"Babysitters Club 028 Welcome Back, Stacey!" - читать интересную книгу автора (Babysitters Club)

The phone rang twice.
A familiar voice answered it.
"Hello, Claud?" I said.
Chapter 4.
I was a little nervous about calling right in the middle of a BSC meeting. Kristy likes the meetings to be strictly meetings - since they are only half an hour long - and she doesn't like to tie up the phone with nonclub business. But nobody seemed to mind my call too much (especially not Claudia).
"Stacey?" Claudia replied, after I'd said hello.
"Yeah, it's me."
Right away, Claudia's emotional antennae must have gone up. Mary Anne's are always up (that's why she's so sensitive to people), but Claud's come up instantly when someone she cares about is having a hard time. "What's wrong?" she asked. "Something's wrong, isn't it?"
"Yes. Can you talk for a minute? I know I called during a meeting, but ..."
"Just a sec," said Claudia hurriedly.
I heard some funny sounds. First a muffled one that was probably Claud putting her hand over the receiver, then some scufflings and murmurings that were probably Claudia and Kristy arguing over whether to allow a personal call during a meeting. Claudia won quickly.
"Hi, Stace," she said, a bit breathlessly. "Okay, go ahead. What's wrong?"
"Well," I began, "it's - it's my parents." This was hard to talk about over the phone. I wished my friends were right there with me.
"Your parents?" Claudia repeated. "Is one of them sick or something?"
"Oh, no. Nothing like that." (I knew Claud was thinking of Mimi, the hospital, and the funeral.) "It's just that they fight so much. And the fights are getting bigger. Today I came home and Dad was already there and I stood out in the hallway and listened to them yell at each other. They were yelling awful things, Claud."
"What kinds of things?" she whispered.
I told her about the jewelry bills and Mom calling Dad a workaholic and everything else I could remember.
"Gosh," said Claudia when I'd finished. "That sounds serious."
"I know," I replied. I could feel the tears starting again, but I don't like to cry over the phone, so I put a stop to them.
"I'm not sure what to say," Claud went on. "My parents have never had a fight like that. They always just try to discuss things. You know what? Maybe you should talk to Dawn.
Her parents fought a lot before she left California. Nobody else's parents have big problems." Claudia paused. "What?" she said to somebody in the background. Then, "Oh." She got back on the phone. "Kristy says to tell you that when her real father was living with them the Thomases fought an awful lot, but Kristy was too little to remember much of it. Here, let me put Dawn on."
There were more scufflings and murmurings in the background, and I pictured Kristy looking at Claud's clock and tapping her fingers on the arm of the director's chair I was sure she was sitting in. (She always sits in the director's chair, wearing a visor.) But after just a moment, Dawn was on the phone.
"Hi, Stace," she said. "I'm really sorry you're having some problems."
"Thanks," I replied, "but it's my parents, not me."
"When they make you feel bad, it's your problem, too. Believe me, I know. So what's going on?"
"What isn't?" I answered bitterly. I wanted to tell Dawn everything, but suddenly I just couldn't. That mental picture of an impatient Kristy kept creeping into my mind. Plus, I felt funny telling Dawn my parents' business. In
fact, I felt pretty funny knowing that the entire club already knew my business. I wanted their comfort and support - but I didn't necessarily want to turn myself inside out for it. Maybe calling during a meeting hadn't been such a good idea after all.
I cleared my throat. "Well, Mom and Dad are just fighting all the time," I told Dawn. "Over everything."
"Money and stuff?"
"Yeah," I said.
"Their relationship?"
"Yeah."
"You?"
"Yeah."
"Oh, that's a bad sign."
Okay, enough of this. I changed the subject immediately. "So how's Jeff?"
"Jeff? My brother?"
"Who else?"
We giggled. Maybe the conversation had been getting too heavy for both of us.
"He's fine," said Dawn. "Mom and Dad let us call each other whenever we want, but it's hard because of the time difference. I can't call too early in the morning because then it's really early in California, and Jeff can't call after eight at night because it's after eleven here. Still,
he's back in California with Dad, which is great for him. . . . What?" (Another conversation with someone at the meeting.) Then, "Stace? Mary Anne wants to say hello, okay?"
"Sure." I turned to Laine while I waited for Mary Anne, and said, "I'll pay you back every penny of this call. I promise."
Laine smiled. "No problem," she said.
"Stacey?" I heard an excited voice in my ear. It was Mary Anne's, and it occurred to me that the last time I'd spoken to any of my Stoneybrook friends, except for Claudia, had been on the day of Mimi's funeral. I wished we could talk or get together under ordinary circumstances.
"Hi, Mary Anne!" I tried to liven up a bit.
"You want to talk?" she asked gently.
"Yes," I replied, "but not about Mom and Dad anymore."
"Okay." (This is one thing I love about Mary Anne. She doesn't press issues, and she respects people's wishes.)
"So how's Logan?" I asked.
"Oh, he's fine. Or, as Logan would say, he's 'fan.' " We laughed. Logan is from Louisville, Kentucky, and has this neat southern accent.