Jessi and the Awful Secret

by Ann M. Martin

  Kristy’s family has just kept growing! Her mom and Watson adopted a little Vietnamese girl they named Emily Michelle. She’s two and a half and totally adorable. Then Kristy’s grandmother, Nannie, moved in to help take care of Emily Michelle while Watson and Kristy’s mom are at work. And if you add in David Michael’s puppy, Watson’s cat, and the goldfish Karen and Andrew keep at the house, you’ve got a pretty huge family.

  Talking about Kristy leads me right into telling you about Mary Anne Spier. That’s because Kristy and Mary Anne have been best friends ever since they were little. They even look sort of alike. Mary Anne is also on the small side with brown hair and brown eyes. And Mary Anne used to have long hair like Kristy’s, but she got it cut short recently.

  Even though Mary Anne and Kristy are best friends, their personalities are quite different. Mary Anne isn’t a big talker, but she’s a great listener. She really cares about people and is very sensitive. (Mary Anne cries easily, especially when sad things happen to other people.)

  Like Kristy, Mary Anne is now part of a blended family. Originally she was an only child. Her mother died when she was a baby and for most of her life her family consisted of her and her father. This wasn’t always easy on Mary Anne since her father was pretty strict. But then something happened that changed Mary Anne’s life. Dawn Schafer moved to town. She became Mary Anne’s other best friend and her stepsister!

  Here’s how that happened. Dawn came to Stoneybrook from California when her parents got divorced. Mrs. Schafer had grown up in Stoneybrook and I guess she wanted to be nearer to her own parents after the divorce.

  Dawn and her younger brother, Jeff, didn’t like Stoneybrook at first. (I can understand how they felt. Moving isn’t easy.) Their father was still in California along with everyone else they knew. And even now Dawn isn’t completely comfortable with the cold weather. In fact, Jeff never did adjust to the changes. He returned to California to live with his dad.

  Anyway, Mary Anne and Dawn soon became friendly. Mary Anne introduced Dawn to the other members of the club and she joined it, too. Then one day Mary Anne and Dawn were looking through Mrs. Schafer’s old high school yearbook and they discovered an amazing fact. Dawn’s mother and Mary Anne’s father had dated in high school. More than dated. They’d been in love. It turned out that Mrs. Shafer’s parents had sent her to college in California just to get her away from Mr. Spier. They thought he would never amount to anything. (They were sure wrong about that. Mr. Spier is a lawyer now.)

  Mary Anne and Dawn decided to try to reunite their parents. This took some doing, but their plan worked. After dating for an eternity, the two of them got married. That’s how Mary Anne and Dawn became stepsisters.

  The Spiers moved into the Shafers’ old farmhouse. (It was built in 1795 and has a secret passageway which leads from Dawn’s room underground to the barn out back!) At first, Dawn and Mary Anne were thrilled. But then they discovered that blending two families isn’t always easy. Dawn’s mom didn’t particularly like Mary Anne’s cat, Tigger. There was also the mealtime issue. Dawn and her mom are health food nuts and only eat stuff like salads, tofu, and veggie burgers. (They think bacon is the grossest thing on earth.) Mary Anne and her dad eat regular food. So, just planning dinner became a big problem for their new family. Now all that is behind them and they’re happy. Most of the time both Dawn and Mary Anne seem very pleased to be sisters. (By the way, just so you know — Dawn has long, long, white-blonde hair and a casually trendy way of dressing. She’s totally gorgeous but isn’t concerned about her looks at all. I like that about her.)

  The next person I need to tell you about is Claudia Kishi. I find her totally fascinating. She’s unlike anyone I’ve ever met.

  First of all, Claud looks very distinctive. She’s Japanese-American with beautiful, delicate features and long, silky straight black hair. That alone would be enough to make her striking. But Claudia adds to her natural beauty with her own artistic way of dressing. She puts colors and styles together in a unique way. (I’m not sure many people would look good dressing the way she does. On Claud, though, the look is very cool.) For example, today she was wearing a neon green tank top under a white oversized man’s shirt and fuschia pink stirrup pants. The shirt was rolled at the sleeves and belted with a colorful woven belt.

