Claudia Gets Her Guy

  Special thanks

  to the helpful staff at

  Central Vermont Adult Basic

  Education for their

  expertise.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Acknowledgment

  About the Author

  Also Available

  Copyright

  “Aaahhh! Peace at last!” With a huge sigh of relief, I flung myself down on the couch. It was nearly ten, and I had finally, finally managed to tuck all three Rodowsky boys into their beds. With any luck, the rest of my Saturday night would be quiet and relaxing.

  THUMP! CRASH!

  I glanced toward the ceiling. The noises had come from upstairs. Not a good sign. I held my breath and crossed my fingers.

  “Claudia!”

  Jackie’s voice. Big surprise.

  I rolled off the couch and stood up. “Coming!” I called, trying to sound cheerful and patient, like the professional baby-sitter I am.

  I ran up the stairs. Jackie, who’s seven, was walking down the hall toward me. That was the good news — he could still walk. The bad news? He was rubbing his elbow.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “I fell out of bed,” Jackie answered, sniffing a little. His red hair was tousled, his freckles stood out against his pale skin, and he looked unbelievably cute in his black-and-white-plaid flannel pj’s. “I think I broke my funny bone.”

  I nodded seriously. I didn’t know if the funny bone was breakable, but if it was, Jackie would be the kid to break his. He is the most accident-prone child I’ve ever met. My friends and I, who belong to the Baby-sitters Club, or BSC, have a nickname for Jackie. We call him the Walking Disaster.

  “Let’s take a look,” I said, kneeling down next to Jackie. I had a feeling — call it baby-sitter’s intuition — that he was probably okay. I knew he’d had a bad bump, but if he had really broken something I figured he’d be screaming in pain. Carefully, I pushed up his pajama sleeve and inspected the elbow. I didn’t see any swelling or bruising. “Can you move it?” I asked.

  Tentatively, Jackie moved his arm. “Uh-huh,” he said.

  I put on a very serious look. “In that case, I don’t think we’ll have to perform a funny-bone transplant,” I said.

  Jackie cracked up.

  “What happened?” Shea, Jackie’s older brother (he’s nine), rubbed his eyes as he walked down the hall toward us.

  “Jackie fell out of bed, but he’s okay,” I said, standing up and putting my hands on Jackie’s shoulders. I steered him toward his room. “Time for everybody to get back into bed.”

  I tucked Jackie in again, made sure Shea was settled, and lowered the dimmer switch on the hall lights. I was heading down the stairs when I heard a little voice call my name.

  “Claudia?”

  It was Archie, the youngest Rodowsky boy. He’s four.

  I sighed. “What is it?”

  “I’m thirsty.”

  “Okay,” I called, turning away from the stairs. “Stay in bed, and I’ll bring you a glass of water.”

  A few minutes later, I plopped down on the couch again. Before I relaxed totally, I listened for noises from upstairs.

  Not a peep.

  “Aaahh,” I said, leaning back. It’s funny. I love baby-sitting, mostly because I love hanging out with kids. But I also like this part, the time when the kids are in bed and I have a chance to relax. It’s always fun to hang out on another family’s couch, read their magazines, and check out the contents of their fridge (if you have permission, that is).

  The Rodowskys have a very nice couch (it’s covered in old, worn brown leather), excellent magazines (Vogue, Glamour, and People, to name a few), and awesome snacks (they’d left me some Chunky Monkey ice cream in the freezer).

  I thought about fixing myself a bowl of ice cream but decided to wait until later. Instead, I picked up a magazine and began to leaf through it, keeping one ear out for sounds from upstairs. There were no thumps or cries, and soon I began to relax. My thoughts drifted away from the quiet, peaceful house and across town to a noisy, crowded gym.

  The gym was in Stoneybrook Middle School (or SMS), where I am in the eighth grade. Most of my friends were at a party there that night. A farewell party for Mr. Zizmore, one of the math teachers.

