“And now,” said Kristy, loving every second of being in charge, “back to the yard. And Charlotte, you blindfold Stacey, okay?”
Charlotte nodded importantly.
When we were gathered in the yard again and my eyes were bound so tightly that I couldn’t even see the daylight, a hush fell over the party.
Then I heard singing. Twenty-eight little voices and six bigger voices were joined together singing a song to the tune of “Happy Birthday”: “Farewe-ell to you, Farewe-ell to you. Farewe-ell dear Stacey. Farewell and good luck!”
The blindfold was removed. As if by magic, a table had appeared, and on it were paper plates, napkins, cups, a pitcher of punch, and two cakes. One was a huge sheet cake decorated with pink flowers. In blue frosting was written: GOOD-BYE STACEY, GOOD-BYE. The other cake was tiny and said simply: STACEY.
“The little one’s for you,” Claudia whispered to me. “The bakery makes a special no-sugar cake for people with diabetes. The other cake is for the rest of us.”
“That’s so sweet,” I said, giving her a hug, and adding, “No pun intended. Seriously. You guys thought of everything. I really appreciate it.”
So I ate my little cake and the kids and my friends gobbled up the big cake. Then Mary Anne found an excuse to award a prize to any kid who hadn’t already won one (most original picture on the mural, neatest cake-eater, that sort of thing).
A few minutes later the parents started arriving to pick up their crayon-y, egg-smeared, cake-covered children. As each guest left the party, instead of receiving a “goody bag,” he or she handed me a homemade card. Kristy had asked them to make the cards the previous week and bring them to the party.
I read all the cards many times that night.
The funniest was Margo Pike’s, which said: GOOD LICK STASY. HAVE FUN IN NEW YURK. The one that made me cry was Charlotte’s (of course): GOOD-BYE, STACEY. I WILL ALWAYS MISS YOU. I WISH YOU WERE MY SISTER.
Well, I would always miss Charlotte and the other children and my Stoneybrook friends. I would never, ever forget them. After all, I had one mural, twenty-eight cards, and thousands of memories.
“Order, order! Come on, you guys,” said Kristy, sounding cross.
I looked around Claudia’s bedroom. The time was five-thirty. The day was Friday. It was the beginning of my last-ever meeting with the Baby-sitters Club. I wanted to remember my friends exactly as I saw them right then. They were all being so typical and normal.
Claudia was sprawled on the floor, halfway under her bed. She was rooting around in a shoebox and mumbling, “I know I have Fritos somewhere. I just know it.” She was wearing a wonderful Claudia outfit — a purple-and-white striped bodysuit under a gray jumper-thing. The legs of the bodysuit stretched all the way to her ankles, but she was wearing purple push-down socks anyway. Around her middle was a wide purple belt with a buckle in the shape of a telephone. And on her feet were black ballet slippers.
Dawn was standing by the window pulling a strand of her blonde hair as far out to the side as it would reach. “See?” she was saying to Mary Anne. “It is almost as long as my arm. I told you. By the end of the year, I bet it’ll be much longer, even if I have to have the split ends trimmed off.” She was wearing a very short kilt, an oversized red sweater, and yellow socks over red tights. On her head was a red beret with a sparkly initial pin attached to the side.
Mary Anne, looking wide-eyed at Dawn’s hair, was saying, “That’s amazing. How come my hair doesn’t grow that fast? Maybe if I attached weights to the ends —”
“If you attached weights to the ends,” Dawn interrupted her, “you would look like a Martian.”
Mary Anne giggled. “How do you know what a Martian looks like?” she said. She was wearing an outfit that I had helped her choose. It was tame, but not dorky — a navy blue minidress with a pink sash, blue tights, and black slippers like Claudia’s.
Kristy was wearing her uniform — jeans, a turtleneck (pale blue), a sweater (blue-and-white striped), and sneakers. She was sitting in Claudia’s director’s chair, a pencil over one ear, her visor perched crookedly on her head. She wanted (badly) to start the meeting, and she was tapping a pen on our club notebook and calling for order.
I stood by the doorway to Claudia’s room and just looked.
