Bad News/Good News Read online

  Katani Summers

  a.k.a. Kgirl…Katani has a strong fashion sense and business savvy. She is stylish, loyal & cool.

  Avery Madden

  Avery is passionate about all sports and animal rights. Sheis energetic, optimistic & outspoken.

  Charlotte Ramsey

  A self-acknowledged “klutz” and an aspiring writer, Charlotte is all too familiar with being the new kid in town. She is intelligent, worldly & curious.

  Isabel Martinez

  Her ambition is to be an artist. She was the last to join the Beacon Street Girls. She is artistic, sensitive & kind.

  Maeve Kaplan-Taylor

  Maeve wants to be a movie star. Bubbly and upbeat, she wears her heart on her sleeve. She is entertaining, friendly & fun.

  Ms. Razzberry Pink

  The stylishly pink proprietor of the “Think Pink” boutique is chic, gracious & charming.

  Marty

  The adopted best dog friend of the Beacon Street Girls is feisty, cuddly & suave.

  Happy Lucky Thingy and alter ego Mad Nasty Thingy Marty’s favorite chew toy, it is known to reveal its alter ego when shaken too roughly. He is most often happy.

  more on beaconstreetgirls.com

  Be sure to read all of our books:

  BOOK 1 - worst enemies/best friends

  BOOK 2 - bad news/good news

  BOOK 3 - letters from the heart

  BOOK 4 - out of bounds

  BOOK 5 - promises, promises

  BOOK 6 - lake rescue

  BOOK 7 - freaked out

  BOOK 8 - lucky charm

  BOOK 9 - fashion frenzy

  BOOK 10 - just kidding

  BOOK 11 - ghost town

  BOOK 12 - time’s up

  BSG Special Adventure Books:

  charlotte in paris

  maeve on the red carpet

  freestyle with avery

  katani’s jamaican holiday

  Coming Soon:

  BOOK 13 - green algae and bubble gum wars

  SPECIAL ADVENTURE - isabel’s texas two-step

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are

  used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s

  imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely

  coincidental.

  ALADDIN MIX

  Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  Copyright © 2004 by B*tween Productions, Inc.,

  Home of the Beacon Street Girls

  Beacon Street Girls, Kgirl, B*tween Productions, B*Street, and the characters Maeve,

  Avery, Charlotte, Isabel, Katani, Marty, Nick, Anna, Joline, and Happy Lucky Thingy

  are registered trademarks and/or copyrights of B*tween Productions, Inc.

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  ALADDIN, ALADDIN MIX, and related logo are

  registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Library of Congress Control Number 2008920649

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4391-5958-3

  ISBN-10: 1-4391-5958-0

  Visit us on the World Wide Web:

