The Truth About Stacey Read online

“SHHH!” The man turned around again.

  The woman next to him turned around, too. “The movie is starting,” she said, “and I’d like to hear what’s going on.”

  I stood up. “Will you please let me by, Laine?” I asked super-politely. “I’d like to get something to eat.”

  I stalked out of the dark theater—but I wasn’t alone. Laine was right behind me. I ignored her and stepped up to the snack counter. “A small Diet Coke and a small popcorn, please,” I said to the boy behind the counter.

  He told me the price.

  I gulped. I’d forgotten how expensive things were in New York.

  The boy pushed my order across the counter. “Here you go.”

  I unfolded my money. I was seventy-five cents short.

  I blushed furiously.

  “Here’s seventy-five cents.” Laine dropped three quarters into the boy’s outstretched hand.

  “Thanks,” I mumbled.

  “Stacey?” Laine said as I turned around, carrying my food.

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  She didn’t have to say what she was sorry about. I knew. “You are?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m sorry, too. I guess I should have told you what was wrong, but Mom and Dad weren’t telling anyone but family…. How come you stopped being my friend?”

  Laine looked at her feet. “I don’t know.” She sat down on a bench outside the entrance to the ladies’ room.

  I sat down next to her, trying to balance the soda and the container of popcorn.

  “I mean, I do know, I think. This is going to sound funny, but I was jealous.”

  “Jealous? Of me? You wanted to be sick?”

  “Well, no. Of course not. I think if I had known what was wrong, I would have acted different. But you were getting so much attention. The teachers were always asking how you felt and giving you extensions on our assignments. And you got to miss so much school.”

  “Laine, I nearly had to stay back.”

  “You’re kidding. I didn’t know that…. Well, anyway,” she went on, “remember Bobby Reeder?”

  I nodded.

  “He said he thought you were contagious. I don’t know why I believed him, but I did. And since I was your best friend, I was positive I was going to get it, whatever it was. I was so scared. I just didn’t want to be around you anymore. When my mother and father finally found out about our fight, they were sort of mad. We talked about it, but I didn’t know how to apologize to you. That’s why I never wrote after you moved to Connecticut. Besides, I didn’t think you’d accept my apology. If I were you, I wouldn’t want me for a friend.”

  I giggled. “Well,” I said after a moment, “I was pretty mad. You did some mean things. But I guess it would have helped if I’d told you the truth. You know, lately I’ve been remembering New York a lot. And every now and then, I’ve thought, ‘Gosh, I wonder if Laine would know….’ A couple of times I almost decided to write you a letter.”

  “What kinds of things were you wondering about?”

  “Well, for instance, remember Deirdre Dunlop, and how we always said she’d be the first one in our class to outgrow her training bra? So, I was wondering—did she?”

  Laine laughed, nearly snorting her root beer up her nose. “Yes!” she exclaimed. “And remember Lowell Johnston?”

  “Yeah.”

  “The day Deirdre came in wearing her new bra, he asked her for a date.”

  “You’re kidding!”

  “No. Honest. Cross my heart.”

  I kept asking questions and Laine kept answering them. I realized how much I had missed her.

  The next thing we knew, people were pouring out of the theater and into the lobby. We’d missed the whole movie!

  “Oh, well,” I said to Laine. “It was worth it. We can see this movie anytime, but on Monday, I’ll be leaving.”

  We tossed our empty cups and boxes in a trash can and waited in front of the theater for our parents.

  That night, Laine and I talked until 2:30. We were tired the next morning, but we wanted to make the most of our day. We ate breakfast by ourselves at Leo’s Coffee Shoppe around the corner from Laine’s apartment building. Then we took a walk in Central Park. In the afternoon, the Cummingses and Mom and Dad and I went to Paris Magic. It was the best musical I’d ever seen. Afterward, we ate dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, Joe Allen.