  Maybe I should stop for a second and introduce myself. My name, in case you haven’t guessed, is Claudia. Claudia Kishi. I’m thirteen, and, as I said, I’m in the eighth grade. I’m Japanese-American, and I’ve lived in Stoneybrook, Connecticut, all my life. I have an older sister named Janine, who has an IQ the size of Jupiter (she’s a certified genius). My dad’s an investment banker, not that I have much of a clue about what that means, and my mom’s a librarian. Her mother, my grandmother Mimi, used to live with us. I was very, very close to Mimi, and it was hard for me when she died. I still miss her and think of her just about every day.

  Mimi understood how important art is to me. Art is a huge part of my life. I love making it, thinking about it, looking at it. I can lose myself in making a collage or staring at a van Gogh. I love to explore different kinds of art: sculpting, drawing, painting, and making jewelry. Last week I even did some finger painting, something I hadn’t done in awhile. It was a blast!

  Mimi would have had her sleeves rolled up and her hands in the finger paint with me. I can’t see my mom or dad doing that. They’re proud of my artistic talents, but I think it would mean more to them if I were an exceptional student like Janine.

  That will happen when pigs sprout wings.

  I don’t hate school, but I don’t see the point of most of the stuff we learn. Take math. I can’t understand what all those X’s and Y’s have to do with real life. And I definitely believe that good spelling is overrated as an important skill. I mean, my spelling is about as bad as it gets, but people seem to understand what I’m writing about. Most of the time. My friends do, anyway.

  Not that I’m so sure about who my friends are these days. My oldest friends, Kristy Thomas and Mary Anne Spier, are still good buds. But my best friend, Stacey McGill? Things just aren’t the same with her lately.

  In fact, things have changed a lot. I guess we’re not best friends anymore. We weren’t even speaking to each other until recently. We’re talking again now but not the way we used to talk. When we were best friends, we could talk about absolutely anything. I trusted her with my deepest, darkest secrets, and she trusted me with hers. Plus, we used to make each other laugh; we could giggle together for hours. These days, we talk more the way Janine and I talk. That is, we’re pleasant to each other, but sort of polite.

  It feels weird. Very weird.

  Stacey and I bonded instantly when she first moved to Stoneybrook from New York City. We share a love of fashion, and we both adore shopping. I thought Stacey was the coolest, most sophisticated girl I’d ever known. Our friendship lasted through all kinds of tough times too — her parents’ divorce and Mimi’s death and when Stacey had some trouble with her diabetes.

  So what happened? I’m almost embarrassed to tell you. But here goes.

  A boy came between us. A boy named Jeremy. Jeremy Rudolph. He’s new at SMS, and he’s the cutest, sweetest guy in school. I had a major, major crush on him from the moment I first saw him. And Stacey knew it. But did that stop her from going out with him?
>
  Take a guess.

  According to her, it’s not her fault. See, she had a crush on him too. And when he asked her out, after telling her that he saw me as “just a friend,” how could she say no?

  Excuse me. I’m getting mad just thinking about it. Sometimes I still can’t believe that Stacey would stoop so low.

  By the way, did I mention that she already had a boyfriend when she moved in on Jeremy? She was going out with this guy Ethan, who lives in New York. I guess she didn’t have any more loyalty to him than she did to me. She says that she and Ethan had decided to cool it for a while just before Jeremy asked her out. Sure.

  Anyway, she and I had this absolutely humongous fight. She said some really awful things to me, things I’ll never be able to forget. And I guess I slammed into her too. To be honest, I think there were problems in our friendship before Jeremy ever came along. Maybe we would have had that fight eventually even if he hadn’t entered the picture.

  Ever since then, we’ve spent a lot of time avoiding each other. But I refuse to avoid Jeremy. He and I are friends, whether Stacey likes it or not. We can really talk to each other. I like his company and he likes mine. To tell you the truth, I think he and I have more in common than he and Stacey do — but I’m not going to go there. He’s Stacey’s boyfriend, and I am trying to accept and respect that.

