"Okay. See you."
Inside, I gave Jamie a cookie, and he and David Michael played with the G.I. Joes and then watched Sesame Street on TV. Jamie"s accident was long forgotten by the time his mother came home.
Mrs. Newton paid me and I ran to my house, leaving David Michael with Sam, and then ran across the street to Claudia Kishi"s.
Recently, I haven"t felt quite as comfortable visiting Claudia as I used to. This year she had to go and start growing up faster than us. She"s wearing a bra, and the way she talks, you"d think boys had just been invented.
She acts like all the guys in the seventh grade aren"t the same goony boys they were last year. Last year, the boys were saying, "Want some ABC gum?" and then handing us the gum out of their mouths, saying, "It"s Already-Been-Chewed, get it?" and laughing hysterically. Last year, the boys were giving us noogies on our arms and throwing spitb.a.l.l.s at us. Last year, the boys were pulling our chairs out from under us when we stood up to answer questions. This year (if you listen to Claudia), the boys are heroes. Personally, I don"t see any change.
I rang the Kishis" bell. Claudia came to the door. She was wearing short, very baggy lavender plaid overalls, a white lacy blouse, a black fedora, and red high-top sneakers without socks. Her long black hair was carefully arranged in four braids. I felt extremely blah compared to her.
I was so used to seeing Claudia in outfits like that that I didn"t bat an eye. What I did notice was that she was wearing makeup. There was blue stuff on her eyelids, gold stuff above her eyes, and magenta stuff on her cheeks.
"Claudia!" I gasped. "Your face! You look like" - I couldn"t stop myself in time - "you got made up for the circus. ... I mean . . . it"s so colorful. . . ,"
"Thanks a lot."
"No, honestly, Claud. You don"t need makeup. You"ve got such a beautiful face. . . ."
"Oh, you just think it"s exotic," said Claudia.
Well, maybe I do. Claudia"s parents are originally from j.a.pan. They came to the United States when they were very young. Claudia has silky, jet-black hair, dark eyes, and creamy skin without so much as a trace of a pimple. She"s absolutely gorgeous. But she has this wild streak in her that makes her buy belts made of feathers and wear knee socks with palm trees on them. Makeup was something new, though.
"Are you going to wear that" - I pointed to her face - "to school tomorrow?"
"If I can get away with it."
I nodded. Claudia"s parents are very conservative. They don"t understand her taste in clothes at all. They"re pretty nice about the fedoras and stuff, although they won"t buy any of those things for her. (That"s why she has to baby-sit - to earn money for all that stuff.) But I didn"t know how the Kishis would react to Claudia"s day-glo face. I didn"t know how our teachers would react, either.
1 said h.e.l.lo to Mimi, Claudia"s grandmother, who was busy making dinner, and followed Claudia upstairs to her room. "Where"s ]a-nine?" I asked.
Claudia rolled her eyes. "At the university, where else?"
Janine is Claudia"s fifteen-year-old sister. She"s only a soph.o.m.ore in high school, but she"s taking cla.s.ses at StoneybrookUniversity. This is because Janine is a real live genius. An average person has an IQ of 100. An above average person has an IQ of 120 to 140. A person with an IQ of 150 is considered a genius.
Janine"s IQ is 196.
Sometimes she makes me want to barf. She almost always makes Claudia want to barf. She thinks she knows everything. (Actually, she does.) She"s forever correcting us. If I say, "David Michael, you can"t play outside today because it"s raining," Janine will say, "Kristy, you should say, "David Michael, you may not play outside today." If you say he can"t, it means he"s physically unable to, and that"s not true. What you mean is that he does not have permission to play out of doors."
Janine sounds like a textbook. Her best friend is this fourteen-year-old math nerd who"s going to graduate from high school in the spring. Her second best friend is her computer.
I"m sure it"s because of Janine that Claudia concentrates on art and is a terrible student.
I was relieved to hear that Janine wasn"t home.
Claudia and I plopped down on her bed. "Mary Anne"11 be here in a few minutes," I said. "I have this really great idea that I want to tell both of you about."
Claudia"s eyes lit up. "What is it?"
"A baby-sitters club," I announced.
