Monica was normally a good girl, but one day she had a problem. Sometimes, when you have one problem, you have many more problems. This day was like that.

Monica had been in a bad mood that day from the start. When she came down in the morning for breakfast, she found that she had eaten the last of her favorite cereal the day before. She yelled at her mother for not getting a new box until she was hoarse. Her mother tried to convince Monica that she should have told her yesterday that the box was empty. She was not a mind-reader who knew everything. But Monica was too angry to listen.

She was mad at her teacher because he gave her a poor grade on her workbook. She knew she had done good work, but her teacher had not seen it that way.

At lunch, Monica had quarreled with her friends because she wanted to trade sandwiches and they didn't want to trade with her. She told them that next time they wanted to trade, she wouldn't, no matter what the sandwiches were.

By the time Monica reached her house that afternoon, she had another problem. There were spots in her eyes. These were not bright colorful spots. That would have been fun, like looking into a kaleidoscope. These were little black spots that just got in the way, making it hard for her to see anything.

Monica stomped into the house, slamming the door behind her.

"Monica!" cried mother, "don't slam the door like that!"

"I can't help it," answered Monica. "There are spots in my eyes and I can't see."

"Spots in your eyes? Let's see."

But mother did not see. She put Monica's face in as good a light as she could find, but could see nothing wrong with the eyes. All she accomplished was making Monica more cross than ever by having the light shine in her face.

"Are you seeing stars because somebody hit you, or did you fall on your face?" asked Mother.

"Nobody hit me. I didn't fall on my face. I'm better coordinated than that. The spots just came because they wanted to."

"I don't think that spots come into people's eyes just to be mean."

"They do too."

"Maybe I should call the doctor."

Over Monica's protests, Mother did just that. The doctor had her bring the girl in right away, so off they went. The doctor's lights for examining Monica's eyes were much too bright for her and the doctor's chair was most uncomfortable. The more the doctor looked, the more spots Monica had in her eyes, but the doctor could see nothing wrong. He said her eyes were perfect.

When it was time for dinner, the spots still had not gone away. They made it hard for Monica to see what she was eating. She always wanted to know what was on her plate so she would know if she liked it or not. Since she didn't see well, in spite of what the doctor had said, she concluded that she had been served food she did not like. Sionce she did not like the food, she refused to eat any of it. Her father asked her nicely to eat, then asked her not so nicely. Her brother started to make fun of her for being a bad girl. The spots grew worse. Monica yelled and screamed until she was sent to bed without the dinner she didn't want anyway.

All that night Monica dreamed of her dark spots. The next morning, they were as bad as ever. Breakfast was the same as the day before, because, with the excitement over the spots, Mother had forgotten to buy Monica's favorite cereal. In school, she did her work badly and received a bad grade. It was the teacher's fault. At lunch, she sat by herself because she knew her friends would be crabby if she tried to talk to them.

So Monica was badly out of sorts when she came home that day. Nobody believed her when she said she had spots in her eyes. They blamed her for being a bad girl. But the reason she was bad was because she had spots in her eyes. It was the spots that were bad. As for herself, Monica knew she was a good girl.

When she reached her house, she made a good decision. She did not stomp into the house and slam the door. Instead, she went around to the back yard, and sat down on the grass to think things over. Her cat was chasing a chipmunk until the little animal got away. Then the cat came over to Monica. It rubbed its sides against Monica and waited for her to pet it, which she did.

"What's wrong, Monica?" asked the cat.

"I didn't know you could talk," said Monica.

"That's because I haven't talked to you before. It may never happen again. Can you tell me what's wrong?"

"Yes, there are spots in my eyes, little dark spots, lots of them. But nobody believes me."

"I believe you," said the cat.

"You do?"

"Of course I believe you. You wouldn't say you have spots in your eyes if you didn't. I know you all too well for that."

"Thank you."

"Do you want the spots to go away?" asked the cat.

"Oh, yes. How can I do that?"

"What are you looking at?"

"The spots, of course," said Monica.

"That's your problem. Try looking at something else."

"But I can't, these spots get in my way."

"Do you have spots in your eyes, or are you blind?" asked the cat.

"I just have spots."

"Then you can see other things, can't you?"

"Yes. The doctor said my eyesight is perfect."

"Then try looking at all the other things you can see so well."

So Monica tried looking at other things. First, she looked at her cat. When she did, she noticed that her cat really was the loveliest cat she knew. Then Monica looked at the trees in the back yard, and at the flowers that were just beginning to bloom.

"Where are the spots in your eyes now?" asked the cat.

"What spots?" asked Monica.

In fact, she had forgotten all about them. She walked off to the grocery store to buy a box of her favorite cereal, and a box of her mother's favorite cereal as well. She did her homework, and enjoyed her dinner that night very much. The next morning, there were two boxes of her favorite cereal on the table.