Good-bye Stacey, Good-bye

Good-bye Stacey, Good-bye

Ann M. Martin

Chapter 1.

I was daydreaming.

In my fantasy, I had walked into Candy Land. Not the little kids' game, but a real land where everything was made of candy. You know, peppermint-stick lampposts and rivers of chocolate and fields of green icing. I stopped and sampled everything I saw — a lick of peppermint, a slurp of chocolate, a mouthful of icing.

I have to tell you, even I thought the fantasy was pretty lame, but the thing is, I've got diabetes, which means I have to limit the amount of sweets I eat — which means no candy or sugary junk food. I've had diabetes for almost two years now. That's close to twenty-four months without white chocolate and root beer barrels and Twinkles and Ring Dings and Yodels. I try to pretend that this doesn't matter, but the truth is — sometimes I'd kill for a Tootsie Pop.

So you can see why I was dreaming about Candy Land.

It was unfortunate though, that I was dreaming during math class. When my teacher called on me, I answered, "Huh?" Now, ordinarily, I'm a pretty good student, especially in math, so Mr. Zizmore looked confused. I was saved by the bell, though, and gratefully escaped into the hallway. School was over for the day, and I had a busy afternoon ahead of me.

First I was going to baby-sit for one of the greatest little kids in the world. Then I was going to go to a meeting of the Baby-sitters Club. The Baby-sitters Club was the reason I had the job in the first place. The club is really a sitting business that I run with four of my friends.

"Stacey! Stacey!" someone called.

I turned around, trying to open my locker at the same time. "Oh, hi, Claud!" I replied.

Claudia Kishi is my best friend here in Stoneybrook, Connecticut. (I have another best friend, Laine Cummings, in New York City, which is where I used to live.) Claud came running toward me, her black hair flying.

"What's up?" I asked her.

"You will never guess what I just heard."

"What?" I pulled my French book and a pair

of dirty gym socks out of my locker and stuffed them into my knapsack.

"Are you in a hurry?" asked Claudia.

"Yeah. I'm sitting for Charlotte Johanssen today. I'm supposed to be at her house by three. . . . What did you hear?"

"That Howie Johnson asked Dorianne Wall-ingford to go to the library with him this afternoon."

I frowned. Howie wasn't exactly my boyfriend. In fact, he wasn't my boyfriend at all. But he had taken me to the last few school dances. So why was he asking Dori to study with him?

"Maybe they're doing a group project together or something," I suggested. But I was far more hurt than I let on, even though there was no reason to feel that way.

"Yeah. That must be it." Claudia slipped her arm comfortingly across my shoulders. "Come on. I'll walk you to Charlotte's. And then I'll see you at the club meeting later."

Claudia left me at the Johanssens' driveway. We had talked about Howie all the way from StoneybrookMiddle School to Charlotte's house.

We had decided that Howie was a jerk.

When I rang the Johanssens' bell, Charlotte met me at the door, bouncy and happy as

usual. She's my favorite kid and I'm her favorite sitter.

"Hi!" she cried. "Hi, Stacey! Guess what — I got invited to a sleepover party! It's at Vanessa Pike's and we're going to go to the movies first. Four of us. Me and Vanessa and Suki and Merry."

Charlotte stopped chattering only long enough to let her mother give me instructions for the afternoon. As soon as Dr. Johanssen left, Charlotte began talking again. Sometimes I just couldn't get over how she had changed since I first baby-sat for her. That was a year ago, when she was seven. She was quiet then, and sad, and had no friends her age. Now she's happy and friendly and has a new best girlfriend each week. Her mother says half the change is due to the fact that Charlotte wasn't being challenged enough at school and needed to skip a grade (which she did) — and the other half is due to me! According to Dr. Johanssen, I helped Charlotte learn a lot about herself and about getting along with kids. That makes me feel terrific. Also, it's kind of nice to be somebody's favorite person. (But it's scary, too.)

When I left Charlotte's, it was almost 5:30, so I ran straight to Claudia's house. The meetings of the Baby-sitters Club are held in Clau-

dia's bedroom since she has her own phone and her own phone number. Also for this reason, Claudia is the vice-president of the club.

