Dawn's Big Move Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Letter from Ann M. Martin

  Acknowledgment

  About the Author

  Scrapbook

  Also Available

  Copyright

  “You add what?” asked my stepsister, Mary Anne. She looked up from the steaming wok on the kitchen stove.

  “Arrowroot,” I answered. “And keep stirring.”

  “Arrowroot?” Mary Anne said. “That sounds sickening.”

  “It’s for thickening,” I replied. Then I realized what I’d said. So I added, “Underthtand?”

  We both started giggling. It was one of those days.

  I don’t know about you, but I go crazy in the early fall. Especially when the air is so cool and clear you can almost drink it. I just want to run around in the falling leaves and scream and sing. So what was I doing? Slaving in the kitchen with Mary Anne Spier, trying to make “Tofu Garden Delight.”

  Bet you’re dying to know what that is. Well, I wasn’t too sure myself. But it’s the name of this excellent stir-fry dish at a restaurant called The Source in Anaheim, California (that’s close to where I’m from). Since Mary Anne and I had agreed to make dinner that night, I was determined to figure out the recipe. Even if it meant being cooped up on an incredible day.

  You know what Mary Anne thinks? She’s convinced I like the fall because in California the weather is the same all year round and there is no fall. Well, I love Mary Anne — she is my best friend in the world and I mean the world — but here’s the news for all you East Coast dudes: WRO-ONG. There are seasons in California, and leaves do fall from trees. Okay, it’s not as vivid as here, or as cold, but it has its own good points.

  Here, by the way, is Stoneybrook, Connecticut. And I, by the way, am Dawn Schafer. My mom and I moved here from California when I was in seventh grade (I’m in eighth now). See, Mom grew up here and her parents still live here, so she figured she’d move back here after she and my dad divorced.

  Yes, it’s true. My parents live on opposite sides of the country, like bookends. Sometimes I tell people I have a “bicoastal family” because it sounds pretty cool. But let me tell you, it feels pretty awful.

  You know what else? My brother, Jeff, lives in California with my dad. He did move here originally with Mom and me, but he wasn’t happy at all. He started having trouble in school and being really moody, and we finally realized he was homesick for Dad (and California). So after a lot of arguing and crying, my parents decided to let him live with Dad. I really, really, really miss him. He’s ten years old, and I don’t know, I feel weird not being around to see him grow up. I’ve been thinking about visiting Dad and Jeff again a lot lately.

  I have been out there a few times. It’s fun, but boy, is it hard to say good-bye. Plus my dad has this girlfriend named Carol, which makes things complicated. At first I didn’t care for Carol. Okay, the truth — I couldn’t stand her. She was always trying to act super-young, as if she could be my age, but she’s like thirty-two or so. Actually, I don’t mind her now. She acted her age once, and I was pretty impressed. I mean it, too. It happened when the whole Baby-sitters Club went out there to visit. (The BSC is a club I belong to. I’ll tell you about it later.) One of our members, Stacey McGill, got a crush on some guy and started hanging around with him and his friends. Well, they were pretty wild — wild enough to wind up having a car accident. Nobody was hurt, thank goodness. But when Carol found out, instead of keeping it a secret (to be cool and get on our good side), she told my dad. I know it may sound weird, but I respected her after that. She was acting like a responsible grown-up.

  Dad’s thinking of marrying Carol, and that’s another reason I want to go out there so badly. I mean, if she’s going to be his wife (my stepmother) I should get to know her a little, right?

  Anyway, that’s the western side of my family. As for me and my mom, well, we haven’t exactly let the grass grow under our feet. (Don’t you love that expression? It means that we haven’t just sat around doing nothing.) First of all, I joined the Baby-sitters Club. Because of that, I made eight fantastic friends, including Mary Anne Spier. And Mom has gotten involved with all kinds of local organizations. She also got involved with a guy! Who? Well, he was her high school sweetheart and his name is Richard Spier.