  When we got back to Laine’s apartment, she and I wanted to have another night of secrets and chitchat, but Mrs. Cummings said, “Lights out at ten o’clock,” since Laine had to go to school the next day. By the time we went to sleep, I felt as if two huge weights had been lifted from my chest. One weight was the fight with Laine. The other was Dr. Barnes and his clinic. I didn’t have to worry about either one anymore.

  Mom called Dr. Werner’s office early Monday morning. The receptionist said she could squeeze me in between patients, so I saw Dr. Werner at 10:30. She said I was doing fine.

  And then we went home. I couldn’t believe how happy I was to see Stoneybrook again. And I couldn’t wait for school to let out so I could talk to the other members of the Baby-sitters Club. Luckily, I didn’t have to wait long.

  As soon as I saw kids riding their bikes up my street, I called the Kishis.

  Mimi answered the phone.

  “Hi, Mimi,” I said. “It’s Stacey.”

  “Stacey! You are at home? Claudia said that you would not be back until Wednesday. Everything is all right, I hope.”

  “Oh, yes! It’s fine. Great, in fact! I’m glad to be home. Is Claudia back from school yet?”

  “She is just walking in the door. Please wait and I will call her to the phone.”

  “Hello?” said Claudia, after several seconds.

  “Claud, it’s me, Stacey! I’m back early! I’m finished with Dr. Barnes. Did anything happen over the weekend? Did you go to the mall? Did any parents call Liz or Michelle?”

  “Quite a few,” Claudia replied smugly. “Charlotte and Jamie and the other kids told their parents everything. You should have seen the faces those girls put on in school today! If looks could kill, you’d be the only member of the Babysitters Club left.”

  “Wow,” I said, giggling.

  “I think our meeting this afternoon will be pretty interesting.”

  “Can I come over now? I can’t wait any longer.”

  “Sure!”

  I ran right over to Claudia’s house. On the way, I passed Sam Thomas. I realized I’d barely thought about him recently. I’d been too wrapped up in doctors and the Baby-sitters Club. Besides, I was looking forward to going to the Snowflake Dance with Pete Black.

  “Hi, Stacey!” Sam called.

  “Hi, Sam!” I replied, and ran on.

  Claudia met me at her front door and we went upstairs to her room. The girls had not, as it turned out, gone to the mall with their sandwich boards. Too much had been happening with the Baby-sitters Agency and the angry parents. They had decided to try to go the next weekend—if it was even necessary.

  The phone began ringing at 4:30, an hour before our meetings start. Kristy and Mary Anne hadn’t arrived yet. I answered the first call. It was Mrs. Newton. “Hi, Stacey,” she said. “I’m holding a meeting of the Literary Circle at my house on Friday afternoon, and I need someone to watch Lucy and keep Jamie busy for a couple of hours.”

  Watch Lucy! I was thrilled. “Oh, I’ll do it!” I said. “What time?”

  “Three-thirty to five-thirty.”

  “Great! I’ll be there.”

  “By the way, Stacey, I thought you’d like to know that I had a talk with Cathy Morris. I hope I wasn’t too hard on her. I explained all the responsibilities that are involved in baby-sitting and told her how upset I was about last week. I think she honestly didn’t realize what she was doing wrong. She also told me she just found an after-school job at Polly’s Fine Candy. She seems excited about it.”

  “Well, good,” I said. “She’ll probably
earn more money that way.”

  “I also called the Johanssens, the Marshalls, the Pikes, the Spencers, the Gianmarcos, the Dodsons, and even Kristy’s mother, just in case she would ever think of using the agency for David Michael. All the parents agreed that, if nothing else, they ought to know their baby-sitters in advance, and not trust the agency to find sitters for them. And I heard a number of complaints from other parents. Jamie and Charlotte weren’t the only unhappy children. I want you to know how grateful we are that you girls were brave enough to come forward and tell us what was going on.”

  “Well,” I said, “it wasn’t easy, but I’m glad we did it.”