  http://www.SimonSays.com

  CONTENTS

  Part One Bad News

  CHAPTER 1 CHARLOTTE

  CHAPTER 2 Changing the Rules

  CHAPTER 3 The Fifth Wheel

  CHAPTER 4 Three’s a Crowd

  CHAPTER 5 Try or Not

  CHAPTER 6 The Seventh-Grade Page

  CHAPTER 7 Meeting in the Tower

  CHAPTER 8 Reverse Psychology

  CHAPTER 9 Rules to Live By

  CHAPTER 10 Family Feuds

  Part Two Good News

  CHAPTER 11 The Homeroom Page

  CHAPTER 12 Beacon Street Girls to the Rescue

  CHAPTER 13 Social Dancing

  CHAPTER 14 Girls’ Choice

  CHAPTER 15 The Mysterious Letter

  CHAPTER 16 Emergency Meeting

  CHAPTER 17 Talking It Out

  CHAPTER 18 Finding the Past

  CHAPTER 19 A Day of Memories

  CHAPTER 20 Making the Grade

  CHAPTER 21 Jeri’s Place

  CHAPTER 22 The Room in the Picture

  Bad News/Good News

  Book Club Buzz

  bad news/good news trivialicious trivia

  Part One

  Bad News

  CHAPTER 1

  CHARLOTTE

  Wishes and Jinxes

  Sunday night, way too late

  I know I should be in bed already but I can’t seem to fall asleep. Dad came into my room a few minutes ago and found me out on the balcony, searching the sky for the Seven Sisters—seven stars that travel together around the skies. It’s the constellation that always makes me think of Mom because it was her favorite. Dad’s been working like crazy on his new book and he seemed kind of distracted, but he wanted to kiss me good-night and catch up on how things are going. Dad and I have always been close—we have so many inside jokes. Like one of us will say, “Well…there’s good news and bad news. Which do you want to hear first?” And we always answer together, right at the same time, “Give me the bad news first!” I don’t know why, but that always cracks us both up.

  When Dad asked me what was coming up for this week, I had a whole list. It’s hard to believe that just a few weeks ago, I was brand new here and worried that I was going to have to suffer through seventh grade in a new city without a single friend. When I think back on everything that’s happened—meeting Maeve, Avery, and Katani…all the stuff that we went through before the four of us became such good friends—I feel like the luckiest girl on earth. I’m still not sure what kind of magic turned us from worst enemies into best friends. But it happened, and tonight I feel like Maeve, Katani, Avery, and I are part of a new constellation. Like four stars traveling around together!

  I know I’m getting too big to wish on stars. But, it’s something I started doing with Mom when I was really young. We’d sit outside together until we could see the first star come out. Then we’d trade wishes. She always said the same thing: My wish is for your wish to come true.

  That seems like such a long time ago. I was only four when she died. But even though I’m almost 13 now, wishes still matter. And I…finally feel at home. That’s why, when I saw the first star tonight, I made a wish. Know what it was?

  Let this last. Don’t let anything change how perfect things are right now.

  Later, thinking back on it, Charlotte decided that all of the trouble had started with her journal entry. It’s as if I knew somehow, she thought. It was a jinx. I must have sensed it was all too good to be true.

  But Monday morning, sprinting down Corey Hill through the changing New England leaves, the only problem on Charlotte’s mind was how to make it to school without being late. Big changes of any kind seemed a million miles away.

  “Charlotte! Wait up!” Maeve Kaplan-Taylor called, her long red hair streaming behind her as she hurried to catch up with Charlotte at the corner of Summit Avenue and Beacon Street.

  “Hi, Maeve!” Charlotte slowed her pace down by a fraction of a second, shifting her book bag from one shoulder to the other. “We can’t be late today!” she reminded her friend. “Ms. Rodriguez says she has big news for us this morning in homeroom—remember?”

  It was a beautiful fall morning. The trees lining Beacon Street glinted with gold and red. Crisp and clear, the air felt invigorating as the girls hurried together past the bright-colored storefronts on their way to school. Ordinarily Charlotte liked to take her time as she
ambled down Beacon Street, which ran beside the trolley tracks leading east into the city. Her walk to school had already become a familiar routine—stopping at Montoya’s Bakery for one of their kid-sized blueberry muffins and waving to her new friend Yuri, the Russian man who ran the small grocery store at the corner. He was often outside in the morning rinsing off the stacks of red and green apples in the open cases lining the front of his shop. Sometimes she even had time to stop and check out the new books in the window of her favorite bookstore.

  But this morning Charlotte was short on time. First, her alarm hadn’t gone off and she’d overslept, thanks to staying up so late writing in her journal. Every attempt to get her hair to look OK failed dismally. One braid kept sticking out like an antenna. Then her shoelaces broke, and the only new ones she could find were magenta. Nice look, she thought wryly, glancing down to see one sneaker with white laces and the other with laces the color of a ripe mango. But thank goodness her vintage jean jacket was just where she left it. That jacket had belonged to Charlotte’s mother, and it always gave her good luck—as if nothing bad could happen to her when she was wearing it. Of course, her copy of To Kill a Mockingbird, which she needed for English class, was wedged under a pile of laundry on the chair in her bedroom. “Oh well…Mondays!” Charlotte sighed.

