These Books Made Me

Baby-Sitters Club: Stacey Part 1

• Prince George's County Memorial Library System • Season 6 • Episode 4

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It's a Super Special Baby-Sitters Club episode! We were thrilled to be joined by special guest, author Lakita Wilson (Be Real, Mercy Weaver, Sparkle, Pretty Girl County) for this episode. She's a BSC super fan and we have so much to say about Stacey. We're tackling two books, The Truth About Stacey and Stacey and the Fashion Victim. 

We are discussing whether Stacey's diabetes (diabeetus?) is just a stand-in for bigger issues in the 80s, her very weird parents and their truly terrible parenting decisions, and sleepover antics. We're also discussing the truly disturbing events at the heart of Stacey's mystery at the fashion show. Will Stacey become the Fresh Princess of Bellair's or will she have a tragic rooftop accident? Were the gang wars between the BSC and The Agency justified and did they need to involve wearing sandwich boards? We also have thoughts on Watson and his weird relationship with cigars and whether rompers are truly workwear. 

These Books Made Me is a podcast about the literary heroines who shaped us and is a product of the Prince George's County Memorial Library System podcast network. Stay in touch with us via #TheseBooksMadeMe on socials, follow us on Instagram @TheseBooksMadeMe or reach out by email at TheseBooksMadeMe@pgcmls.info. 

For recommended readalikes and deep dives into topics related to each episode, visit our blog at https://pgcmls.medium.com/.

SPEAKER_04

Hi, I'm Howwa. I'm Heather. I'm Hannah. And I'm Darlene. And this is our podcast, These Books Made Me. Today we have a super special guest. Can you introduce yourself, please?

SPEAKER_09

Hi, I'm Lakita Wilson. I have written middle grade novels like Be Real Macy Weaver and Sparkle. And I write young adult novels like Last Chance Dance and most recently Pretty Girl County, which is about gorgeous Prince George's County. Woo-hoo! Woo!

SPEAKER_07

I think you're our first outside guest.

SPEAKER_04

Yes. Really? I think you're definitely our first author guest.

SPEAKER_09

The begging and the DMs worked. It worked. Okay.

SPEAKER_04

Here we go. So when we posted our last uh Babysitters Club episode about a year ago, Lakita saw the post and was like, do y'all take guests? And we were like, um, absolutely. This is a special occasion. Yes, and so this has been, you know, manifested almost a year ago. So today we're going to be talking about two Babysitters Club books, The Truth About Stacy and Stacey and the Fashion Victim by Anne M. Martin. Friendly warning as always, this podcast contains spoilers. If you don't yet know that smoking is pretty bad, proceed with caution. Was this everyone's first time reading the book? If not, how did this reread compare to your memories of reading it when you were younger? As most of the time, this was my first time reading it, so I'll let y'all go ahead and reminisce.

SPEAKER_07

I'm with you today, Hawa.

SPEAKER_05

I'm with you too. I did not, I did not grow up on Babysitter's Club. So these are fine.

SPEAKER_06

Lakita and I are gonna hold it down. We are doing it. Okay, so I for sure read the truth about Stacy. I don't think I read Stacy in the fashion victim, but I think it's one of the mysteries. So I may have sort of been bailed on the series at the point that it was written. So the truth about Stacy was fine. It was as I remembered it. I did not quite remember the details of her being run out of New York. And I think I was just like infusing it with what we had made up is why she ran out of New York when we read the other girls' books. Definitely want to delve into that because that was wild. That was a great little reread. I stand by these books as great for like the age that they're meant for. Like I think these are just a perfect book to give an eight-year-old who wants to feel a little bit more grown up and read about babysitters and have some nice, wholesome role models, you know, full entrepreneurship. It's great. The second book was crazy. It ownership was crazy. Wow. Yeah, we just went like full sweet valley high with the second book. It did feel like that. And so, yeah, I'm so excited to talk to everyone about that one today because that was a wild ride. Lakita, I know you read these as a kid too.

SPEAKER_09

I probably read like every single babysitter's club. I was like, it was like waiting for Beyonce tickets.

SPEAKER_02

But there is a prize for whoever solves it first. Two tickets to the Sundays Beyonce Knowles rock music concert.