  Claud finished the outfit with dangly ceramic-bead earrings she’d made herself in pottery class. She’s super artistic. She paints, sketches, draws, sculpts. You name it!

  Besides art and cool clothing, Claudia loves junk food. Her parents disapprove of Ho-Ho’s and Twinkies and stuff like that, so she hides them all over her room. You never know when you’re going to pick up a pillow and find a bag of potato chips or something behind it. The other thing she stashes away are her Nancy Drew books. Her parents don’t approve of those, either. They don’t think the mysteries are “intellectual” enough.

  Claudia couldn’t care less if the books are “intellectual.” One thing Claud is not interested in is school work. Although she can’t spell for anything, she’s definitely not dumb. She just doesn’t like school. And, unfortunately, her grades show it. She’s the complete opposite of her older sister, Janine, who is a genius. Janine has some sort of super I.Q. which is tough on Claudia.

  Speaking of cool, Stacey McGill is right up there with Claudia. In some ways, she may be even cooler, since she’s originally from New York City. Stacey and Claudia are best friends and they seem more sophisticated than the rest of us. Stacey wears her blonde hair in a perm. She has very trendy clothes, although they’re not quite as artistic as Claudia’s.

  Like my family, Stacey’s family came to Stoneybrook because her father’s job was transferred to Stamford. She met Claudia and became part of the club. From then on, she started liking Stoneybrook, even though she still missed New York. Just when she really felt as if she belonged, her dad’s company transferred him back to New York. So, Stacey said good-bye to everyone and moved back again. (Here’s a coincidence — my family moved into her old house then!)

  In New York, things didn’t go too well for the McGills. I’m not sure why, but Stacey’s parents decided to divorce. Mrs. McGill came back to Stoneybrook and Stacey came with her. Everyone in the BSC was happy to see her, of course.

  Stacey has another problem. She’s diabetic. She has to watch what she eats — no sweets at all. And, she has to give herself injections of insulin every day. I think that would really get me down, but most of the time Stacey is a very up-beat person.

  Here’s how our club works. We meet every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from five-thirty to six in Claudia’s room. Claudia is the only one of us who has a phone with a private number in her bedroom. That’s why we meet here. It’s also why Claudia is the vice-president.

  During club hours, our clients call and set up baby-sitting appointments. It works out great for them because they can call just one number and reach seven baby-sitters instead of having to make a bunch of phone calls.

  Actually, they’re reaching nine sitters. We have two associate members of our club. They don’t come to meetings but we call them if no one else is free to baby-sit. One of them is Logan Bruno. He’s Mary Anne’s boyfriend. (She’s the only one of us who has a steady boyfriend.) The other associate is a girl named Shannon Kilbourne. She lives near Kristy and goes to a different school.

  Mallory and I are junior officers. Because of our age, we only sit during the day, which means after school or on weekends. This frees the others to take night jobs. (I can’t wait until I’m old enough for night jobs. I won’t feel like such a kid.)

  So, anyway, our clients call and say when and what time they need a sitter. Then whoever answers the phone says she’ll check it out and call right back. That’s where Mary Anne comes in. She’s the club secretary and keeps the record book in order. The book (another of Kristy’s great presidential ideas) contains everyone’s schedules — my ballet classes, Mallory’s archery club meetings, Claudia’s art classes, Kristy’s softball g
ames. If one of us has a dentist appointment or a big class project due, it goes into the book. Mary Anne then looks at the book and tells us who is free to take a particular baby-sitting job. She’s very proud of the fact that she’s never, ever, made a scheduling error.

  The record book also lists the names and phone numbers of all our clients and any important information about the kids we sit for, like food allergies, fears, bedtimes, and stuff like that. It’s a good thing to check before going on a job.

  The only part of the book Mary Anne isn’t responsible for is the record of money we’ve earned and spent. That’s Stacey’s department since she’s the club treasurer (and our resident math whiz). Even though each of us takes home the money we earn, Stacey keeps track of it, just for the record. She also collects dues and puts the money in a big envelope.

