Suddenly I realized I had made plans to hang out with Josh. Somehow that had slipped my mind. "Oh, wow," I exclaimed, "I totally forgot!" I knelt beside my bag and tried to stuff in one more book. No matter how I arranged and rearranged them, only four of the five I needed would fit.

    "Totally forgot what?" Josh knelt beside me and tugged on the book I was still holding. I let go, and he ended up sitting down unexpectedly in the middle of the hall. All of us, including Josh, laughed again. "I was going to do that to you," he said, standing up and brushing off the seat of his jeans.

    "I beat you to it." I smiled at him, glad to see him after a long day.

    Josh flashed me a grin and tucked my book under his arm. "You ready?" I looked at Jeannie, Joanna, and Shira standing on one side of me and Josh standing on the other. Then I looked at my watch and calculated how much time was left before I had to be at my Baby-sitters Club meeting - and came up with, well, not enough to shop with my friends, and hang out with Josh. The BSC meets at my house every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoon at five-thirty (more about this later). The club members are close friends of mine too. Sometimes I feel as though I need two or three more of me to be able to spend enough time with all my friends.

    "Ready for what?" Joanna asked.

    Josh looked from me to the girls, his smile fading. "Claudia? We have plans, right?" I nodded.

    "But you said you were going shopping with us!" Shira said.

    I nodded again.

    "No problem," said Joanna. "You can come shopping with us, Josh." Joanna, who's super-organized (she's president of the seventh-grade class), always has an answer. She grabbed my math book out of my backpack and headed for the door.