Baby-Sitters Beware Read Free Page B

more things about their younger daughter that mystify Claud's parents). She's even managed to combine her love of junk food with her art, by organizing an art show based on junk food. Claudia is the vice-president of the BSC, mostly because she's the only one of us who has her own phone line in her room. That lets us receive calls from clients and call them back without tying up anybody's family telephone line. Claudia doesn't have any official duties, but she makes it her unofficial duty to see that we are well supplied with junk food, plus a little healthy food on the side, for every meeting, something we all appreciate.
    The health food is mostly for Stacey. It used to be for Dawn, too, and of course we all can eat it. But unlike the rest of us, Stacey can't eat junk, not the sugary kind, anyway. And she has to watch what she eats very, very carefully.
    That's because Stacey has diabetes, which means her body can't regulate the sugar in her blood. She could get very, very sick if she isn't
    careful — even go into a coma. It also means that she has to give herself insulin injections every single day.
    For a long time, Stacey's parents were just as overprotective of Stacey in their way as Mary Anne's father was of her. But Stacey finally managed to convince them that she could be trusted to take care of herself. And she does.
    As BSC treasurer, she also takes care of our dues. Stacey is a math whiz, and good at other subjects in school, too. She's a little more sophisticated than the rest of us, most of the time. In fact, right now she's dating a guy named Robert who hangs out with a crowd at SMS that thinks they are too cool to talk to mere mortals. Robert's not like that, but Stacey was drawn into that crowd for a while, which caused some trouble in the BSC. Boy, am I glad that is all over!
    Anyway, Stacey's an only child, like Mary Anne, but unlike Mary Anne or Kristy or Dawn, she's not part of a blended family. Her mother and father got divorced not too long ago. Now her father lives in New York City, while Stacey lives here in Stoneybrook with her mom. Stacey visits her father in New York often, so she maintains her New York cool. But then, it's hard to shake Stacey up. She's
    one of the calmest, most level-headed people I know.
    Mal and I are the third set of best friends in the BSC. We are both in sixth grade and we both love horses and horse stories, especially the ones by Marguerite Henry. We also like mysteries, and we are the oldest kids in our families, which is a big help for a baby-sitter, experience-wise. But while Mal is the oldest of eight kids (including a set of triplets) I have just one younger sister, Becca, who is eight, and one younger brother, John Philip, also known as Squirt (he's a toddler). My aunt Cecelia lives with us, to help keep an eye on us since my mom went back to her old job.
    Mal has blue eyes, curly reddish brown hair, and pale skin that burns and freckles easily. She wears braces and glasses and dreams of the day her braces come off and her parents allow her to have contact lenses. Mal likes to write and draw, and wants to be a children's book author and illustrator someday. She's already won prizes for her writing, and she even had a temporary job helping out a famous children's book writer who lives in Stoneybrook.
    I like to dance. In fact, I want to be a ballerina someday. I get up every morning at 5:29 A.M., one minute before my alarm goes off, to
    practice my ballet moves at the barre that my parents set up for me in the basement of our house. I am a little taller than Mal, and thinner, and I have brown skin and brown eyes. I guess I'm inclined to wear ballet style clothes (Mal is a jeans and sweater person, more like Kristy). I often wear my hair pulled back in a bun, and leotards and leg warmers are fashion accessories for me as well as dance necessities.
    Both Mal and I wear earrings because we were recently allowed to have our ears pierced, the first victory in our ongoing