“And she really likes the guy,” I added. “Anyway, after we ate supper, we split up, and Toby bought me a pink seashell to remember him by. He won a teddy bear for me, too. We’re going to write each other. I hope.”
“He sounds really nice, Stace,” said Claudia.
“Yeah …”
“How are the Pike kids?”
“Oh, they’re fine. I think they had a great time. I feel like I know them so well now—I mean, understand them. You know why Nicky’s a pest?”
“Why?”
“Because he wants to be ‘one of the guys,’ but sometimes the triplets don’t let him play with them. Then he feels left out of the whole family. And Byron’s different than we thought he was. He’s quieter than Adam and Jordan, more serious. Kind of sensitive. And Vanessa can drive you crazy with this poetry kick she’s on, but she’s really a good little kid. Oh, and Mallory was a big help. We put her in charge of a few of the kids sometimes, and she did fine. Listen, when are we having our next Baby-sitters Club meeting? Monday?”
“I think so. We’re all back.”
“Great. I can’t wait to talk to Dawn and see how California was. And Kristy must have had a trillion sitting jobs while we were all away.”
“There’s only one bad thing about all this,” said Claudia.
“What?”
“The summer’s almost over. School’s going to begin again.”
“Yeah,” I replied, “but not for two weeks. And you don’t know what could happen in two weeks.
Almost anything. After all, in two weeks I found my first real love, lost him, found another, and got my first kiss.”
“Your first kiss! You didn’t say anything about that!”
“Oh … didn’t I?” I replied casually.
“No! Tell me.”
“Okay.”
I knew we’d be on the phone for at least an hour, but who cared? After all, I was in love.
* * *
Dear Reader,
When I was growing up, my family often took a trip to the New Jersey shore in the summer. Many summers, we went to Avalon, New Jersey. So did my best friend, Beth, and her family. But two summers my family went to Surf City. The fictional town of Sea City is based partly on Surf City and partly on Wildwood, the town next to Avalon. And some of the incidents that take place in Sea City are based on experiences that Beth and I had when we were in Avalon. For example, we thought it was fun to attract the attention of the lifeguards — who were much older than we were! There was a little tiny boardwalk with some shops and an arcade where Beth and my sister, Jane, and I played Skee-Ball. Every time we scored points at Skee-Ball, we won coupons that could be turned in for prizes, like keychains and small stuffed animals. The summers at the beach were a long time ago, but now I can think about them every time I write a Baby-sitters Club book about Sea City.
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 © 1987 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.
e-ISBN 978-0-545-53254-9
Ann M. Martin, Boy-Crazy Stacey
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