new shoes. It's not his fault he's so busy. Yes it is. I'm not making excuses for my dad anymore. I can't stick him now. And I especially can't stick her.

  I'm going to add to my worry.

  I wish she was wicked.

  That sounds daft. Mr. Speed will think I'm seriously weird. Mind you, Mr. Speed is a little bit weird himself. He's speedy, like his name. He whizzes up and down the school corridors, he dodges round the desks in the classroom, and he skips across the playground. He really did skip once when Claire brought a skipping rope to school. He could do all sorts of fancy footwork too—but then he tripped and fell over and said a very rude word. He's not a bit like the other teachers.

  This Worry Web Site is all his idea. It's instead of Circle Time. You know, when you all sit in a circle, fidgeting, and you're meant to discuss your problems. Sometimes it's dead boring because someone like Samantha bangs on about missing her dad. Everyone always feels sorry for Samantha because she's so little and pretty with lovely long fair hair. Even Mr. Speed has a special smiley way of looking at her that makes me sick.

  Sometimes Circle Time is terribly embarrassing because someone stupid like poor William confides the sort of problem that should stay a deadly secret. He told the whole class that he wets the bed and his dad yells at him and makes him cry and his mum says she can't keep up with washing his sopping sheets. Some of the kids giggled and poor William looked as if he was going to cry again. Mr. Speed got very fierce with the gigglers and praised William for being so honest and sensible over a tiny physical problem that happens to heaps of people—but even Mr. Speed couldn't stop half the class calling poor William Wetty Willie in the playground.

  So maybe that's why he came up with the Worry Web Site idea.

  “I've designed the supercool, wacky, wicked Web site on the classroom computer, OK? Any time you have a problem, access the Worry Web Site when it's your turn on the computer and type it in. You don't need to put your name. Then we can all contribute our comments and suggestions—just as long as they are kind and constructive, get it?”

  We got it.

  Everyone started typing in their worries. Someone had a good long moan about their sneaky sister and their brainy brother.

  Someone was worried about being bottom of the class.

  Someone wrote about having scary nightmares.

  Someone was sad because their pet rat had just died.

  One of the boys wrote that he liked one of the girls a lot. That made everyone giggle—and Greg went very pink. Hmm! I wonder who he fancies?

  Someone else went on and on. Oh boo hoo, it's so sad, I miss my dad, etc, etc. We all know who that was. At least Samantha can still see her dad when she goes to stay with him and his new girlfriend.

  Well, I see my mum. Sometimes. I have to take my little sister, Hannah, so she can get to know our mum. She left when Hannah was just a baby. Mum had Depression which made her very sad so she cried a lot and then ran off. When she ran off I guess Dad and Hannah and I got Depression too because we all felt very sad and cried a lot as well. It felt very scary when Dad cried so I told him that it was OK. I'd look after him and Hannah now.

  I do look after both of them. I've been almost like Hannah's mum. When she was a baby I fed her and washed her and dressed her and changed her (yucky, but you have to do it). I cuddled her lots and played peekaboo and do you know something? The very first word she said was Holly. That's my name.

  She's said millions and millions and millions of words since. She is a total chatterbox. She's in the preschool class at my school and Miss Morgan obviously adores her—though she always gets into trouble for talking. She even talks during Story Time. She doesn't mean to be naughty. She just likes to join in.

  I read to her at bedtime from my special book of fairy tales. She likes “Red Riding Hood” best, especially the wolf bits. “Oh, Grandma, what big teeth you've got,” I say in a teeny tiny Red Riding Hood voice, and then Hannah shrieks, “All the better to EAT YOU ALL UP!” and bounces up out of bed at me, gnashing her teeth. Once she bit me on the nose by accident. She can be a very boisterous baby sister.

  My favorite fairy tale is “Snow White.” When I read the start of the story out loud and say that Snow White's hair is as black as coal and her skin as white as snow and her lips as red as berries, Hannah always shouts, “Holly berries!” and stabs at the picture with her finger.

  “That's you, Holly,” she says.

  I wish! I don't look the slightest bit like Snow White. I have got red lips (especially if I've been eating red M&M's) but I often have a red nose too (I get lots of colds). My hair is straggly mouse (though my nails are sometimes as black as coal). Snow White is as pretty as a picture. Her picture in the book is beautiful, with tiny glass mirrors and red apples all round the border and Snow White herself is wearing a white dress embroidered all over with tiny gold stars. Snow White is small too, not that much bigger than the Seven Dwarves, and she's thin as a pin. I am not pretty. I am as plain as an empty page and a bit on the podgy side too.

  I don't care. I take after my dad. I used to be glad. I used to love my dad sooooooo much. Whenever he collects us from the After School Club he always says, “Where are my special girlfriends?” I h
ave always been his Big Grown-up Girlfriend and Hannah his Teeny Tiny Girlfriend. But now Dad has a real girlfriend. I'm scared she's going to come and live with us and be my stepmother and it's not fair.

