I never owned the Baby-Sitters Club

I was heading to my best friend, Claudia Kishi's, for a meeting called the Baby-Sitters Club a.k.a BSC. It was a Wednesday. We hold it every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from five-thirty to six because Claudia has her own phone with a private line. I love that idea so we don't have to tie the other phone lines during the meeting. She's the vice-president.

The others are Mary Anne Spier, her two best friends, Kristy Thomas & Dawn Schafer, who is also Mary Anne's stepsister, Mallory Pike, Jessi Ramsey, and me-Stacey McGill.

I'm thirteen years old and attend Stoneybrook Middle School for eighth grade. I live in Stoneybrook, Connecticut with my mom. I grew up in New York City with both of my parents. The first time I moved here was in seventh grade when my father was transferred here. Then a year later, we had to move back to New York City. However, my parents' had been fighting ever since, so they announced they were going to get divorced. Dad wanted to stay in New York while Mom planned to move back here. I had to choose who I want to live with.

After a lot of thinking, I decided to return here with Mom and now, Mallory is my neighbor in back of me. We go to school and walk to Claudia's house together often. I do visit Dad a lot.

I have blue eyes and blonde hair. I'm also diabetic. I can't eat sugar or sweets. I have to inject myself daily and see a doctor a LOT otherwise I could really sick. Being a diabetic isn't so bad when you're used to it.

At Claudia's, it was only five-twenty when I got there. I'm the treasurer and collect dues on Mondays. I'm terrific at math. If I can't attend to any meetings, our alternate officer, Dawn, takes over for me. In fact, she can take over for anyone. I'll tell you more about her later.

Since Claudia's my best friend, I'll begin with her. For starters, she's Japanese. She has a long black hair and black eyes. She enjoys art; she can be super creative. She hates school; her older sister, Janine, is very smart. Luckily, Claudia do gets C averages, which she would need to stay in the club with us.

She provides snacks for us including healthy ones for me and Dawn. She passes junk food to the rest. She hides them and her Nancy Drew books because her parents don't approve any of them.

Like I said before, Mary Anne and Dawn are stepsisters. First of all, Mary Anne only grew up with her dad. Her mom died long time ago when she was an infant. Her dad was strict for years until she was a seventh grader. In the meantime, Dawn was growing up in California with her parents and her only brother, Jeff, until the Schafers got divorced. Dawn moved here with her mom and Jeff over on Burnt Hill Road. Jeff never adjusted here and moved back to California. Mary Anne and Dawn already became good friends. They even discovered that their parents dated way back in high school. They ended got back together and became a stepfamily. Mary Anne calls Mrs. Schafer, Sharon, while Dawn calls Mr. Spier, Richard. Mary Anne and Mr. Spier lived on Bradford Court before they joined Sharon and Dawn along with Mary Anne's cat, Tigger.

Mary Anne's the secretary. She's very organized and has a perfect handwriting. She can keep track on everything and doesn't make any errors.

She's also very shy and quiet. The oddest thing about that fact Mary Anne has a boyfriend! His name is Logan Bruno. He came from Kentucky with his parents and two siblings; Kerry & Hunter. He's one of the associate members- which means he doesn't attend any meetings, but is on call if we're all booked, if one of us is sick or on vacation.

Like me, Dawn has blonde hair and blue eyes & doesn't touch any candies, sugar, or meat. She prefers healthy foods.

Kristy Thomas is Mary Anne's first best friend. It's very odd about it because they're partly different. Unlike Mary Anne, she's out going out and pretty loud. Plus she's into sports while Mary Anne is horrible at it.

On the other hand, they do look alike. They're short for their ages even though Mary Anne grew taller, they moved to join their stepfamilies, and oh, they both have adopted siblings. Plus, Mary Anne and Kristy have brown hair & eyes.

Kristy lived next door to Mary Anne and across the street Claudia with her parents & three brothers. Her older brothers are Charlie and Sam & her younger brother is David Michael. Mr. Thomas left the marriage about seven years ago. Mrs. Thomas recently got remarried to this millionaire, Watson Brewer. After the marriage, the Thomas family moved in with the Brewers in the mansion that Watson owns. Kristy has two younger stepsiblings, Karen and Andrew. Like I said, Kristy has an adopted sister, Emily Michelle. She's an adorable two-year-old from Vietnam. Nannie-Mrs. Brewer's mom-moved in to help out.

She's the president. The club was her idea when her mom had a tough time to find a sitter for David Michael. She had two other ideas; 1) the Kid-Kits to help kids to be entertained if they're sick, get bored on a rainy day, or if they miss their folks and 2) the notebook so we would know what was happening during a sitting job.

Mary Anne has two adopted siblings; Carlos Peters and Meredith Sousa. Let's start with Carlos since he was the first one to be adopted. See, he lost his whole family when he was just eight years old; his older brother had a scarlet fever and his older sister was killed in a car crash along with both of his parents.

Meredith's dad passed away when a tourbus blew up a few years later. She's from London, England. She was an exchange student when she found out her mom and only sister were killed the same way her dad died.

The final members are Mallory and Jessi. They're eleven and are in sixth grade. They're too young to sit at night except for their younger brothers and sisters. That's why they're called Jr. Officers.

Mallory has seven siblings while Jessi only has one sister and one brother. They're both extremely talented: Mallory is a terrific writer and Jessi is a wonderful dancer. They're great sitters. They each have a hamster; Mallory has Fido and Jessi has Misty. They feel their parents treat them like kids even though they convinced their parents to let them to get their ear pierced. They love to read horse stories. The last difference is that Mallory's white and Jessi's the African-American.

Remember when I said Logan's one of the associate members? Well, the other one is Kristy's friend and neighbor, Shannon Kilbourne. She has two younger sisters, Tiffany and Maria. Like me and Dawn, Shannon has blue eyes and blonde hair.

Dawn came at five-twenty-five without Mary Anne, which was unusual, because they always come together.

"Where's Mary Anne?" asked Kristy.

"We have a tragedy here: my mom just threw Mary Anne out for no reason," replied Dawn.

"What! Why?" asked Kristy.

"My mom and Mary Anne haven't gotten along lately. I don't know what it is," continued Dawn.

"Uh-oh. What did Mr. Spier have to say about this?" asked Claudia.

"She's heading straight to his law office now to see him. In fact, he's getting worried about the relationship," replied Dawn.

"Sharon needs a lot of explaining about why she threw out my best friend," said Kristy.

"Tell me about it," said Claudia.

"Mom's lucky it's not winter or raining because Mary Anne had no jacket on when she got thrown out," said Dawn.

"I know otherwise she could get sick with a cold and your mother could get the blame," added Kristy as the rest of us agreed.

"What's going on here?" asked Mallory when she and Jessi arrived from baby-sitting Mallory's siblings.

"We just found out Sharon threw Mary Anne out for nothing," replied Claudia.

"What!" exclaimed Mallory and Jessi.

"Mr. Spier is going to flip out on Sharon," said Jessi.

"I know," agreed Kristy.

"Especially since he's been very protective of Mary Anne," said Dawn.

"Plus where she would go?" asked Mallory.

"I agree on that," said Dawn.