Ann Martin: Stacey And The Haunted Masquerade

Stacey And The Haunted Masquerade

Ann M. Martin

Chapter 1.

"Stacey?"

"Here!" I called out. Then I continued to draw suns, planets, stars, and hearts on the front cover of my social studies notebook. It was a bright, sunny fall morning, and I was sitting in creative doodling class, otherwise known as homeroom.

Homeroom. What a strange name. It’s a room, all right, but it’s nothing like home. Unless your home happens to have chalkboards, fluorescent lights, and seven rows of barely awake eighth-graders who are whispering, passing notes, brushing their hair, or scrambling to finish the last three questions of their math homework, while a teacher (Ms. Levine, in my case) tries to take attendance, keep some order, and make announcements.

I don't know about you, but, thankfully, my home isn't anything like that. For one thing,

my mom hardly ever takes attendance. Just kidding.)

I mostly use homeroom as a time to gather myself together for the day. None of my good friends is in my homeroom, so I don't have anybody to whisper with or pass notes to. (Sheila McGregor and I used to pass notes back and forth, but we don't anymore, which is a long story I'll tell to you some other time.) I always take care of my hair and clothes before I leave the house in the morning, since both of those things are pretty important to me, so I'm never brushing my hair or checking my outfit in the classroom. And I never leave my math homework unfinished. English homework, maybe, but never math. I actually like math, and I'm good at it, so I usually breeze right through any assignments.

I always sit next to Sheila McGregor in homeroom. Why? Because my name is Stacey McGill, which means Sheila and I are alphabetically related. Like Sheila, I'm thirteen, and I go to SMS —StoneybrookMiddle School— which is inStoneybrook,Connecticut. Unlike Sheila, and unlike most of my classmates, I did not grow up in Stoneybrook. I grew up inNew York City, inManhattan. (My parents are divorced, and my dad still lives inNew York. Even though I chose to live in Stoneybrook with my mom, I still visit him there as

often as I can.) And, not to be a snob about it, my urban roots do set me apart a little from the rest of the SMS student body. It’s not that I'm better than them, it’s just that I've seen more (including sad things, such as homeless people, and terrific things, such as the Caribbean Day parade) and done more (not too many kids in my class can say they've been to the opera, or to an exhibit of French avant-garde painters) than a lot of Connecticut kids my age.

I don't think I'm really all that different, though. Oh, sure, maybe I dress with a little more style and sophistication (I love to shop), and maybe my perm is a little wilder than most (my long blonde hair looks best when it’s super curly), but basically I'm just your average, everyday teenager.

Except for one thing. I have diabetes. In case you don't know what that is, it’s a lifelong disease, and a pretty serious one. My body doesn't make this stuff called insulin, which is necessary for processing sugars and carbohydrates. That means two things: one, I have to give myself insulin to make up for the fact that I don't produce it myself (I inject it, which isn't nearly as big a deal as you'd think), and two, I have to keep a very close eye on my blood sugar, which I do by testing my blood regularly and by being extremely careful about

what I eat. I have to keep track of every bit of food I consume, every day. And sweets are pretty much out. When we first found out I had diabetes, my parents were incredibly over-protective, especially since I'm an only child. They've eased off a bit, because I've taken more and more responsibility for caring for myself. By now, it’s almost routine. But even so, diabetes is a major part of my life.

It’s only a part, though. I don't see myself as a sick person at all. I can do anything my friends can do (except pig out on chocolate bars), and I try never to let my diabetes bother me. And, while I'm definitely not glad I have diabetes, I think dealing with it has helped me grow up a bit faster than some of my classmates.

Take Todd "Totally Immature" Long, for example. Half the time he still acts like a fifth-grader. That morning in homeroom, he was trying his hardest to drive Ms. Levine nuts by clicking his ballpoint pen about seventy zillion times a minute. Every time she looked up to see where the sound was coming from, he'd stop and give her this innocent smile. Then, when she looked down at her attendance sheet again, his smile would turn into a devilish grin and he'd start clicking again. Ms. Levine finally decided to ignore the noise, which was the smartest thing for her to do.

I ignored him, too. I blocked out that irritating clicking noise by humming my current favorite song, "Sister Sally" (by the group Great Blue Whales) as I doodled on my notebook. By then I was drawing linked hearts with the caption S. M. + R. B. = LUV. My boyfriend's name is Robert Brewster, and I really do luv him. In fact, he's the most luv-able guy I've ever met. I drew a string of hearts across the top of the back of my notebook, and I was trying to decide if I should keep going and cover the whole notebook with them when suddenly a storm of static erupted from the loudspeaker over the classroom door.

"Yow!" yelled Todd, clapping his hands over his ears.

"Why can't they fix that thing?" cried Sheila.

I wondered the same thing. I have never heard one announcement at SMS that didn't start with an earsplittmg burst of static. It usually doesn't last long, though, and it didn't that morning. Soon, I could hear a voice through the noise. It was Mr. Kingbridge, our assistant principal. Mr. Kingbridge is okay, except for the fact that he has no fashion sense. I mean none. He wears the most ridiculous ties, the silliest jackets, and the ugliest shoes I've ever seen. At an awards night one year, he won the prize for worst dressed. I've thought of offering to be his fashion consultant, but I can't figure out how to do that without insulting him. After all, he's an adult. Supposedly, he should know how to dress himself by now.

Anyway, that morning the static took over the first part of his message, but we heard the tail end of it. "Go, Chargers!" he said enthusiastically. That meant he'd been talking about the SMS football team. I glanced at Sheila, who is a cheerleader. She was wearing a big "Go Chargers" button. She glanced back at me, and then looked away quickly. I don't think she has ever understood why I once turned down a chance to be on the cheerleading sClaud, or why Robert, who used to be on the basketball team, quit (he hated the special treatment athletes are given, and thought it was unfair). I think she does understand why I stopped hanging out with her and her friends, though.

Sometimes I don't understand why I ever wanted to be part of Sheila's group. I went through a very confusing time recently, when I thought I might be outgrowing my old friends, who belong to a dub called the BSC (for Baby-sitters Club — more about that later). I'm ashamed to say that I treated those old friends horribly. But I'm happy to say that they eventually forgave me when I discovered

that my "new" friends (Sheila's crowd) were not the kind of people I wanted to hang out with. I'm a member of the BSC again (I wasn't, for a while), and that makes me happy.

Anyway, back to Mr. Kingbridge. As usual, he was blabbing on and on, and nobody in the room was paying much attention to him. But then he said something that made us all sit up and listen. Something about a dance. A Halloween masquerade, to be exact. The first one to be held at SMS in twenty-eight years, according to Mr. Kingbridge. Immediately, even before I heard any of the details, I loved the idea. I mean, I'm way too old to be dressing up for Halloween, right? But part of me — the kid in me, I guess — misses the chance to be somebody else, just for a night. I began to think about costumes. I could be Cleopatra, and Robert could be Antony. Or we could be Bonnie and Clyde, or Jack Sprat and his wife. And if Robert weren't into dressing up, so what? I could be Marilyn Monroe or Wonder Woman. I could be anybody!