  “Yes, it is so fair,” said Hannah. “We want her to be our mother.”

  “No, we've got a mother already. You remember, Hannah,” I said.

  “Not really,” said Hannah.

  We haven't gone on a visit to our mum for quite a while. We want to, but the last time we didn't get on with Mum's new boyfriend, Mike.

  “Oh yes! He shouted and we cried,” said Hannah.

  “You cried. I'm not a baby,” I said.

  “You did so cry, I saw. I don't like that Mike. Or our mum,” said Hannah.

  “Yes you do,” I insisted. “No, I like our new mum much, much, much more,” said Hannah.

  You will never guess who this new mum is going to be. Miss Morgan. Yes, that Miss Morgan. Hannah's teacher.

  “I love her to bits,” said Hannah happily.

  Dad loves her to bits too.

  I suppose I used to like her just a little bit myself. I used to take Hannah into her classroom every morning. Dad has to drop us off at school very early or else he'll be late for work. Miss Morgan is always there, though. I used to like seeing what she was wearing. She doesn't look a bit like a teacher. She's got long hair way past her shoulders and she wears long dresses too, all bright and embroidered, and she has these purple suede pointy boots with high heels. She looks as if she's stepped straight out of my fairy-story book.

  I liked the way her preschool classroom looked too. It was all so bright and cozy and small. I'd hang about for a while, keeping an eye on Hannah, showing her the sink and the giant building bricks and the powder paints and the playhouse. I especially loved the playhouse. I hadn't had much time for playing since Hannah was born. I suddenly wanted to scrunch up small and squeeze in through the tiny door and squat safe inside, too little to do anything else but play.

  I didn't, of course. I'm not daft like poor William. But Miss Morgan saw me staring, and the next day when I dropped Hannah off she asked me if I'd be sweet enough to tidy up the dolls and the little beds and tables and chairs because all those four-year-olds had got them all higgledy-piggledy.

  I sighed a bit, like I didn't really want to, and then I leant through the open window of the playhouse and sorted it all out. It was kind of fun. I don't know why. Doing it for real is no fun at all. Still, the playhouse dolls didn't whine or fidget or refuse to put their arms in their sweater like someone I could mention.

  The next morning Miss Morgan said, “Guess what, Holly, the playhouse is in a mess again.” I sighed and said, “I suppose you want me to fix it?”— and so it got to be a habit. I also put fresh water in the sink and cleaned up the sandpit and tested out the building bricks to see if there were enough to make a proper fairy-tale palace like the pictures in my book. Hannah didn't join in these early-morning games. She just wriggled onto Miss Morgan's lap and chattered to her nonstop.

  “Feel free to tip her off your lap whenever you get tired. She does tend to go on and on,” I said.

  Miss Morgan didn't seem to mind a bit. I sometimes wished I could climb on her lap and chatter too, just like Hannah. Miss Morgan used to be my favorite teacher in the school—even better than Mr. Speed.

  Dad met Mr. Speed and Miss Morgan when he came to Parents' Evening. Dad said that Mr. Speed was very pleased with my progress and that he said I was a very good, sensible girl and the little star of his class. I twinkled. Dad said that Miss Morgan was very pleased with Hannah too and that she said she was very lively and loving. If Miss Morgan had said Hannah was very good or sensible she would be a terrible fibber.

  “Mr. Speed's smashing, isn't he, Dad?” I said happily.

  “Yes he is,” said Dad. “Miss Morgan's rather special too, isn't she?”

  Dad took to coming into Hannah's class with us every morning even though it made him late for work. Then Miss Morgan came round to our house with some special wax crayons for Hannah (big mistake: remember Snow White's stepmother's purple robe) and some rainbow metallic pens for me. The next Saturday, surprise surprise, we just happened to bump into Miss Morgan in the children's library. We all chatted for a bit and then we took Hannah to the swings and then we all had lunch in McDonald's. Before we knew what was happening we were seeing Miss Morgan every single Saturday and sometimes Sundays too.

  I didn't mind a bit at first. I know this makes me the most seriously stupid, dumb dolthead but there you are. Even poor William would have twigged what was going on—but I thought Miss Morgan was my friend. And Hannah's too, of course. I didn't dream that she was there because of our dad.

  Miss Morgan is as pretty as a princess. Our dad doesn't look a bit like a handsome prince. Well, not the ones in my fairy-tale book. They don't wear baggy T-shirts and tracksuit bottoms and fluffy socks with holes in the toes. Though Dad got all dressed up in a suit on Friday night.

  “I'm going out, girls. I've asked Auntie Evie up the road to baby-sit.”

  “We don't need Auntie Evie. She fusses too much,” I said, pulling a face. “I'll baby-sit for Hannah, Dad.”