  Yes, the father of Mary Anne, who, as you know, became my stepsister! You see, Mary Anne’s mom died when she was a baby. Mary Anne doesn’t even remember her, and Richard didn’t talk about her at all for years. Her death left him shocked and heartbroken, and he could barely make it through the day. He even left Mary Anne with her grandparents for a long time, until he could pull himself together. Eventually he took her back and raised her by himself. Now, he is not exactly Mr. Laid Back. With Mary Anne, he became incredibly strict. He made her wear little-girl clothes, keep her hair in pigtails, and come in for super-early curfews until seventh grade. Mary Anne hated that, but she forgives him. She says he was just worried about being a perfect mother and father.

  Whatever.

  Fortunately, he treats her like a true thirteen-year-old now. He’s still kind of stuffy, and super-organized. (Make that mega-organized. Turbo-organized. I mean, he wears his shirts in a strict order each day so they wear out evenly.) But my mom liberated him. Now, how would you picture a woman who’d fall in love with Richard Spier? Guess again. My mom couldn’t be more different. She’s … well, easy-going, fun-loving, carefree, absentminded….

  Okay, okay, she’s sort of a space cadet. Not always, but she does do some pretty strange things. In our house, it is not unusual to find a mitten in the refrigerator or a set of keys in the microwave. And it’s kind of amazing we manage to eat regular dinners. Once I discovered raisins in my clam chowder. Another time she made a yogurt-based salad dressing with oregano and ground pepper — but we had to dump it because she used vanilla-flavored yogurt.

  Ta-da. We are now on one of my favorite topics. Food. I am very careful about what I put in my body. I eat no red meat, and I find sugary things absolutely disgusting. Whole grains, sprouts, tofu, organic vegetables — I love natural, healthy foods.

  Okay. Are you done saying “Ew” and pretending to barf? Good. A lot of kids feel the same way, but you know what? I’m shrugging. It doesn’t matter to me. That’s the way I am, and I’m pretty happy about it.

  “Here it is!” I exclaimed, pulling from the cupboard a jar of arrowroot. (It’s a white powder that looks a little like baking soda.)

  “What does it taste like?” Mary Anne asked. “Wood?”

  “No, Mary Anne,” I replied patiently. “I mean, not that I know what wood tastes like. Arrowroot’s like cornstarch, but not as gloppy. Now keep stirring! Look, the bok choy’s burning.”

  “The who?”

  My stepsister, you may notice, is not a health food freak. But I love her anyway. Of all the people I’ve ever met, she is the most caring and sensitive. She can practically read my mind when I’m feeling terrible, and she is the best listener. I am soooo lucky to have Mary Anne as a sister. The only thing I don’t like doing with her is going to movies. She cries a lot in general, but at movies it’s pretty embarrassing. I mean, when we saw Pocketful of Miracles at an oldies festival once, they practically had to call a flood warning.

  I should also tell you that Mary Anne is the on
ly BSC member with a steady boyfriend. His name is Logan Bruno and his looks are número uno. We are talking hunk. He has curly hair, blue eyes, a Southern accent, and he plays sports and likes to baby-sit.

  No, he’s not perfect. He can be bossy (Mary Anne broke up with him over that once) and he takes it way too personally when his sports friends tease him about his sitting. But other than that, he’s pretty cool.

  Now. Back to the drama of the stir-fried dinner. Act One, the Preparation. I threw in some vinegar and soy sauce and it began to smell delicious. Even Mary Anne agreed. I checked the rice on the back burner, and it was perfect.

  Mary Anne dressed the salad we’d made (with a homemade, plain-yogurt-based dressing), and we were ready for …

  Act Two. It began with the ringing of the doorbell and the opening of the front door. “What smells so fabulous?”

  Enter my mom, Sharon Porter Schafer Spier. Wearing a summery-print oversized blouse and matching shorts, she breezed into the kitchen and gave her daughter and stepdaughter a kiss. “What a treat to come home to dinner!” she exclaimed.

  She exited.

  A few minutes later Richard Spier arrived and he immediately set the table. (Forks and knives for him and Mary Anne, chopsticks for Mom and me.)

  Act Three. Dinner.

  Theme: Health food can taste good.

  “My compliments to the chefs,” Richard said.

  “What’s your secret?” Mom asked.