The president is Kristy Thomas. Kristy was the one who had the original idea to start a baby-sitting club. (Kristy is full of ideas.) The sign of a good businessperson, my dad always says, is the ability to recognize a problem and find a way to solve it (a money-making way to solve it, that is). And that's exactly what Kristy did a year ago. She saw what a hard time her mother was having trying to find a sitter for her little brother, David Michael. Her mom had to make one call after another, looking for someone who was free. What Kristy thought was, Wouldn't it be great if her mom could find a sitter with just one phone call? And now our club provides that service. When somebody calls Claudia's number on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday afternoon between 5:30 and 6:00, they reach Claudia (of course), Kristy, Mary Anne Spier, Dawn Schafer, and me, Stacey McGill.

We are the members of the Baby-sitters Club.

As I've said, Kristy is the president and Claudia is the vice-president. The secretary is Mary Anne. Her job is to schedule baby-sitting appointments and to keep track of the stuff in

our club record book. The record book is where we write down the names and addresses of our clients, important club information, and our sitting jobs.

It's also where we keep track of the money we earn, but that's my job. I'm the treasurer. I'm responsible for collecting our club dues, too. Each week, the five of us put some money into our treasury. The money pays for Kristy's big brother Charlie to drive her to and from meetings, since she moved out of the neighborhood last summer, and it buys treats for ourselves (like pizzas), as well as club supplies.

Dawn Schafer is our alternate officer. Her job is to take over the duties of any other club member who can't come to a meeting for some reason. Let me tell you, she got her fill of being vice-president recently when Claudia missed meeting after meeting because of this new, weird friend of hers, Ashley Wyeth. Thank heavens, Claudia has gotten over all that and is a normal club member again. And Dawn is back to her alternate officer status.

There are also two associate members of the Baby-sitters Club — Logan Bruno (a boy!) and Shannon Kilbourne. But they don't come to our meetings. We just phone them for help when we get too busy.

I was the first club member to reach Claudia's

house that afternoon, which was fine with me because it would give the two of us a few more minutes to talk about what a jerk Howie Johnson is. I am so glad Claudia is my best friend. We've only known each other for a little over a year, because my parents and I lived in New York until then, but as soon as I moved to Connecticut we became friends. We are amazingly different, yet amazingly alike. For instance, Claudia is Japanese-American. Both of her parents were born in Japan. I'm just American. Well, technically I guess I'm Scottish-American and French-American, but you have to go back pretty far on either side of my family to find someone who actually lived in Scotland or France. Plus, Claudia is a terrible student but a great artist, and I'm a good student, but I don't know a thing about art.

On the other hand, Claudia and I are both sort of sophisticated. We've been interested in boys much longer than anyone else in the club, and we like to dress in wild, flashy clothes. Actually, Claudia may be a little wilder and flashier than I am, but our taste is about the same.

We were just deciding that Dorianne Wall-ingford is as big a jerk as Howie is when the doorbell rang and a few moments later, the rest of the club members came thundering

upstairs. Kristy was first. She was wearing what I've come to think of as her Kristy uniform — jeans, sneakers, a turtleneck, and a sweater. That's the only kind of outfit she wears these days. She was followed by Mary Anne (who's Kristy's best friend), dressed slightly better in a jean skirt and an oversized sweat shirt. Kristy and Mary Anne remind me of a pair of magnets. They stick together even though they are as different as the opposite magnetic poles. Kristy is loud and outgoing and Mary Anne is quiet and shy. (She's sensitive, a good person to talk to if you have a problem.) They do have their similarities, though. They're both small for their age, and they're both a little less mature than Claudia and I. And Mary Anne is just beginning to be interested in clothes. (Kristy still couldn't care less.) Also, Mary Anne has a boyfriend — Logan Bruno, our associate club member. Kristy has never had a boyfriend, or even really liked a boy.

Last to run up the stairs was Dawn. She's our newest club member. Her mother moved her and her brother here from California after her parents got divorced. Dawn is an individual. She does things her way and doesn't care much about what other people think. She and Mary Anne are good friends, which is how

Dawn became a member of the club. Dawn has the longest, palest blonde hair I've ever seen in my life.

