Free Kristy's Great Idea by Ann M. Martin

she’s a witch. She isn’t, of course, but she doesn’t like animals and Boo-Boo seems to have gotten on her bad side. We try to keep the two of them apart. Okay, I’m off, kids.” Watson kissed Andrew and Karen good-bye. “I’ll be home by one-thirty,” he told Mary Anne.
    Mary Anne was just wondering how to entertain her charges when Karen began to talk. It turned out that she was a nonstop chatterer. “We’re divorced,” she announced.
    â€œYup,” said Andrew.
    â€œOur parents live in different houses.”
    â€œYup,” said Andrew. He sat down in a little wagon.
    â€œOur mommy’s going to get married again.”
    â€œYup,” said Andrew, pushing himself around the playroom.
    â€œThen we’ll have one mommy and two daddies.”
    â€œYup,” said Andrew. He backed into a bookcase.
    â€œAnd if our daddy gets married again, then how many mommies and daddies will we have, Andrew?”
    â€œYup.”
    Mary Anne giggled. “Come on, you guys. It’s a sunny day. Let’s play outside, okay?”
    â€œOh, great!” exclaimed Karen. “I have a new doll. Daddy bought her for me. She hasn’t been out in the sun much yet. I think she should get a tan, don’t you? Dolls can tan, you know. Of course, they’re real anyway. They can do whatever people do. They can draw and break-dance and …”
    Mary Anne was beginning to feel dizzy. “Want to play outside, Andrew?”
    â€œYup.”
    Mary Anne took the kids into Watson’s big backyard. Andrew brought the wagon and pushed Boo-Boo around in it.
    â€œIs he allowed to do that?” Mary Anne asked Karen. “Your father said not to touch Boo-Boo.”
    â€œOh, he meant
you
shouldn’t touch Boo-Boo. You’re a stranger. But Boo-Boo knows us. He wouldn’t hurt us.” Karen paused for a breath and went on. “You see that house? The one next door?”
    Mary Anne peered over Watson’s rose gardens and between the trees. Next door was asprawling Victorian mansion, with gables and turrets and wooden curlicues on the porch. The paint was peeling and one shutter was crooked. Mary Anne said later that it looked dark and scary.
    â€œYes?” she said to Karen.
    â€œThat’s where the witch lives, right, Andrew?”
    Andrew plowed the wagon into a tree and Boo-Boo leaped out. “Yup.”
    â€œIt’s Mrs. Porter, and she’s an honest-and-truly witch. Mrs. Porter isn’t her witch name, though. Her witch name is Morbidda Destiny. The big kids on the street told me so. And she eats toads and casts spells and flies to witch meetings on her broomstick every midnight.”
    Mary Anne stared at the house, nibbling away at her nails again. She wasn’t sure what to tell Karen. If she told her the stories weren’t true, she probably wouldn’t get off to a very good start as a baby-sitter. If she agreed with Karen, she’d practically be lying to her. At last she asked, “Do you believe in the stories about Morb—Mrs. Porter?”
    Karen nodded. “I have proof.”
    â€œYou do?”
    â€œYup. The proof is Boo-Boo. Mrs. Porter made him fat. One day when Boo-Boo was nice andskinny, he went into Mrs. Porter’s garden and dug up some of her flowers. Mrs. Porter came out and yelled at him and threw a fit. The next day he started getting fat.”
    â€œYup,” said Andrew.
    â€œSo now we have to keep Boo-Boo away from Mrs. Porter’s house. We don’t want her to cast another spell on him. Making him fat wasn’t so bad, but she might do something really, really mean.”
    â€œWell,” said Mary Anne, “we don’t have to worry about it today since Mrs. Porter’s not at home.”
    And it was at that
exact
second that Mary Anne saw a window shade snap up on the first floor of Mrs. Porter’s house. A wrinkled face with a big nose pressed itself