  Most days, Charlotte and her dad ate breakfast together before he cycled off to Boston University, where he was teaching writing this semester. They took turns making breakfast. Charlotte loved to cook, especially for her dad, who was the world’s most appreciative audience. Her specialty was herbed scrambled eggs with grated French gruyère cheese. If she got up early enough, she could scan the cartoon page of the newspaper and sip hot chocolate while her dad finished his coffee. Not today. This morning Professor Ramsey was running late too. Charlotte was halfway out the door before she remembered that she’d forgotten to kiss Marty—the adorable, floppy-eared dog she and her friends had adopted—good-bye.

  “Marty, you are too cute,” Charlotte chided him, kissing his head as she scooted him back behind the door. He kept trying to follow her, it took three tries to get him to settle down before she could go. “Marty, I promise, little buddy, we’ll have a good long walk when I get home,” Charlotte said as she rushed toward the door. By this point Charlotte was in such a state that she almost plowed smack into Sapphire Pierce, the Ramseys’ landlady, as she dashed out the door.

  Miss Pierce had shaken her head, smiling. “Good morning, Charlotte!” she’d called fondly as Charlotte raced off again like a cyclone. The Ramseys didn’t know Miss Pierce at all when they first moved in—she kept to her own apartment on the first floor, and seemed to be almost a recluse. Now, Charlotte and Miss Pierce were beginning to become friends. Miss Pierce used to be an astronomer at the Hubble Observatory before she retired and moved back to Brookline. She loved talking to Charlotte about the stars, and lately they had started having tea together every once in a while in the afternoons. But this morning there was no time for more than a frantic hello.

  8:05! Charlotte didn’t want to be late, today of all days. She was really curious about Ms. Rodriguez’s exciting news. Not that Charlotte could stand to be a minute late anyway. She loved junior high—now that she felt at home there, and now that she had friends to share it with!

  It was hard to believe that just a few weeks ago, all of this—Brookline, the Abigail Adams Junior High School, even her new home—had felt so strange and unfamiliar. Because of her dad’s career as a travel writer, Charlotte had lived all over the world. Since her mother died, she and her father had been on the move every few years. They were a team—that’s what her father always said. Last year they had even gotten to live in a houseboat on the Seine, the river that runs through the heart of Paris. Before that, they’d lived in Port Douglas, Australia—and before that, in the Serengeti desert in Tanzania, Africa. Other kids always marveled at all the places Charlotte had seen. Charlotte never lost the sense of wonder that came with discovering something (or someone) new. But now that she was almost thirteen, staying in one place and having a real home felt more and more important to her.

  So this time, when her father let Charlotte pick their destination, she’d chosen Brookline, Massachusetts, just a few miles from downtown Boston where she and her mom and dad had lived when she was a baby.

  Charlotte was convinced that this move would be different from any of the others. She was certain that she and her father were going to put down roots this time. After all, they’d found a fabulous house to live in. They were renting the second floor of Miss Pierce’s house, 173 Summit Avenue, a beautiful rambling yellow Victorian with a huge front porch, leaded windows, and lots of charm. Inside, the house was filled with nooks and crannies—thick, carved banisters, oak-pegged floors, and high ceilings. Everything about it reminded Charlotte of another era, from the stained-glass window on the landing to the cozy window seats piled with plump cushions. The house sat high on Corey Hill. From the top floors you could see east to the CITGO sign in Kenmore Square and south all the way to the Charles River. Charlotte had her own balcony off her bedroom where she could look at the stars at night. Even better, the top floor of the house led to an amazing cupola with a tower room that you got to by crawling up through a trap door in the ceiling. It was just like a secret hideaway in a novel!