SPEAKER_09

And then the super specials came out. Okay. Like I doubled down on the babysitter's club. Um, one thing I don't remember, and I just I cannot believe Stacey had blonde hair. Because I specifically remember her having like a, I don't know, like like light brown hair. So I was like a little shocked about that. Also, I am from the era where um I bought some books today, like where the characters look 30. I'm 50, 50 years old, on the cover. And so I am, I am very happy that they look very age appropriate in the new illustrations. But um shout out to the old photography as well, because you know, we we got some grade A drama in these books, and it did not it did not lessen with the with the reread. So I'm excited to talk about that.

SPEAKER_05

Well, she does wear enough makeup that she looks 40 in the second one.

SPEAKER_06

That's true in the photo show. I did highlight that in the book.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, I'm growling it on. Does she really look 40 or does she look like a 13-year-old's idea of what she thinks? That's what that's literally why I hope.

SPEAKER_06

She looks like all of the 40-year-old smokers are around here, bro.

SPEAKER_09

Who's your favorite character growing up? So until Jesse came on the scene, because listen, I am always going to stand for like the one black character. I'm like, Jesse, you made it. So like I I love Jesse, but before Jesse came along, it was it was Claudia. Because Claudia had trouble in school. I could not do division. Claudia liked snacks. I love little Debbie. Um, and her her clothes sounded fantastic as a kid. Um a little busy as an adult, but like I I love Claudia Kishi. Like, fave. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

No, I don't have a favorite. I don't think I've read enough of them to have a favorite.

SPEAKER_06

Was Jessie in the second book that we read? She was. Okay. She has that back to juniors already. Okay.

SPEAKER_04

You know what's so funny? I did not pick up that she was black. So yeah.

SPEAKER_06

How would they even talk about her? Coco's Coco skin.

SPEAKER_04

I was probably looking, I was trying to finish the book this morning. I was probably reading it too fast.

SPEAKER_09

I feel like I should have Coco skin.

SPEAKER_04

You know what?

SPEAKER_07

I'm gonna search, I'm gonna go search Coco in the so I can see that. They feel like they describe like every character each time they reappear in the books. Yeah, like sort of exhaustively. It's like they get like, it's like in the Odyssey when they like give each character like a little epithet, except like for description. That's a weird comparison.

SPEAKER_09

I used to skip that part when I was a kid. I was like, I know. I already know. I know what they look like.

SPEAKER_04

It's like when you're watching TV and you wish there was like a skip recap, like not to be on a skip recap, but you wish the books had that.

SPEAKER_06

Christy's wearing a turtleneck again. All right, we'll dive into some plot summaries here. I did my best with these. We got two books. This is gonna take a minute. In The Truth About Stacy, our least homegrown member of the Babysitters Club, takes center stage. Stacy McGill has recently moved from New York City to Stonebrook, bringing with her a fashionable wardrobe, a sophisticated city girl reputation, and a secret she's tired of explaining. Stacy's friends in the Babysitters Club already know she has diabetes.

SPEAKER_03

Diabetes.

SPEAKER_06

And they don't think it's a big deal. But we learn why Stacy left New York in the first place. After trying to hide her condition from her old classmates, Stacy became the subject of rumors, gossip, and some truly spectacular middle school cruelty, especially from her former best friend Lane. It's enough to make anyone want to switch zip codes. Back in Stony Brook, the Babysitters Club faces a new threat: the Babysitter's Agency. A rival service run by older teenagers who promise parents mature, possibly high school age, professional sitters. Unfortunately, professional turns out to mean willing to hire literally anyone. Enter Liz and Michelle, the two agency crime bosses whose babysitting style can best be described as outsourcing the jobs to Randos and hoping for the best. The agency's sitters leave children unsupervised, break household rules, and almost spontaneously combust themselves by snuffing out cigarettes on a lazy boy.

SPEAKER_08

This girl is on fire.

SPEAKER_06

The best that can be said for the agency is at least no one dies on their watch. As complaints about the agency pile up, the BSC's reputation for responsibility and genuine care wins the day. In the B plot, or maybe the A plot, we learn that Stacy's parents are still mortified to have a diabetic daughter.