There was a good chance that I’d never be part of a scene like this one again. For about the eighty zillionth time since my parents had announced the move I wanted to cry. Instead I said, “Hi, guys!”
“Hi, Stace!” my friends replied.
And with that, Mary Anne burst into tears. “Your last meeting!” she wailed.
“Oh, please don’t start that,” I said. “I’m not kidding. I don’t want us to spend our last meeting crying.”
“Yeah, behave like big, grown-up baby-sitters,” said Kristy, and we laughed. “Okay,” she went on, “we have lots to do today, so let’s get started.”
I sighed and sat down on Claudia’s bed.
Claudia had found the Fritos. They weren’t under the bed at all. They were behind a spare blanket in her closet. She passed them around.
“First order of business,” said Kristy, her mouth full, “is the notebook. Have you all read it?”
“Yes,” we chorused, like little kids in school.
“Okay. Here’s the second order of business. As we all know, Stacey will be leaving tomorrow. When she goes, we’ll need a new club treasurer.”
“Not to mention another club member,” murmured Claudia, but I was the only one who heard her.
“And so it’s time to make Dawn, formerly our alternate officer, the new treasurer of the Baby-sitters Club.”
I gave Dawn a wavery smile, feeling sad, but I couldn’t help thinking at the same time that Kristy was just using this occasion as an opportunity to show off. I mean, when we originally formed the club, we all just decided, okay, Kristy’s president, Claudia’s vice president, and so forth. No big deal. But now Kristy called Dawn and me to stand on either side of the director’s chair.
“Stacey McGill,” she began, and then paused. “I want this to be official,” she said thoughtfully. “Is Stacey your real name?”
“No, it’s a fake one,” I replied.
Kristy made a face. “Is it your full first name?”
I sighed. “No. My full first name is Anastasia. Anastasia Elizabeth.”
“You are joking!” cried Kristy.
“No, I’m not. But you can see why I never tell anyone that. Even my parents don’t call me Anastasia.”
“All right,” said Kristy. “Oh, wait. Dawn, what’s your full name?”
“Dawn Read Schafer.”
“Okay. Anastasia Elizabeth McGill,” said Kristy, “as president of the Baby-sitters Club, I hereby thank you for all of your help, and for being responsible, and for being our treasurer.”
“Wahh,” wailed Mary Anne, in tears again. Everyone ignored her.
“You were our first treasurer and a good friend and we’ll really miss you. Luckily,” she went on, “our newest member can move up from her position as alternate officer to take over as treasurer. Dawn Read Schafer, I hereby make you treasurer of the Baby-sitters Club.”
“Too bad she can’t add,” whispered Claudia.
Everyone ignored her, except for Dawn who said, “I heard that.”
Kristy handed the manila envelope containing our club dues to Dawn. “You are now in charge of the treasury,” she said.
Kristy probably would have gone on forever except that the phone started ringing with job calls then. We arranged sitters for the Perkinses, the Rodowskys, Jenny Prezzioso (yick), and Jeff Schafer. It was the first time nobody asked me about my schedule or whether I was interested in the jobs.
When things quieted down, Kristy said, “Wow, that was close. We had to do some juggling to fit in a sitter for Mr. and Mrs. Rodowsky.”
“Oh, Stacey,” sobbed Mary Anne, “what are we going to do without you?”
I think Mary Anne meant What are we
going· to do without you as a friend? but Kristy was thinking of our business, as usual. “She’s going to be tough to replace, but I know we can do it,” she said.
“You know,” spoke up Claudia, “there is Mallory Pike. We’ve always said she’s a good sitter.”
The rest of us nodded thoughtfully.
“She was a big help with our play group last summer,” said Dawn.
“She was great at the beach,” I added. “Really responsible. Didn’t you think so, Mary Anne?”
Mary Anne gulped and nodded.
“She wants to baby-sit,” said Kristy. “Um, but she’s two years younger than we are.”
“I had just barely turned twelve when we started the club last year,” said Mary Anne, sniffling.
“I know,” said Kristy, “but you were in seventh grade, not sixth, and you were almost a year older than Mallory is now. That makes a big difference.”
“Mallory is the oldest of eight kids,” I pointed out. “She can probably diaper a baby better than any of us.”