"A baby-sitters club?" she squealed.
"Yeah, I"ll explain it all when - " Just then, the doorbell rang.
Claudia thundered down the stairs, yelling, "I"ll get it!" She flung open the front door and hauled Mary Anne up to her room. "1 like clubs!" she exclaimed. "Tell us your idea!"
"Well, it all started last night," I began. I told them how Mom had had to call nearly everyone in Stoneybrook, looking for a babysitter, and how long it had taken, and how bad David Michael had felt. "So I thought we could sort of join together. We all baby-sit anyway. We could advertise ourselves and get more customers. We should meet a few times each week and tell our customers what those times are. Then they can make one call and reach a whole bunch of us at once. And if, like, Mrs. Pike wants too sitters, she"ll only have to make one call." I explained everything else I had thought of, and wound up with, "Okay, here are two things to think about: One, where should we hold our meetings; and two, who else could we ask to join the club?"
"I can answer both questions," said Claudia. "We should hold the meetings here, because I have a phone in my room."
"Oh, terrific!" I exclaimed. (I"d been hoping Claudia would suggest that.) "And I know someone who might want to join the club."
"Who?" Mary Anne and I asked.
"She"s new. She just moved to Stoneybrook. She lives right over on Fawcett Avenue , and she"s in my cla.s.s. Her name is Stacey McGill."
"Well, okay ..." I said slowly. "Of course, we"ll have to meet her."
"Oh, sure. You"ll really like her. She"s from New York City," Claudia added.
I was impressed. I could tell Mary Anne was, too. She opened her eyes wide. "I wonder why her family wanted to leave there to come here," she said.
Claudia shrugged. "Don"t know. But I"m glad they did. Stacey"s really cool."
Mary Anne and I glanced at each other, not sure that this was a good sign.
"What"s everyone doing tomorrow afternoon?" asked Claudia. "Can we meet then?"
"If it"s at five-thirty again," said Mary Anne. "I have to baby-sit before then."
We agreed to meet late the next afternoon. And that was how the Baby-sitters Club officially began.
CHAPTER FOUR.
Promptly at 5:30 the next afternoon, I crossed the street to Claudia"s house and rang the bell. Claudia answered it again, this time wearing a baggy yellow- and black-checked shirt, black pants, red jazz shoes, and a bracelet that looked like it was made from a telephone cord. Her earrings were dangling jointed skeletons that jumped around when she moved. I noticed she wasn"t wearing any makeup.
"Mom and Dad wouldn"t let me," she said.
"Well, you got away with the skeletons."
Claudia grinned. "1 didn"t put those on until I got to school," she whispered. "Mimi"s the only grown-up home now and she doesn"t mind if I wear skeletons."
"Oh, very sneaky!" Claudia knows every trick.
As we went up the stairs, Claudia said, "Stacey"s already here. I really hope you like her." She lowered her voice. "And Janine"s home."
I groaned.
"Sorry. Her door"s open, too."
At that moment, Janine stuck her head out into the hall. "Oh, hi, Kristy," she said. "I thought I heard voices. Claudia told me about the Baby-sitters Club. That sounds like an outstanding idea."
"Well, hopefully it will - " I began.
Janine"s face took on her know-it-all look. "Kristy, hopefully is one of the most commonly misused words in the English language. The word means "in a hopeful manner." It is not acceptable to use it to mean "it is to be hoped." If I were - "
I didn"t have the vaguest idea what she was talking about. "Gee, Janine, I gotta go," I cut her off as Claudia went on into her room. "Stacey"s waiting for us. See you." I really cannot take much of Janine. And I always make a mistake in front of her. I don"t know how Claudia manages to live in the same house with her.
Just as I reached Claudia"s bedroom, the doorbell rang. "That"s Mary Anne," I called. "I"ll let her in, Claud." I ran downstairs, opened the door, warned Mary Anne about Janine, then ran back upstairs with Mary Anne at my heels. We ran straight to Claudia"s room, careful not to look in at Janine as we ran by her open door.
"Hi," Claudia said, closing her door behind us. "You guys, this is Stacey McGill. Stacey, this is Kristy Thomas and this is Mary Anne Spier."