  “I know you're just like a little mother to Hannah, love, but I'd feel happier if Auntie Evie was here to keep an eye on things,” said Dad, tying the knot in the funny Simpsons tie Hannah and I gave him last birthday. He only wears his tie if he's going somewhere really special.

  “Are you going out somewhere posh with your mates from work, Dad?” I asked.

  “No, love,” said Dad, sprucing his hair in the mirror. “Why does it always stick straight up?”

  “Maybe you need some hair gel, Dad.”

  He peered in the mirror, his head at an odd angle. “You don't think I'm going thin on top, do you, Holly?”

  “Yeah, like you're almost totally bald,” I said, teasing him. “Leave it out, Dad, you've got lovely thick hair.”

  “You're a great little kid, Holly,” said Dad, giving me a hug.

  “So where are you going, Dad?”

  Dad looked in the mirror rather than at me. “I'm taking Jenny out for a meal.”

  “Jenny?”

  Dad went red.

  “You know. Miss Morgan.”

  I stared at him. Hannah bounced up.

  “A meal? Can we come too? Can we go to McDonald's?” Hannah begged.

  “No, no, you wouldn't want to come, Hannah. We're going to this Italian place.”

  “I like Italian food. I like spaghetti,” Hannah insisted.

  “Well, maybe you and Holly can come with us another time. But this is a meal just for grown-ups,” said Dad.

  “It's a date,” I said. I spat the word out as if it was deadly poison. “You and Miss Morgan. You're going out with her!”

  “You don't mind, do you?” said Dad. “You like Jenny—Miss Morgan.”

  “We love her,” said Hannah. “Oh, Dad, is she your girlfriend now?”

  “Well — sort of,” said Dad, positively beet red.

  “Oh, great, great, great!” Hannah shouted. “Here, Dad, why don't you marry Miss Morgan and then she can be our mum!”

  “Not so fast, Teeny Tiny Girlfriend,” said Dad, and he picked Hannah up and swung her round and round. Her feet flew out and her left Pokémon slipper clunked me straight on the head.

  I made a lot of fuss though my head didn't really hurt a bit. It was inside me that was hurting. My dad—and Miss Morgan!

  “What's up, Big Grown-up Girlfriend?” said Dad. “Is your head really sore? Shall I kiss it better?”

  “I'm not a baby. Don't be so daft,” I snapped. “Save your kissing for Miss Morgan.”

  Dad looked like I'd thrown a bucket of cold water all over him. He blinked at me.

  “I thought you'd be really pleased like Hannah,” he said. “You like Jenny, Holly. I don't get it.”

  I didn't really get it either. I just knew it was all spoilt now. And I carried on spoiling it. We still went out every Saturd
ay, but I mucked it up. I sighed and fussed and moaned in the children's library. Whenever Miss Morgan picked out some book she thought I might enjoy I'd glance at it and give a big yawn and go, “Boring!” So she found picture books for Hannah instead. Dad and Miss Morgan sat squashed together on one of those silly saggy cushion chairs, with Hannah tucked under their chins looking at the pictures in the book. They looked like a real family already.

  The girl behind the counter in McDonald's thought they were a family too. Hannah jumped up and said she wanted a giant portion of French fries and five ice creams and the girl laughed and looked at Miss Morgan and said, “Perhaps we'd better ask Mum first.”

  “She's not our mum,” I said fiercely. When we sat down with our food I thumped my plastic tray so hard my milk shake tipped and trickled all over me, and quite a bit of Miss Morgan too.

  “For goodness' sake, Holly, what's the matter with you?” said Dad, mopping at Miss Morgan with his paper napkin. He just let me drip. “You're behaving like a total idiot.”

  “You're the total idiot,” I muttered. Not softly enough.

  “I've just about had enough of you, showing me up and behaving so badly,” Dad hissed.

  “Here, Holly, let's go to the ladies' room and get some paper towels,” said Miss Morgan in a friendly but very firm teacher's voice, so I couldn't quite manage to say no. When we were in the ladies' room she didn't mess around with the milk-shake stains. She put her hands on my shoulders and looked me straight in the eyes.

  “It's OK, Holly. I understand the way you feel.”

  “No, you don't,” I said sulkily.

  I didn't see how she could understand when I didn't have a clue why I felt so bad and was acting bad into the bargain.

  “I like your dad—and he seems to like me,” said Miss Morgan.

  “Yuck!” I said.

  “Yes, OK, it seems very yucky to you. It probably would to me too if I was in the same situation.”

  The really yucky thing was she was being so niceynicey-nice to me, sooooo soft and sweet. It made me feel fiercer than ever.

  “I promise you, I'm not trying to take the place of your mum. I know just how much she means to you. She'll always stay your mum—and Hannah's— forever and ever, even though you don't see her anymore.”