  Especially since Stacey and I sort of made up recently. We’re trying to get past the Jeremy incident and be friends again, but I have a feeling it’s not going to be easy. As you might be able to tell, I still feel pretty angry at her sometimes. And I think she’s still mad at me too. She thinks I should be more understanding. If Jeremy didn’t want to go out with me, what did it matter if she went out with him? That’s her way of seeing things.

  So. All of this may help explain why I didn’t mind missing the party that night. How much fun would it have been to watch Stacey and Jeremy having a blast together all evening? Sitting for the Rodowskys sounded like a much better time. For that matter, sitting on a beehive sounded like a better time!

  I smiled to myself — just as I heard the front door open. I glanced at my watch. Time had flown. Mr. and Mrs. Rodowsky were already home, and I hadn’t even dug into the Chunky Monkey or finished looking at Vogue. Instead, I’d been spacing out and thinking about Stacey and Jeremy. Oh, well. I yawned and stretched and stood up to welcome the Rodowskys.

  Half an hour later, I was in the kitchen at my house, having a late-night snack and staring at a note my mom had left for me. It said Mary Anne had called about fifteen minutes earlier and that I should call her first thing in the morning. She had “big news.”

  Darn. Why was Mary Anne’s father so strict about late-night phone calls? There was nothing I could do but go to bed, wondering what the “big news” might be….

  I woke up bright and early on Sunday morning. Well, maybe most people wouldn’t consider ten-thirty “bright and early,” but for me it is. You’re supposed to sleep in on weekend mornings. It’s, like, a law of nature or something. I’ll never understand Janine, who thinks it’s fun to wake up at the crack of dawn for an early Saturday morning breakfast with her study group. You’ll never catch me comparing chemistry lab notes at eight A.M. (You probably wouldn’t catch me doing that any time, but that’s beside the point.)

  As soon as I opened my eyes, I remembered Mary Anne’s “big news.” I decided to head to her house right after breakfast. I thought I could smell pancakes on the griddle downstairs, and my stomach was rumbling.

  I pulled on my favorite old cargo pants and a thermal shirt I’d tie-dyed in all the colors of the sunset and went downstairs. Sure enough, my dad was at the stove, flipping pancakes. “Good morning,” he said. “Three or four?”

  “Five,” I answered. “I’m starving.” I held out a plate, and he flipped a stack of blueberry pancakes onto it.

  “Didn’t they feed you over at the Rodowskys’ last night?” he asked with a grin. “I thought they always had Ben & Jerry’s on hand for you.”

  I’ve made a point of telling my parents about the good stuff other families have in their freezers and fridges and cupboards. Why? Because my folks don’t believe in junk food. My mom’s idea of a treat is a perfectly ripe cantaloupe.

  I, on the other hand, do believe in junk food. Doritos rule, and nothing beats a Mallomar. If anyone ever developed a junk-food scope that could detect sugary, salty, greasy, yummy snacks, the meter would go wild in my room. I’ve hidden that kind of stuff all over. There are Snickers bars in my sock drawer, Gummi Bears behind the books on my bookshelf, and M&M’S under the mattress.

  “They had ice cream, but I passed on it,” I told my dad.

  He raised his eyebrows and reached out to feel my forehead. “Are you feeling okay?” he asked.

  I laughed. Then I sat down at the table for some serious pigging out.

  The pancakes were terrific. I told my dad so as I brought my plate to the sink and rinsed it off. He asked what I was doing that morning. “I’m going over to Mary Anne’s,” I answered.

  “Her new house must be almost finished. You’ll miss having her next door,” he said.

  He was right. It had been fun having Mary Anne so nearby. It was sort of like old times. When she and Kristy and I were little kids, we all lived here on Bradford Court. Then they moved away, Kristy to live across town in this huge mansion that belongs to her new stepfather, and Mary Anne to a big old farmhouse that belonged to her stepmother.