SPEAKER_03

Diabetes.

SPEAKER_06

And they are taking her to a shady TV doctor in New York City who promises to cure her via a mixture of supplements and weird exercise restrictions. Stacy enlists Charlotte's mom to help her with this dilemma. Stacy gains confidence and confronts Lane, puts her foot down about the quack, and finds a reputable doctor. And the babysitters club proves that being dependable beats being flashy every time. Lane and Stacy make up, and Stacy lands a date to the dance with Pete. In Stacy and the Fashion Victim, Stacy McGill gets the opportunity of someone's lifetime when she's chosen to model in the Bel Air's department store Princess Bel Air fashion show.

SPEAKER_02

I'll tell you how I became the prince of a town called Bel Air.

SPEAKER_06

For a girl who loves clothes, trends, and all things stylish, strutting down a runway in fancy outfits sounds like a dream come true.

SPEAKER_01

I'm a model, you know what I mean, and I do my little turn on the kettle.

SPEAKER_06

At first, Stacy's thrilled. She and the other young models attend rehearsals, try on glamorous outfits, and prepare for what promises to be the biggest fashion event Stony Brook has ever seen. Unfortunately, all of the Tween Teen models are catty, diet-obsessed chain smokers except for Harmony, who has the worst stage mom ever, and Cynthia, who's just over the whole thing. Behind the scenes, things start getting very strange. 14-year-old Harmony Skye clearly doesn't want to be there. Instead of simply quitting, however, Harmony embarks on a shadow campaign of increasingly outrageous sabotage. Harmony is poisoned, scary threats get scrawled on mirrors and lipstick, costumes are ruined, rehearsals are disrupted, and mysterious accidents threaten the entire production. Stacy and her friends begin to suspect that these mishaps aren't accidents at all and begin an investigation. Also, like obviously they're not accidents. Someone's writing on the mirrors. But okay. In our B plot, or maybe our A plot, as a lot of ink is dedicated to it, everyone in Stony Brook is smoking. Tween models, stepfathers, and crotchety aunties. And everyone in Stony Brook is littering. We have cigarette butts ending up all over the place, and the girls have had it.

SPEAKER_00

And if people didn't smoke, there would be no employment for the youth of today.

SPEAKER_06

That's right. Christie's got another great idea for the great Stony Brook Smoke Out, a strange PSA campaign of sorts that guilts adults they know into quitting. Watson even dresses in a tux to ruin and bury his Cuban cigars. But I digress, we have child poisonings we need to solve. In the end, Harmony's schemes are exposed when the club catches her scrolling on the mirror. The reasons behind her behavior come to light. Basically, Harmony thought harming a lot of people in hopes that her mom would pull the plug on her modeling career was a great plan. To be fair, she's 14 and not allowed to eat by her abusive mom. It's part mystery, part fashion fantasy, and part cautionary tale about what happens when someone decides that committing a series of petty crimes is somehow easier than having an honest conversation. Yeah, that was a lot. There was a lot of crossover, though, just on the basis of I'm so worried about talking about this thing that I create a much worse situation, is true in both books. Stacy and her parents not being willing to say she's diabetic. Insane. Like I what is happening there to the degree that she does get like bullied out of her school because everyone's like, what is wrong with you? Like you're just acting super weird and you're not telling anyone what's happening. You're fainting into your tomato soup.

SPEAKER_09

I mean, head first. Head first into the tomato soup. Like I'm gonna I mean to the point where she's like wetting the bed. I'm like with her friend in it. In it, and you think there's no explanation.

SPEAKER_07

Do you think she's gonna just die?

SPEAKER_09

Well, it's okay. Let's change it.

SPEAKER_07

No. Why didn't why didn't she tell her why didn't they tell her best friend?

SPEAKER_06

Or why didn't she tell her best friend? I'm so confused. Yeah, like at the point that you pee on somebody, you need to explain you have a medical condition. Yeah, like just leaving that there is and I'm sorry, you moved to Connecticut, like like you moved states because your daughter's diabetic. I couldn't have anyone find out about that. They were trying to take her like uh Dr.

