Before they did, something exciting occurred to me.

"Hey, Mom, are you pregnant? You are, aren't you?" I exclaimed. My parents always wanted to have another kid after they had me, but they hadn't been able to. Maybe I was* finally going to be a big sister.

Dad smiled ruefully. "I wish that were the truth," he said, "but it isn't. I think I better tell you what's really going on before you imagine us colonizing Mars or something."

I giggled.

"All right," he went on. "This is the truth. Do you remember when my company opened the branch inStamford ?"

"Yes," I replied. "Right before we moved here."

Dad nodded. "Well, the new branch isn't doing well at all. The company has decided to get rid of it —"

"Oh, no! You lost your job!" I cried. Frantically, I began to calculate how much money I had saved from baby-sitting jobs, and how far it could be stretched.

"Not quite," said Dad. "They're combining theStamford branch with theBoston branch. And I'm being transferred back toNew York ."

After I dropped my knife onto my plate, a silence fell over the room. The room, in fact,

became so silent that I could hear theMarshalls ' dog barking two houses away.

"Stacey?" said my mom gently. "We know this is a surprise, but think how much you've missedNew York ."

"I know, I know. I am thinking about that." I really had missed New York, even though my last few months there had been pretty unhappy, what with doctor visits, and friends who'd become former friends, and even a couple of stays in the hospital. On the other hand, I liked Stoneybrook a lot. I didn't have any former friends here, only true, good friends — except for Howie and Dori, the Jerk Twins. And I had the Baby-sitters Club and Charlotte Johanssen and a school I liked and a whole big house, instead of a not-so-big, tenth-floor apartment.