  A minute later, I got off the phone and began bubbling over with everything Mrs. Newton had said.

  But Claudia just glared at me.

  “What?” I said. “What’s the matter?”

  “Stacey, you took that job Mrs. Newton offered. You know the rules.”

  Oops. “Oh, yeah,” I said. “Sorry.” The rule is that every job that comes along must be offered to all the members of the club before someone takes it. I had just broken one of our most important rules.

  “I’d like to take care of Lucy, too, you know,” said Claudia. “And I bet Kristy and Mary Anne would feel the same way.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said again. “I just forgot. I was so excited.”

  “Oh, it’s okay,” replied Claudia. “I’d be pretty excited if I were you. Besides, I’ve broken that rule often enough myself.”

  I grinned. That was true.

  During the next half hour, both Mrs. Marshall and Mr. Johanssen called with last-minute jobs they had had agency sitters lined up for, but had canceled over the weekend.

  Kristy and Mary Anne arrived. We were offered four more jobs. One was with a new client. At six o’clock we got off the phone.

  “I wonder if anybody will call us at home tonight,” said Mary Anne.

  “Probably,” answered Kristy. “With Christmas so close, everybody is going to parties, dinners, concerts…. This may be our busiest season.”

  “Well,” I said, “it’s been tough, but we hung in there and beat out the agency.”

  “More important,” added Kristy, “we beat them because we’re good baby-sitters.”

  “We won the battle and the war,” said Mary Anne.

  “We’re the best!” exclaimed Claudia.

  “I feel like we need a cheer,” I said. “You know, ‘Rah, rah, rah! Sis, boom, bah! … Something … something … The Baby-sitters Club! Hooray!’”

  “Would you settle for junk food?” asked Claudia. She removed a bag of gumdrops (and a smushed package of Saltines for me) from under the cushion of her armchair. “We ought to congratulate ourselves and celebrate.”

  The four of us looked at each other. “Congratulations,” we said solemnly.

  “We made it,” I added.

  Claudia passed around the food.

  Ring, ring.

  “Hello?”

  “Hello … Stacey?”

  “Yes … Laine, hi! Oh, I’m so glad you called. Hang on just a sec?” I rested the phone on the kitchen table. “Mom, it’s Laine. I’m going to talk to her in your room, okay? Could you hang up the phone when you hear me get on?” I raced upstairs and closed the door to my parents’ bedroom. “I’m on, Mom.” I heard a click as she hung up the phone. “All right, now we can talk,” I told Laine. “So what’s going on?”

  “Well, I wanted to know what happened with your baby-sitting club. Last weekend, you said something was going on with some agency.”

  “Oh, you won’t believe it! The agency went out of business!”

  “You are kidding me!”

  “No, honest,” I said. “The parents stopped calling the agency because they decided they couldn’t trust Liz and Michelle—you know, those two girls—to find good sitters. But guess what? Okay, so Claudia tells me this on Monday. We go to school on Tuesday and there’s Liz, standing on the lawn, carrying a sign that says ‘Makeovers Inc.,’ and next to her is Michelle with a bunch of flyers. She’s passing them out, and Kristy, the president of our club, is so curious she goes and takes one even though Michelle is looking at Kristy like she’s a snake or a roach or something.”

  Laine giggled.

  “We read the flyer,” I continued, “and Liz and Michelle already have a new business! You call them and pay them five dollars, and they show you how to put on makeup, figure out the best way to fix your hair, that kind of thing. It’s perfect for them, since that’s all they care about. Then, for another five dollars, they’ll take you shopping and help you pick out new clothes and jewelry and stuff. They even have special rates before school dances and holidays. Those girls are smart, Laine. They’ll probably earn more money doing that than lining up sitting jobs for their friends.

  “Oh, gosh,” I went on. “I have so much to tell you! Yesterday, I got to sit for Lucy Newton, the new baby I told you about.”

  “Really?” squealed Laine. “You got to sit for her?”