“True,” said Kristy. “But I know for a fact that she’d only be allowed to baby-sit in the afternoons or on the weekends. Never in the evening.”
“Maybe she could be a sort of junior sitter,” said Dawn. “And, hey, if we found another junior sitter, the juniors could take a lot of the after-school jobs. That would free the rest of us for the evenings. It might make a big difference.”
“Well, I don’t know where we’re going to find another junior sitter,” said Kristy, “but I agree, that’s a good idea. For now, should we at least find out if Mallory would be interested in joining the club?”
“Yes!” was our response.
Kristy reached for the phone.
“Wait,” I said. “Can I call her? I’m the one whose place she’d be filling.”
Kristy paused with her hand halfway to the receiver. “I,” she said, “am the president.”
“And I,” I said, “am moving away and you might never see me again. I really want to call Mallory. Couldn’t this be my last official club duty?”
“Oh, all right,” said Kristy after a pause. “Thanks,” I said. I dialed the Pikes’ number and asked for Mallory. Then I explained our idea. “You’d have to come to a couple of meetings first and see how things go, but are you interested?”
“Yes! Yes! Yes!” Mallory shrieked so loudly that I had to hold the phone away from my ear.
“She’s interested,” I told my friends after Mallory and I had hung up. “I’ll leave the details to you.”
We took a few more job calls. It was almost six o’clock. Two more minutes and my last Baby-sitters Club meeting would be over.
“What time do the movers come tomorrow?” asked Dawn.
“Eight,” I replied. “We’re completely packed. As soon as the van is loaded, Mom and Dad and I will leave in the car.”
The room fell silent. From somewhere, Claudia produced a bottle of diet soda and five paper cups. She filled the cups and handed them out to us. Then she held hers in the air. “I’d like to make a toast,” she said. “To Stacey. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye, Stacey,” echoed Kristy, Mary Anne, and Dawn.
“Good-bye, you guys,” I replied.
We drank our sodas.
The meeting was over.
I woke up six times during my last night in our house in Stoneybrook. Each time I did, I checked the digital clock that was still plugged in by my bed.
I woke up at midnight and had to go to the bathroom. Then I woke up at 1:33 after a dream about being chased by a bulldog. At 2:56 I leaped out of bed to make sure I’d remembered to put something important in my purse. (I had.) At 4:07 I woke up thinking about the moving men. They would arrive in three hours and fifty-three minutes. At 4:48 I had to go to the bathroom again. At 6:10 I just woke up. I don’t know why. But I was mad because my alarm was going to go off in twenty minutes, and the night already seemed like a waste, sleep-wise.
Mom and Dad and I fixed a strange breakfast that morning. We were trying to eat up what little stuff was left in the refrigerator. I had some yogurt, an apple, and a piece of bread. (The toaster was packed.) Mom and Dad had cottage cheese, bologna, and oranges. Yech.
Nobody was in a very good mood.
“Those movers better get here on time,” said Dad. “They better not be late. If they’re late …” I waited for him to finish his threat, but he didn’t. He just rolled up a piece of bologna and stuffed it in his mouth.
Mom fluttered nervously around the kitchen, trying to stay organized.
“Put all your trash in here,” she told Dad and me, pointing to an empty grocery bag. (We were eating off paper plates and using plastic spoons, forks, and knives. The kitchen was practically bare.) “Then, Stacey,” she went on, “put anything that’s left in the refrigerator and the freezer into this other bag and we’ll give it to one of the neighbors. Oh, put the rest of the paper plates and things in, too.”
Breakfast seemed to be over when Dad stopped rolling up bologna slices and Mom began pulling out drawers and opening cupboard doors, checking (for at least the tenth time) to be sure that they were empty. I filled up the grocery bags with our few leftovers and set the bag on a counter. Then I went upstairs to my room. I stripped my bed, folded the sheets and blanket and spread, and placed them in the one carton that was still in my room. This is what my room looked like: stripped bed, empty bookcase, empty bureau, bare desk, two chairs without any clothes thrown on them. My closet was completely empty. The lone carton sat in the middle of the room next to my purse. I added my nightgown and the digital alarm clock to it. Even though I knew that nothing else was left in my room, I began doing what Mom was doing downstairs. I looked into every drawer and even under my bed to make sure I hadn’t forgotten to pack anything.