  I say “belonged” because that farmhouse doesn’t exist anymore. It burned to the ground not long ago, which was traumatic for Mary Anne. Now her family is rebuilding, and while they’re waiting to move in to the new house they’re living next door to me. (My neighbors are away for a year, so Mary Anne’s family is renting their house temporarily.)

  As I crossed my yard to Mary Anne’s, my curiosity began to grow. What was her big news about? I had a funny feeling — but I tried not to think about it.

  She answered the door when I knocked. “So?” I asked. “What is it?”

  Mary Anne took a breath. “You know how I hate gossip,” she began.

  It was true. Mary Anne is a very sensitive, caring person. She doesn’t like to talk about people behind their backs. “I know,” I said. “But you’re going to tell me anyway, aren’t you?”

  She gave me a tiny smile. “Come on in,” she said, leading me up to her room.

  When we were settled in on a comfy window seat, she said, “It’s about Stacey and Jeremy.”

  “I knew it!” I exclaimed.

  Mary Anne looked startled. “You did? Who did you hear it from?”

  “Nobody. I mean, I still don’t know exactly what you’re going to tell me.”

  “They broke up.”

  “Wow,” I said, trying to take it in. My stomach felt strange and my heart was racing.

  Mary Anne nodded. “I know. See? I told you it was big news.”

  “So tell me more,” I said. “Who broke up with who?” Suddenly, this piece of information seemed very, very important.

  She shrugged. “I’m not sure, but I think it was mutual. They seemed fine with it. They stayed at the party, but they didn’t hang out with each other. And it looked like they were both having a good time.”

  I could picture Stacey talking with other boys. Had Jeremy talked with other girls?

  I swallowed. “Jeremy didn’t seem upset?”

  Mary Anne shook her head. “Not really. He was just hanging out, joking around with the guys — you know.”

  So maybe he hadn’t talked with other girls.

  Would he have talked with me if I’d been there?

  Should I even be thinking about it? After all, the breakup wasn’t about me. It was between Stacey and Jeremy, and it didn’t have anything to do with me.

  Did it?

  Mary Anne and I talked for a while more, about the breakup and the dance and how it had felt for her to be there alone (she recently broke up with her longtime boyfriend, Logan Bruno
). Finally, she told me she’d promised to help her dad with some errands. “Are you okay?” she asked as I left. “I mean, I can understand that you might feel a little strange about all of this.”

  “Thanks, but I’m fine,” I said. “And thanks for letting me know about it.” We hugged, and I headed home to think.

  In my room, I took out my watercolors and set up a big pad of newsprint on my easel. Sometimes drawing or painting helps me when I need to think. When I make art, I’m relaxed. And when I’m relaxed, I can figure things out.

  Sometimes.

  Not that morning, though. As I dipped my brush into the paint and created swirls of color, my thoughts continued to race. I didn’t know how to deal with what I’d just heard from Mary Anne. Normally, whenever something important happened to me, the first thing I would do was call Stacey. My best friend.

  But I couldn’t call Stacey. In fact, I didn’t even want to. She and I couldn’t talk the way we used to — especially about this subject.

  I couldn’t call Jeremy either.

  I would have liked to. If I were really his friend, I would have called. And I am his friend. (I almost reached for the phone.) Unless … could I be something more? (I pulled my hand back.)

  Jeremy had made it very clear that he didn’t like me in that way. He cared about me, I knew that. But he didn’t like like me. He was only interested in me as a friend.

  But … that was before we’d gotten to know each other better. My thoughts drifted to some of the phone conversations we’d had recently, in which we’d talked about anything and everything. I remembered the biography project we’d worked on together at school and thought about all the things we’d learned about each other.

  I felt my heart racing again. Maybe Jeremy had changed his mind. Maybe he was interested in me in that other way. Maybe — maybe that was why he had broken up with Stacey.

  The thought made me so agitated that I knocked over my glass of water. As I raced to the bathroom for towels to clean up the mess, I scolded myself. I had to forget about Jeremy and what he might be thinking. I’d know soon enough, when I saw him. In the meantime, there was no point in torturing myself.