  “The different textures,” I explained.

  “And the right amount of arrowroot,” Mary Anne added.

  Richard stopped chewing. “What?”

  Mary Anne gave me a look. We both started laughing.

  “Just eat, dear,” Mom said with a smile.

  Richard shrugged and munched. Before long we were all jabbering away. Well, not all. Richard doesn’t jabber. He speaks, slowly and clearly. But even he was pretty psyched about something. You could see it in his eyes. It was the look he gets when he has something to say about the stock market (zzzzzz). But this time it was actually about something interesting.

  “I was reading in the Stamford paper about the joint fund-raising event by the Chambers of Commerce of Stoneybrook and Lawrenceville,” he said. (Hang in there, it gets better.) “This, um, ‘Run for Your Money,’ I believe it’s called? It looks interesting. Anyone can form a team — coworkers, families, friends — and there are all kinds of crazy events. You pay a fee to enter and the proceeds go to charities. I think Stoneybrook’s donating to an organization for the homeless, and Lawrenceville chose a literacy program.”

  “I wonder if Kristy knows about this?” Mary Anne wondered.

  “She’s probably already assigned us to teams,” I said.

  “Wouldn’t it be fun to get some of the little kids involved?” Mary Anne asked.

  “Well, I was thinking that the four of us should enter something,” Richard suggested.

  Mom raised her eyebrows in surprise. (Richard is not exactly athletic.)

  Neither is Mary Anne. “I don’t know, Dad,” she said.

  Richard stood up and pulled the newspaper out of his briefcase, which was lying by the wall. “Look, most of the events are not true sports competitions. For instance, potato sack races —”

  “ ‘Midway games,’ ” Mom began reading, “ ‘tug-of-war, pie-eating contests, underwear race —’ ”

  “Underwear race?” Mary Anne said, blushing. (Yes, blushing.)

  “That’s the one we should enter!” I piped up.

  Now it was Richard’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “Yes, well, I’ll take that under advisement.”

  (That’s Richard’s idea of humor.)

  “I think it would be fun to enter as a family!” Mom said.

  “Yeah, it would,” Mary Anne replied.

  I nodded. I know I should have been more excited, but when Mom said “as a family” I thought of Jeff and Dad. They would love to be in Run for Your Money. They’re both athletic, and they have a great sense of humor.

  And I realized again I was dying to see them.

  “Dawn?” Mary Anne said. “Is something wrong?”

  “Uh-uh,” I answered. “I was just … thinking. You know, about Jeff and Dad.” Then I made myself smile and chopsticked some dinner into my mouth.

  Mom looked at me sympathetically. “Why don’t you call them tonight?”

  “Yeah, I guess I will,” I said. I chewed on some bok choy for a minute. “Mom? Would it be, like, too expensive for me to go out and visit?”

  Mom looked at Richard, who shrugged. “Well, we can book some tickets for Thanksgiving,” Mom said.

  “Okay,” I replied. “That would be great, I guess.”

  I tried to sound happy, but I know I didn’t. Thanksgiving was months away.

  “Unfortunately, it’s the closest school holiday,” Richard added.

  “I know …” I mumbled.

  “You really miss them, don’t you?” Mary Anne said.

  My eyes started to well up. My eyes. The ones belonging to me, Dawn Schafer, who teases Mary Anne about being a water faucet at movies. Boy, was I bummed.

  “I know how you feel,” Mom said. “Look, Thanksgiving’s not that far away. But I guess we could try to arrange a long weekend before then, if you’re desperate to see them.”

  “No,” I said, “that’s okay. I can hold out.”

  I dug into my Tofu Garden Delight. I had this great need to stuff my mouth. If I didn’t, I might blurt out that I was lying.

  * * *

  I did call home that night. Jeff answered the phone.

  “Hi,” I said. “It’s your sister.”

  “Duh.”

  I ignored the snide remark. “How’s it going?”

  “Fine.”

  “Is school okay?”

  “Yecch.”

  “Too bad.”

  “Guess what? In gym I won the home run derby. And guess what else? I came in fifth in the physical fitness contest, but that was out of a hundred and three kids. And I got an O on my book report. That’s for Outstanding. It’s like an A in the older grades. Or better.”