SPEAKER_00

Sevy. Assimilation meme is gonna go and digest with you. It becomes one with you.

SPEAKER_04

Um, hello, like you to be fair, he was a sham, but and like I think it was so interesting that both of her parents were so, and granted, like, I guess they were like, oh, well, you know, they found out that mom couldn't have any more babies, so they felt like they were like overly protective of her. But I'm just like, but if anything, you would think that you would want the best medical care, not just going to somebody that somebody saw on TV, right? Like, why does your daughter who was in middle school have more sense about this than you?

SPEAKER_09

Yeah, I was like, why does she have more sense than them? Well, these are people who moved two states away.

SPEAKER_08

Right before diabetes.

SPEAKER_04

So I guess Stony Brooke was going to be more accepting of like the, you know.

SPEAKER_06

But if there's like a rampant diabetes outbreak in Stony Brooklyn, they did all town as it.

SPEAKER_05

They did think that she was contagious or because they didn't know what she had.

SPEAKER_06

Tell them what was going on, which was a really weird choice.

unknown

I yeah.

SPEAKER_04

Especially considering that they were like middle school age, like even if they didn't necessarily know what diabetes was, I feel like to kind of they didn't grow up on the Nick Jonas.

SPEAKER_05

Nick Jonas!

SPEAKER_08

I wish I could go back and tell that 13-year-old kid that it'll be okay.

SPEAKER_07

Because the implication were no role models. That they told her teachers, because her teachers seemed nurse must have something. Okay.

SPEAKER_09

And so also people thought she was kind of a jerk because she was getting special treatment. They were like, oh.

SPEAKER_06

That's why she really understood when Charlotte was being teased about being teacher's pet, which again, we're just having a really bizarre solution to this problem. Why would you bump her up a grade? And I say this as a person that was bumped up a grade when I was younger and then returned down later because it was so traumatic. Like, if you take the kid that's a pariah and has no friends with their same-age classmates, moving them up to older, more socially mature classmates is definitely not gonna fix that.

SPEAKER_04

Especially not in the middle of the school year. Right, like on earth.

SPEAKER_05

But she's smart and loves Scrabble.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07

So she'll have a lot in common with third graders, or fourth graders. I think it's very important for children to feel like they are part of their peers to some extent. I said this is someone who was homeschooled. So it's nice to have that perspective. Yeah, a lot of these books feel like I'm an anthropologist. These are experiences I didn't have. So I, you know, I'm looking at it from a bit strange perspective, but uh I I mean I can think I can understand the fact you even if you are marching to the beat of your own drum, you don't want to feel feel completely completely alien.

SPEAKER_06

School for a smart kid at that age is about the social stuff, it's not about math. Like that girl was gonna learn whatever she needs to learn, anyways. Like what she needs help with at school is the social stuff, and like differentiation is a thing. Like, give her some extension assignments if you want to, but teachers maybe help her integrate a little bit better instead of like just letting them mercilessly call our teachers pet all the time.

SPEAKER_09

I, as a person who was bullied, okay, like this was written what, like the 80s, 90s. I don't know. Like, I don't know if that was like on everybody's radar yet. Like, we have to like right now, we have like banners. I walked into my kids' school like a decade ago and was like, whoa, there's like a, you know, whoa, you guys are getting help for bullying? Because let me tell you about the 90s. Let me tell you about that. So I mean, I yeah. No, I felt I felt for Charlotte.

SPEAKER_06

I felt like was she bullied because she was smarter than everyone else, though? Like, I don't know. I mean, the sole incidents we hear about are she finishes things fast, and so then people start like saying teachers pet on the playground at her, which just maybe she is she annoying about it?

SPEAKER_04

Like, is Charlotte a problem here? You know, sometimes kids have bad vibes. I finish this and you you uh need to hurry up.

SPEAKER_09

No, that was terrible. Um, are you still working on that?

SPEAKER_05

I mean, it doesn't take much. It doesn't um yeah, so I'm just gonna say that in middle school, I was voted teacher's pet, and I never talked to teacher. So I was like, I was like, where's this coming from? I think I just gave off a vibe and they were like, yeah, we're voting for her.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, she's the one. Okay, Charlotte.