"Hi!" Stacey and I said brightly.
Mary Anne suddenly turned shy. "Hi," she said softly, speaking more to a wall than to Stacey.
I looked at Stacey. I could see why she and Claudia were friends already. Stacey had on a pink sweat shirt with sequins and a large purple parrot on the front; short, tight-fitting jeans with zippers up the outsides of the legs; and pink plastic shoes. She was very pretty, tall and quite thin with huge blue eyes framed by dark lashes, and fluffy blonde hair that looked as if it had been permed recently. I glanced at Mary Anne. She and I were still in our school clothes - skirts and blouses. I was wearing white knee socks and loafers. Mary Anne was wearing short white socks and saddle shoes. Mary Anne"s hair was, of course, in braids, and I was wearing a blue hair band.
We looked like second-graders. Stacey and Claudia looked like models.
There was an uncomfortable silence.
"Well," I cleared my throat. "Claudia, did you tell Stacey about the Baby-sitters Club?"
"Just what we talked about yesterday," she replied.
"Did you baby-sit in New York?" I asked Stacey.
"Oh, all the time. We lived in this big building. There were over two hundred apartments in it - "
"Wow," said Mary Anne.
" - and I used to put up signs in the laundry room. People called me all the time." She paused. "I can stay out until ten on Friday and Sat.u.r.day nights."
Another "Wow" from Mary Anne.
I was feeling more and more like a baby. How was it possible to feel so much younger than someone who was the same age as you?
"I"d really like to be in the club," said Stacey. "I don"t know too many kids in Stoneybrook yet. And it"d be nice to earn some money. My mom and dad buy my clothes, but I have to earn money for other things - you know, tapes and jewelry and stuff."
"How come you left New York?" asked Mary Anne. Mary Anne has a real thing for New York - for glamour and lights and stores. She wants to live in the city after she"s grown up.
Stacey looked at the floor. She started jiggling her right foot back and forth. "Oh," she said lightly, "my dad changed his job. Gosh, you have a lot of neat posters, Claudia."
"Thanks. I made those two myself." Claudia pointed to a picture of a horse galloping through a desert, and to another of a girl sitting on a window seat, gazing outside.
"Boy, if I lived in New York I wouldn"t leave for anything," Mary Anne went on. "Tell me what it"s like to live there. What was your school like?"
"Well," began Stacey, "I went to a private school."
"Did you have to wear a uniform?" asked Claudia, shuddering.
"Nope. We could wear regular clothes."
"How did you get to school?" asked Mary Anne.
"On the subway."
"Wow."
"Once," Stacey added, seeing how impressed Mary Anne was, "I took the subway all the way from our apartment to Coney Island. I had to change about a zillion times."
"Wow. Did you ever take a cab by yourself?"
"Sure. Lots of times."
"Wow."
At Mary Anne"s last "Wow" we all began giggling.
"Well, anyway," I said, "to get back to the Baby-sitters Club, what I think we should do is make two lists: one of rules, and one of things to do - "
"Does this mean," Stacey interrupted me, "that I"m in the club?"
I glanced at Mary Anne, who nodded her head. I already knew what Claudia thought.
"Yup," I said.
"Oh, hey! Great!" Stacey exclaimed, grinning.
Claudia gave her the thumbs-up sign. Then she pulled a package of peanut M&M"s from under her pillow. "We should celebrate," she said, handing the candy around.
Mary Anne and I were starved and each gobbled down a handful, but Stacey just glanced in the package and then pa.s.sed it back to Claudia. "These are - you"ve only got five left," she said.
"Oh, go ahead," replied Claudia. "I"ve got lots of stuff stashed away. Mom and Dad don"t know about it." She said she had bubble gum in her underwear drawer, a chocolate bar behind her encyclopedias, a package of Twin-kies in her desk drawer, and some Wint-o- green Lifesavers in her piggy bank.
"No, thanks," said Stacey. "I"m, um, on a diet."
"You?" I cried. "You"re skinny already!" Stacey was the first person my age I knew who was on a diet. "How much do you weigh?" I demanded.
"Kristy!" Claudia exclaimed. "Thaf s none of your business."