“Well, if you must know, yes, I do. Nothing would make me happier.”
“So you think I should go?”
“Jessica, Jessica,” Aunt Cecelia said with a sigh. “What can I say? I will never stand in the way of your future. But everything in its time, darling. And you have a lot of time on your hands. Think about that.”
Aunt Cecelia’s words stuck in my brain.
I thought about time. And timing.
I guess you have to, when you’re making the biggest decision of your life.
Dance New York really had happened at the right time in my life. It had given me so much. It had made me feel happy and confident. It had made me realize I could live away from home. Be a leader.
Now I had the opportunity to go back. For more of the same thing. Was this happening at the right time too?
Sure, I’d have to give up some things. My walks to school. The Baby-sitters Club. Seeing my little brother and sister every day. Evenings around the dinner table. Graduating from Stoneybrook Middle School with my best friends. Spending my teen years in my own house with my family. My best friend.
What would I gain? A better chance of being a professional dancer someday.
Maybe.
Tanisha had said most of the students don’t make it. And everyone knows that ballet stars come from all over the country. They train in many different places. Places like the Stamford Ballet School.
This was so confusing. Images from the past month were tumbling around in my head.
I thought about Quint. About how he wanted so badly to be my boyfriend. How afraid I’d been! How scared that he’d hate me for telling him the truth.
But I’d stuck to my convictions. I’d had to. And Quint had understood. Nothing awful had happened. We’re still friends. The timing just wasn’t right for anything more.
Timing is important.
Very important.
“A penny for your thoughts,” Aunt Cecelia said.
I took a deep breath.
“I’ve made up my mind,” I declared.
I was surprised at my own words. But the jumble was beginning to clear.
“Oh?”
“I’m going to accept —”
“Oh, dear,” Aunt Cecelia muttered. “I do not plan to be within a mile of this house when your father and mother arrive home.”
“When I’m a little older,” I continued.
Aunt Cecelia squinted at me. “Beg pardon?”
“It’s timing, Aunt Cecelia. Right now, I belong here. With you and Becca and Squirt and Mama and Daddy —”
“Yes, of course you do, but —”
“Don’t try to change my mind. I’m not going to give up dancing. Mr. Brailsford said the offer will stay open. So until then, I’ll go to class and get better and better. And maybe someday …” I shrugged.
“Off to the big time,” Aunt Cecelia said.
“Right.”
“I like the way you think, Jessica.” Aunt Cecelia smiled. “Now, if you would only give your cousin another little nudge about his artwork….”
I gave Aunt Cecelia a big kiss on the cheek and ran to my room.
I didn’t let her finish her sentence.
But she didn’t mind.
I could tell.
* * *
Dear Reader,
In Jessi’s Big Break, Jessi has the adventure of her ballet lifetime. Not only does she get to attend a prestigious ballet school but she gets to live in New York City with a group of new friends with whom she has a lot in common. Jessi finds she loves living in Brooklyn and that being a kid in New York is not as different from being a kid in Stoneybrook as she had thought it would be. She can visit her friends at their apartments. They can order pizza and have a party. She also finds that, unlike in Stoneybrook, she can order in any kind of food at any hour of the day. Plus, she can go to a movie — or she can go to a Broadway show, a jazz club, a museum, or an art gallery. Instead of being driven in a car when she wants to go somewhere, she can take the subway.
Being a kid in New York is exciting! Jessi loved every minute of her visit. You can see why she had a hard time deciding whether to leave Dance NY!
Happy reading,
* * *
The author gratefully acknowledges
Peter Lerangis
for his help in
preparing this manuscript.
About the Author
ANN MATTHEWS MARTIN was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane.
There are currently over 176 million copies of The Baby-sitters Club in print. (If you stacked all of these books up, the pile would be 21,245 miles high.) In addition to The Baby-sitters Club, Ann is the author of two other series, Main Street and Family Tree. Her novels include Belle Teal, A Corner of the Universe (a Newbery Honor book), Here Today, A Dog’s Life, On Christmas Eve, Everything for a Dog, Ten Rules for Living with My Sister, and Ten Good and Bad Things About My Life (So Far). She is also the coauthor, with Laura Godwin, of the Doll People series.
Ann lives in upstate New York with her dog and her cats.
Copyright © 1998 by Ann M. Martin
Cover art by Hodges Soileau
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, THE BABY-SITTERS CLUB, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
First edition, January 1998
e-ISBN 978-0-545-87428-1
Ann M. Martin, Jessi's Big Break
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