  “Well, sort of. Her mother was at home, but I did watch her and her brother for two hours while Mrs. Newton held a meeting. And I got to hold her and give her a bottle. It was great! I can’t wait until I can really baby-sit for her. Oh, and you know what else?”

  “What?”

  “Remember Charlotte Johanssen, the little girl who’s having trouble with the kids at school?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, her parents had a conference with her teacher and they’ve decided to skip her into third grade. The work in second grade is too easy for Charlotte, and her classmates don’t like her because she always does her assignments so fast and never makes any mistakes. Her teacher thinks she’ll do better starting over in a new class where the kids don’t know her and the work will be more challenging. Charlotte seems really excited. She’s going to switch to the new class after Christmas.”

  “Well, that’s good. I really wish I could meet all these people, Stace. I feel like I know them alr—just a sec…. Stacey, my mom says I have to get off in two minutes.”

  “Oh, no!” I cried. “Well, wait. I’ll talk fast. I went to the Snowflake Dance with Pete and we had a great time. I got a new dress. And for Christmas, Mom and Dad are going to give me a phone for my room, just so I can call you! And I want to know exactly how many times Deirdre and Lowell have gone out, counting everything, even trips to the library. And what did you ask for for Christmas?”

  “I—Mom says she has to use the phone. I’ve got to get off.”

  “But, Laine, you didn’t have time to tell me anything about you.”

  “I know.”

  “Hey, you’ll be the first person I call when I get my phone.”

  “Okay! Great!” Laine dropped her voice to a whisper. “Mom doesn’t know it, but I’m going to call you on Christmas Day, okay?”

  “Terrific!”

  “Bye, Stacey.”

  “Bye! Thanks for calling.”

  “Talk to you soon.”

  “I can’t wait.”

  “Me, neither.”

  “Me, neither.”

  “How are we going to end this?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I miss you.”

  “I miss you, too.”

  “Now I really have to get off.”

  “Bye, Laine.”

  “Bye, Stacey.”

  We hung up. A huge grin spread across my face. I had a great idea. If Laine ever came to visit me in Stoneybrook, I would make her an honorary member of the Baby-sitters Club.

  * * *

  Dear Reader,

  I hope you enjoyed reading The Truth About Stacey. Many kids have asked me why I created a character with diabetes. As you may know, when I started writing the Baby-sitters Club I wanted to create a group of characters who are very different from each other, but who work well together. Each of the members of the BSC faces her own set of difficulties. I thought it would be interesting if one character faced physical or medical problems. I
chose diabetes because it affects many kids, and because I have two friends with diabetes. I also wanted to create a character who copes with her disability in a positive way. Stacey doesn’t ignore her illness — she deals with it responsibly, but she tries not to let it interfere with her life.

  Not long after this first book about Stacey was published, I began to hear from kids who are diabetic themselves. Many of them have written to say that the books about Stacey have helped their friends understand the illness. In fact, recently my cat Mouse was diagnosed with diabetes. So the books have helped me, too!

  Happy reading,

  Ann M. Martin

  * * *

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ANN MATTHEWS MARTIN was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane. There are currently over 176 million copies of The Baby-sitters Club in print. (If you stacked all of these books up, the pile would be 21,245 miles high.)

  In addition to The Baby-sitters Club, Ann is the author of two other series, Main Street and Family Tree. Her novels include Belle Teal, A Corner of the Universe (a Newbery Honor book), Here Today, A Dog’s Life, On Christmas Eve, Everything for a Dog, Ten Rules for Living with My Sister, and Ten Good and Bad Things About My Life (So Far). She is also the coauthor, with Laura Godwin, of the Doll People series.

  Ann lives in upstate New York with her dog and her cats.

  Copyright

  Copyright © 1986 by Ann M. Martin.

  Cover art by Hodges Soileau

  All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, THE BABY-SITTERS CLUB, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

  First edition, 1995

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.