When that was done, I sat down on the edge of my mattress. A tear slid down one cheek. I wiped it away with the back of my hand, but another tear followed, and then two more, and then a river. I hated the sight of my empty room, even though I knew that pretty soon my room in New York would look a lot like the way my room in Connecticut had looked. Except that outside the window would be a view of the apartment building across the street, the Blue Pan Coffee Shop, and a locksmith. (Mom and Dad had taken pictures from the window of the new apartment.) And the room would be smaller than this room. And we’d have to put roach traps in the corners because you just have to do that in New York. It’s part of city life.
I heard the movers arrive, but I didn’t want to go downstairs yet. Instead, I stood up, crossed the room to the carton, reached inside, and pulled out the manila envelope that was at the very bottom. I sat on the floor and opened it. Inside were the farewell cards the kids had given me at the party.
GOOD-BYE, STACEY, read Jamie Newton’s card. Jamie had written his name inside, but his mother had written everything else.
I WILL MISS YOU. YOU WERE FUNNY. AND NICE, Karen Brewer had written. She’d drawn a picture of a witch on the cover. I knew the witch was supposed to be Morbidda Destiny, not me.
ROSES ARE RED, VIOLETS ARE BLUE, GOOD-BYE STACEY, I’LL ALWAYS MISS YOU. That was Vanessa Pike, who planned to become a poet.
At last I looked at Charlotte’s card again. I WISH YOU WERE MY SISTER. Oh, Charlotte, I thought. I wish I were, too. Then we wouldn’t have had to say good-bye. We could stay together, because sisters do.
I put the cards back in the envelope, and the envelope back in the box. Now what? I couldn’t go downstairs because my eyes were still red.
“Stacey!” I heard someone call. “Hey, Stacey!”
The voice was outside. I ran to my window.
“Oh, my gosh!” I exclaimed. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. I think I started to do both.
The rest of the members of the Baby-sitters Club were standing in the yard below me. Stretched between two of them was a bedsheet. On the sheet, in dripping blue letters, had been painted the words SEE YOU SOON, STACEY.
Kristy was grinning up at me wh
ile she tried to straighten out her end. Dawn was tugging at the other end. Claudia was the one who had shouted to me. Mary Anne was just standing there crying.
“I’ll be right down!” I shouted to them.
“Okay!” Claudia shouted back.
I grabbed my purse and ran downstairs. By the time I reached the front yard my parents were already there, admiring the sheet.
“You guys are too much,” I told my friends. I felt like hugging them all, but knew we’d be doing plenty of that soon enough.
“This is for you,” Kristy said, indicating the sheet. “To remember us by.”
“Gee, do you think it’s big enough?” I joked, and we all laughed. I turned to Mom and Dad.
“Can I keep it?” I asked.
“Of course,” replied my father. “Most kids want to keep a dog or a cat. All you want is a bedsheet.” (His good humor must have returned when the movers showed up on time.)
Mom and Dad went inside then to direct traffic. Kristy and Dawn folded up the sheet and handed it to me. “Thanks,” I said, “and now I’ve got something for you guys.”
My friends looked interested. Mary Anne dried her tears.
“Don’t get too excited,” I warned them. “It isn’t much.” I reached into my purse and pulled out the thing I’d leaped from my bed to check on at 2:56 that morning. It was a packet of calling cards. Mom and Dad had had them printed up just for me. This is what they looked like:
“I realized I hadn’t even given you my new address or phone number,” I told my friends. “Now you’ve got everything. Plus, see? I’m not going to forget the Baby-sitters Club. In fact, it’s going to grow.”
The five of us sat on the front lawn and watched the movers haul every last thing out of our house and load it into the van that was parked in our driveway. While beds and tables and boxes and bags went by, we talked and giggled. We promised to write, to phone, to visit. But sometimes, there were long silences. I didn’t like them. I felt as if I should be filling them up. During one of them, I retrieved the bag of leftovers and handed it to my friends. “Take whatever you want,” I told them. “Mom doesn’t want to waste this stuff.”