Anastasia's Chosen Career by Lois Lowry Read Free Book Online Page B

sorry you can't stay longer."
    "But..." Anastasia looked at Barbara Page in dismay.
    "But what?"
    "I forgot to do the interview!" Anastasia wailed.
    "So come back."
    "Can I? I mean
may
I?"
    "Sure. Not tomorrow, because every Tuesday I have a senior citizens group in here for lunch and a book talk, and let's see, Thursday's no good because every Thursday I have the local nursery school kids come in for a story hour—"
    "Do they buy books? Do any of them buy books?"
    Barbara Page laughed. "Occasionally. And they do
love
books; that's what matters. Come Wednesday, okay?"
    "Okay. I'll come. And I'll do the interview for sure. And more than that—"
    "More than that what?"
    "I'll buy a book," Anastasia told her. "I really will. And in the meantime, I'll give a lot more thought to my project."
    Anastasia Krupnik
    My Chosen Career
    Even if you are a good-natured person who loves your chosen career, and even if you happen to have a husband and together you own the building that your chosen career is in, still it is important to be a hard-nosed businessperson sometimes.
    You cannot allow people to spill coffee on your stuff.

6

    "You look tired," Mrs. Krupnik said as Anastasia came through the back door and flopped into a kitchen chair without removing her jacket.
    "I am," Anastasia said, "I'm totaled. Hi, Dad. What on earth are you doing?"
    Her father was at the kitchen table with a stack of magazines and a pair of scissors. He made a wry face. "I'm doing Sam's nursery school homework assignment. Why in the world do they tell a three-year-old kid to cut out pictures of trucks when he hasn't even mastered the use of scissors?" Dr. Krupnik turned a page, frowned at a picture of a moving van, and picked up the scissors. "How was your day? I hope they didn't give
you
any assignments that you can't handle."
    "My day was wei —" Anastasia stopped. She remembered how much her father hated the word "weird." "It was odd," she said. "No, I don't have homework. I'm just supposed to practice poise. I'm supposed to speak distinctly and look people in the eye when I talk to them."
    Her father, furrowing his eyebrows, was carefully cutting around the tires of the moving van. "Don't look me in the eye when I'm doing this," he said, "or I'll wreck it."
    "Don't look me in the eye while I'm beating these egg whites," her mother said, "or I'll let the mixer run too long and ruin the meringue." She turned on the electric mixer.
    Anastasia shrugged and began to take off her jacket. "Great," she said. "Where's Sam? I'll look Sam in the eye."
    "Here I am," called Sam from someplace invisible. "Under the table."
    "What are you doing under the table?" Anastasia asked. She picked up the corner of the tablecloth, peered in, and saw her brother huddled there.
    "Playing cave man," Sam said happily.
    Anastasia knelt and put her head under the tablecloth. "Look me in the eye, Sam," she commanded.
    Sam stared at his sister.
    Anastasia stared back at him. She looked him in the eye and spoke distinctly. "Cave man is a dumb game," she said. "It's boring to sit under a table."
    "Yeah, I know," Sam said. "I'm quitting now." He crawled out from his cave.
    "You know what else is boring?" Dr. Krupnik said, putting the scissors down and stroking his beard. "Cutting out trucks. Is this enough, Sam? I did eight."
    "Good," said his father. "Anastasia, look me in the eye, please, and practice poise."
    Anastasia looked her father in the eye. She straightened her shoulders.
    "Good," he said. "Now, I would love it if you would go to the refrigerator and get me out a nice cold beer. Then I want you to tell me about your day."
    "Coming right up," Anastasia said distinctly.

    "Well, one good thing," Anastasia said after her father had opened his beer and had a sip. "I made a new friend. A girl, but her name is Henry. It's really Henrietta, but if you call her that you die."
    "I once knew a girl with a boy's name: Stevie," her mother said. She had spread the meringue over a lemon pie