Since Kristy is a get-down-to-business sort of person, she immediately put on her visor, settled herself in Claudia's director's chair, and called our meeting to order. I announced how much money was in our treasury. Then, "Have you guys all been keeping up with the club notebook?" Kristy asked.

The club notebook is another of Kristy's big ideas. It's a good one, I guess, but it's kind of a pain, too. In the notebook, each of us is supposed to write up every single job we go on, and tell what happened and how the kids behaved and stuff. Then we're supposed to read the book at least once a week to find out what's happened on the jobs our friends have taken. This is helpful, but it sure uses up a lot of time.

We assured Kristy that we'd been reading the notebook. Then Claudia passed around some of the junk food she keeps hidden in her room, most of which I can't eat. I settled for some pretzels.

And then the phone began to ring — my favorite part of each meeting! People call us needing sitters, and we divide the jobs up according to who's free. It was a good day.

The phone rang six times, and we each got one job, except for Dawn, who wound up with two. My job was with Charlotte Johanssen.

Our meetings end at six o'clock, but that evening we all sat around a few minutes longer. Even Mary Anne did, and she usually rushes right home to start dinner for her and her father. At 6:05, the phone rang again.

"A late job call?" I wondered aloud. "It's a good thing we're still here." I picked up the phone since I was sitting closest to it. "Hello, Baby-sitters Club. . . . Oh, hi, Mom." (Why was my mother calling?)

"Honey," said Mom, "would you please come on home? You're late."

"It's only five after six," I pointed out. I usually haven't even reached my house by five after six.

"I'd like you to hurry home," she said firmly.

Something in her voice made my heart leap into my mouth, "Okay," I said, feeling scared. "I'll be right there. 'Bye." I hung up. "I have to go, you guys," I told my friends. "I don't know what it is, but something's wrong."

Chapter 2.

Needless to say, I was a nervous wreck by the time I got home. All sorts of horrible thoughts ran through my mind as I dashed from Bradford Court, where Claudia and Mary Anne live, to my own street. Maybe my grandfather was sick ... or worse. Maybe my dad had been in an accident driving home from his job in Stamford. Maybe, maybe . . .

But when I burst through the front door of my house, I found both Mom and Dad in the kitchen, putting supper on the table. Whatever it was couldn't be too bad, or they wouldn't be folding napkins and filling glasses with milk.

"Here I am!" I exclaimed. "Mom, what's the matter? I thought someone had died or something!"

"Oh, Stace, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to worry you." My mother kissed my cheek. "We have something important to tell you, that's all. Now sit down. Supper's almost ready."

"You're not making me go to another doctor, are you?" I asked warily as I slid into my seat.

When I'd first gotten diabetes, Mom and Dad had been scared to death. They'd dragged me from one strange doctor to another, trying to find a "cure," even though there is no cure for diabetes — just ways to control it. They'd nearly driven me bananas. As it was, all my friends thought I was either crazy or contagious. Things got so bad for us that when Dad's boss offered him a job heading up a new branch of his company in Stamford, Connecticut, he took it, and we moved out of New York and up here to Stoneybrook. My parents finally calmed down about my disease, and I made friends with Claudia and the other members of the Baby-sitters Club. After a while, I even made up with Laine, my New York best friend. (She was mad at me for keeping secrets from her, and we'd had a fight.) So I hoped Mom and Dad weren't going to ruin things by getting weird about my diabetes again.

"Another doctor?" my mother repeated, "Oh, no. Nothing like that." She set out a bowl of broccoli, a fresh green salad, and a plate of baked chicken legs, all foods I can eat. When we were done serving ourselves, I looked expectantly from my mother to my father. One of them had better start talking soon, I thought.

Before they did, something exciting occurred to me.

"Hey, Mom, are you pregnant? You are, aren't you?" I exclaimed. My parents always wanted to have another kid after they had me, but they hadn't been able to. Maybe I was* finally going to be a big sister.

Dad smiled ruefully. "I wish that were the truth," he said, "but it isn't. I think I better tell you what's really going on before you imagine us colonizing Mars or something."

I giggled.

"All right," he went on. "This is the truth. Do you remember when my company opened the branch in Stamford?"