  No one likes to part with money but the dues are necessary. We use the money to pay Claudia’s phone bill, and to pay Charlie Thomas (one of Kristy’s older brothers) to drive Kristy to and from meetings now that she’s moved out of the neighborhood. We also need to restock our Kid-Kits from time to time.

  Kid-Kits are another of Kristy’s brilliant ideas. We each have a box filled with coloring books, crayons, toys, and any little thing we think would amuse kids. Kristy noticed that kids like playing with other people’s toys more than their own. That’s how she came up with the idea and it really works. My Kid-Kit has saved more than one rainy day. Kid-Kits are also great for distracting fighting kids and cheering up tearful ones who don’t want to part with their parents.

  As I said, Kristy is president because she never stops thinking up these great ideas.

  Dawn is our alternate officer. She steps in if any of the other officers is absent. This means she has to know everyone’s job. When Stacey left, Dawn became treasurer for a while. She was more than happy to give that job back since she hates math.

  Besides scheduling appointments, taking dues, and discussing how to spend the dues (if any money is left over we get to do something fun like have a pizza party), we also write in our club notebook. (Guess who’s great idea this was! You got it.)

  In the notebook we write about our baby-sitting experiences. It’s a great resource. If you’re baby-sitting for kids you don’t know, you can just check the notebook and find out about them. It also gives you ideas on how other members have solved particular baby-sitting problems.

  So, you can see that even if the phone never rang, we’d be plenty busy fitting all this into a half hour. But, today the phone was ringing like mad. We’d all taken jobs when Mrs. Newton called at five minutes to six. She needed someone to take care of four-year-old Jamie and little Lucy the next night.

  “Nobody’s free,” said Mary Anne after checking the record book. “We’ll have to call Shannon.”

  Everyone looked at Kristy. She’s usually the one to call Shannon since they’re friends. Today Kristy cringed slightly. “Could somebody else call her?” she asked sheepishly.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Dawn.

  “Lately Shannon’s been calling me asking if I want to go out and do things with her,” Kristy explained. “Her schedule has changed and she has more time on her hands. It seems her school friends are busy with other things.”

  “Shannon’s nice,” said Stacey. “Don’t you want to hang out with her?”

  “Who has the time to hang out?” Kristy cried. “It’s nothing against Shannon. It’s just that with baby-sitting and the club meetings and other stuff, I don’t have any time. Whenever Shannon calls I have to say no because I really am busy. I don’t want to hurt her feelings, but I think they’re getting hurt just the same.”

  “Tell her to call us,” Stacey said. “I think Shannon’s cool.”

  “Me, too,” agreed Claudia.

  “Yeah?” Kristy said, her face brightening. “Then I will call her. I’ll ask her about the job and tell her to get in touch with you guys about doing things together.”

  “I’ve always wanted to know Shannon better,” said Dawn.

  Kristy punched in Shannon’s phone number. “Great,” she said with a smile. “Another problem solved.”

  “Hi,” Mme Dupre greeted the volunteers. We’d assembled outside Mme Noelle’s classroom. Besides Mary and me there were four other volunteers from different ballet classes. Two of them were boys.

  Mme Dupre is French like Mme Noelle, but she’s much younger — somewhere in her twenties — and her accent isn’t nearly as thick. She’s kind of pretty, with grayish-blue eyes and a high forehead. She wears her long brown hair swept back off her face in a tight ponytail. Normally she assists Mme Noelle, but I guess she’d been excused so she could conduct this special class.

  Today, instead of her usual black outfit, she wore gray tights, a matching leotard, bright warm-up leggings, and a red dance skirt. She must have noticed me looking at her. “On Tuesdays from now on, you can wear more casual work-out clothing,” she told us. “I think it might put the children at ease since they haven’t been in a dance class before.”

  “All right!” I cheered happily. Sometimes I get tired of wearing the same old black leotard all the time.