  Charlotte and her three best friends had found the Tower by accident during an overnight. Once they’d found it, they’d discovered that it made a perfect BFF hangout. The four of them could escape up to the Tower to read, to study, to play music, to tickle Marty—to do anything they felt like. Even before they learned that the Tower used to be a special place for Miss Pierce when she was a girl, it still cast its wonderful spell over them. The Tower was an amazing place to get away from the world and to be alone. Charlotte’s friends had helped her carry her writing desk up to the Tower attic, and she loved working up there on her stories. It was so high up that Charlotte felt like she was floating above the city. It was a wonderful place for inspiration…and the perfect place to look at the stars.

  Stars and books, Charlotte was thinking, as she and Maeve hurried down Harvard Street. Stars and books had always been her best friends. For the first few weeks at Abigail Adams Junior High, Charlotte had worried that they were going to be her only friends. It wasn’t easy getting to know a whole new bunch of kids. Even though everyone else was new to junior high too, most of them knew kids from elementary school to make it all less terrifying. Not Charlotte. She’d been entirely on her own, until…

  As if on cue, she heard Maeve’s voice cutting through her reverie.

  “Hey,” Maeve gasped. She was a little out of breath from trying to keep up with Charlotte. “Can’t we…save some…energy for…when we actually…get…there?”

  Charlotte grinned, pushing her glasses up with the tip of her finger. “School starts in fifteen minutes,” she pointed out. “Remember?”

  Maeve hurried beside her, her green eyes sparkling. “My memory doesn’t work at this speed,” she gasped. “Slow down!”

  Charlotte burst out laughing. Maeve packed so much personality into every phrase. Everything she said seemed to have an exclamation point after it! Maeve was stunning, with long red hair tumbling around her shoulders, big green movie-star eyes, and skin the color of soft peaches. Movie star said it all when it came to Maeve’s biggest passion in life. She loved anything having to do with movies, new or old. Every inch of her backpack was covered with buttons: movie stars, old and new; a bright colored “Yes!”; an “LOL”; and a big “Hollywood Rocks!” button right in the middle. Maeve loved to dress up, rock star style. Today, she’d added a cool new touch—a long knit scarf swinging back over one shoulder. “Filene’s Basement,” she confided to Charlotte, tossing it back behind her. “From the five-dollar bin, can you believe it?”

  Charlotte laughed, looking affectionately at her friend. Drama wasn’t confined to the big screen for Maeve—and bargains weren’t the only things she hunted for! Mae
ve was a real heart-on-her-sleeve girl. At first, this quality had put Charlotte off—she had thought Maeve was boy-crazy. Last month, Maeve had a big crush on Nick Montoya, the easy-going, down-to-earth seventh grader whose family owned Montoya’s Bakery. For a while, Maeve talked about Nick all the time. Her friends had heard constantly about how much Maeve liked him—even though it seemed pretty clear that Nick was only interested in Maeve as a friend. Finally, Maeve had summoned up her courage and asked Nick to go see a movie with her a few weeks ago. But their “date”—if you could call it that—had been a total flop. Nick didn’t seem to have a romantic bone in his body—at least not where Maeve was concerned.

  It hadn’t helped matters that Nick actually seemed interested in Charlotte. Charlotte blushed a little, remembering the moment a few weeks back when Nick had bumped into her, walking Marty in the park. Nick wasn’t the romantic type—that’s what Maeve had complained. But there was something…Charlotte didn’t know what to call it—some kind of little charge whenever Nick was around her. Charlotte could feel it. That time when he’d leaned toward her, as if—

  Anyway, she thought, shaking off the memory. The point was, Nick and Maeve—that hadn’t worked. Charlotte wasn’t going to let herself think about Nick that way. They were good friends, that was all.

  One thing that Charlotte really appreciated about Maeve was that she could laugh at herself. She never held a grudge, either. Maeve had gotten over Nick the minute she learned that he didn’t like Gone With the Wind. “Forget that,” she’d confided in her friends. “I’m not spending time with someone who doesn’t feel romantic when they watch Scarlett and Rhett kissing!”