  Typical Jeff. He’ll tell you everything eventually, but he won’t answer a direct question.

  “That’s fantastic! And how’s Dad?”

  “Good.”

  I took a breath. “And Carol?”

  “What about her?”

  “Well … is Dad still going out with her?”

  “Yeah.”

  He didn’t sound too thrilled. “Jeff, are you being nice to her?”

  “Yes,” he said, in a way that meant no.

  I just had to ask the next question. “Has Dad said anything about marrying her yet?”

  “Nope. You want to talk to him? He’s right here.”

  “Sure.”

  After a moment Dad got on the phone. “Hi, Sunshine!”

  “Hi, Dad. I miss you.”

  “I miss you, too. We just got back from roller skating at the beach. Jeff’s getting too fast for me.”

  “Oh, I wish I could come out and see you!”

  “Well, Thanksgiving’s around the corner.”

  Yeah, a far corner, I thought. “Uh-huh.”

  We talked a little more. Carol was there, so she got on the phone for a while.

  After the conversation was over, I went to my room and looked out the window. The leaves on the old maple were starting to turn yellow.

  I narrowed my eyes and tried to imagine it was a palm tree.

  RRRRRINNGG!

  Horrors. It was 5:28 on a Friday afternoon. Starting time for our Baby-sitters Club meeting was still two minutes away, yet the phone was ringing already.

  “Boy, are we popular,” Claudia Kishi said. She picked up the receiver. “Hello, Baby-sitters Club…. Oh, hi, Mrs. Papadakis…. A week from Saturday at eleven? Um, let me find out.”

  She looked at Mary Anne, who was checking the record book. “Jessi, Kristy, and Stacey are free,” Mary Anne said.

  “I can’t
,” Jessi Ramsey informed her. “I’m going away.”

  “I’ll do it,” Kristy volunteered. (Which made sense, because Kristy lives across the street from the Papadakises.)

  “Kristy’ll be there,” Claudia said into the phone. “Great. Okay, ‘bye.”

  There. You have just seen the BSC at work. Simple, huh? Parents call us, we set up sitting jobs. There are seven regular members (and two associates), so someone’s always available. Well, almost always.

  Our headquarters is Claudia’s bedroom, because she’s the only one of us who has her own phone with her own number. (Claud is the club vice-president.) We meet on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, from five-thirty to six. Most of our business comes from regular clients, but new parents call us, too. They hear about us from other parents, or they see one of the fliers we sometimes put up around town.

  Want to know why the Baby-sitters Club is so successful? Two words: Kristy Thomas. She thought up the idea for the BSC one day when her mom was having trouble finding a sitter. The club started with just Kristy, Claudia, and Mary Anne, but the idea worked so well they had to expand.

  We all have titles and duties, like a company. Kristy, of course, is our president. She runs the meetings and thinks up brilliant ideas, such as the record book (which I’ll explain later) and the notebook, in which we write about each sitting job. Writing in the notebook is kind of a pain, but it’s helpful to read about how other sitters have solved problems with certain kids. (Also, some of the entries are really funny.)

  Kid-Kits are another patented Kristy idea. They’re boxes filled with old games, toys, and books — basically stuff we found lying around our houses. Sounds boring, huh? Well, kids don’t think so. They absolutely adore Kid-Kits. Only Kristy could have thought of that. Her brain is so crammed full of stuff, sometimes words just come spilling out of her mouth before she can think. (I guess that’s a nice way of saying she can be loud and bossy.)

  Guess who’s best friends with Kristy the Great and Powerful? Mary Anne the Shy and Meek. They’ve known each other since they were in diapers. Actually, they sort of look alike. Both are on the short side (Kristy’s shorter), and both have dark brown hair and brown eyes. But there the similarities end. Kristy’s very athletic. Mary Anne practically breaks out in hives if you mention the word gym. Mary Anne’s style of dress is neat and preppy. Kristy’s style is super-casual and down-to-earth — jeans, T-shirts, sneakers. And that style didn’t change one bit after she became rich.