  Mme Dupre smiled at me. “The kids are already in the practice room down the hall. Let’s go see what we can do with them.”

  “I can’t believe Vince Parsons volunteered,” Mary whispered to me as we walked down the hallway. She nodded toward the boys who were up ahead beside Mme Dupre.

  “Which one is he?” I whispered back.

  “He’s the snobby-looking one,” she replied. I knew who she meant immediately. Of the two boys, one was Latino, with olive skin, and very handsome. The other was thin with tight blond curls, a long narrow nose, and super-straight posture. “Snobby” perfectly described the expression on his face.

  “Is he really a snob?” I asked.

  “The worst,” Mary said. “He goes to my school and you’d think he was already a major dance star instead of a student. The other guy is cute, though. I don’t know him, but I’m going to try hard to change that!”

  “Do you know either of the girls?” I asked, referring to the other volunteers who were hurrying along with us.

  “The redhead is named Darcy,” Mary told me. “I don’t know the dark-haired girl.”

  When we reached the large practice room it was in an uproar. Screaming, shouting kids were running in all directions. I saw almost forty boys and girls, most of whom looked about eight or nine years old. Mary and I glanced at one another nervously. It seemed doubtful that Mme Dupre would be able to quiet them down, never mind teaching them to dance.

  Mme Dupre turned off the bright overhead lights. Since it was winter time, the sun was already setting and the room became quite dark. She clapped her hands sharply. “Please space yourselves and find a seat on the floor,” she said loudly.

  The kids settled down quickly. Madame turned the lights back on and strode to the center of the room. “Welcome students,” she said. “How many of you have studied dance before?”

  The students looked at one another but no one raised a hand. “I can do the funky chicken!” yelled a boy with a mop of dark curls and big brown eyes. He got up, tucked his arms in, and began to prance around the room, bobbing his head and flapping his arms. Of course, the class broke into peals of laughter. Even I bit my lip to keep from smiling.

  “Very nice,” Mme Dupre said tolerantly. “And what is your name?”

  “Devon Ramirez.”

  “Thank you, Devon. You may sit down now,” said Mme Dupre. “Has anyone else taken classes?”

  One little girl with very dark skin nodded shyly. Mme Dupre noticed her. “What classes have you taken?” she asked.

  The girl spoke so quietly that I couldn’t hear her, even though she was in the front. “Please speak up,” Madame prodded gently.

  The girl’s dark eyes grew large, as though she felt suddenly trapped. “No, I never took a class,” she said in a barely audible voice.

  “Oh, all right,�
�� said Mme Dupre. “Well, I’m very pleased that none of you has prior training. We won’t have to break any bad habits. Here we will start fresh and learn to do things the right way.” She stretched out her arms toward us volunteers. “I want you to meet Mary and Jessi. They’re on my left. And Vince, Raul, Darcy, and Sue are on my right. They will be helping me. My name is Mme Dupre.”

  “Hey, like Jazzy Jo Dupre and the Fly Boys!” cried a pudgy blonde girl with large green eyes. “Man! Now those guys are super cool! Will we learn to dance as good as them?”

  “Ballet is a good basis for all dance,” Mme Dupre replied. “All right, class. We will begin with basic warm-ups. Stay seated, and put your legs out straight in front of you. I want you to bend forward slowly and touch your toes.”

  “This is like gym!” Devon Ramirez complained. “I thought we were supposed to be dancing.”

  “You must always warm up before dancing,” Mme Dupre told him. “Touch your toes, please.”

  “All right, but this isn’t what I thought it was going to be,” Devon said warily as he bent forward.

  When the whole class was bent forward, it was easy to spot two girls busily whispering together in the back. They sat side by side and seemed totally unaware of what was going on in the rest of the class. “Jessi, please go back and speak to those girls,” Madame instructed me.

  The girls were so engrossed in their conversation that they didn’t even see me coming. One was petite with lots of red curls. The other had long, limp blonde hair and porcelain-white skin. When I was nearly on top of them, they looked up at me. “You’re supposed to be warming up like the rest of the class,” I said pleasantly.