SPEAKER_08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_09

No, okay, yeah, the other students superlatives. It just happened.

SPEAKER_05

It just happened.

SPEAKER_09

So maybe kids are thinking about it then. Like maybe they're like, hmm, seems like you finished your your assignments pretty early.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, I think so.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, was it like for the yearbook or like yeah, so it's canonized somewhere. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_06

That's how my school was too. We had like superlatives for eighth grade. So and then high school, obviously, senior year.

SPEAKER_05

You just vote me for anything better.

SPEAKER_04

Speaking of her family, I did like that. Um, not to circle back, but I I did like that Stacy talked to the doctor about it, but the doctor was kind of like, even though her making a whole appointment was kind of wild, Loki. I felt like maybe talking to the parents probably would have been better. This seemed kind of like an avoidant strategy. Like, oh hey, I'm gonna make a whole appointment in New York. That's on the other side of this quack appointment that we have. You actually made it worse.

SPEAKER_09

Because, like, remember, she was like, I'm not gonna talk to your parents. That's just that's overstepping boundaries. Right. But I will make you a doctor's appointment and then write them a aggressive note later on.

SPEAKER_04

And then her parents were like, unless you plan on making another appointment.

SPEAKER_07

I feel like the real life version of this, the parents would have blown up at her and gotten so angry at doctors. Diabetes.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07

I mean, I love in there in the narrative that it happened the way it did, and they the doctor was able to convince him, like, maybe you should just accept that diabetes is a condition, and you should just let her manage it as well as she is. But I feel like there was like a the real life version of this, there would have been like a horrible argument in New York and they would have gone home and the catalyst for her parents' divorce that we learn after.

SPEAKER_06

Right. Like, what? That also came out in the second book we read.

SPEAKER_04

I'm like, were there hints that he was a workaholic in the first book?

SPEAKER_09

Yeah, maybe you know, the kids may not know. Like, maybe Charlotte Johansen's mom knew that the parents were a little high-locked. She's like, you know what? I'm not, I'm not.

SPEAKER_04

She's like, I don't want that smoke. Maybe once the dad stopped worrying about her diabetes, he focused that energy into work and that's why they got divorced.

SPEAKER_06

Or maybe he just got mad at the mom for the like harebrained, let's move out of state plant that was completely unnecessary. Why did we do this? Why did you care about people knowing about this?

SPEAKER_04

So is this people's reaction to like diabetes back then? Like, that's what I'm wondering.

SPEAKER_06

We talked about this. Gosh, I don't know. That may have been like Christy or Claudia books because we thought it was weird then, too. I don't think so. I wasn't that far removed from when these were written. And I had a classmate who was diabetic and no one was weird to him about it. It just wasn't a thing. Like the whole scope of diabetes is a thing for kids was stuff you'd see on commercials where they were fundraising for like the juvenile diabetes association or Wolf and Brimley saying like diabetes over and over about your like order, your like supplies.

SPEAKER_09

Do you think, and this is just me being a conspiracy theorist, but like, all right, these books were made in the 80s and 90s. The big thing at that time was AIDS, HIV AIDS is Stacey Bryan White. And I almost feel like they told Anna Martin, like, hey, we're we're not gonna have an HIV. Like, but like that's the so like let's just water this down. Let's my theory, too.

SPEAKER_07

That beat it is maybe she wanted to have an HIV positive character, and they told her no, but it was kind of written that way. You know what I mean? Yeah, like an idea.

SPEAKER_06

I can see it because again, that was very much the 80s where the whole Ryan White thing was like people didn't want that child in their child's school. And it's like they're getting it off the toilet.

SPEAKER_07

It was so heavily enigmatized at this point at this point.

SPEAKER_06

Well, and it was still a death sentence back then, which I think made people even more like wound up about it than they would have been otherwise. But yeah, that's my theory as well, is that she wanted to do something that spoke to that issue. And they told her, no, these are for younger kids. You need to make it something palatable and not too sad.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, tinfold hat. No, but that's actually a good, like, I think especially for like this age group, I think it's a great like introduction to like even like someone just having something that's a little different than you.

SPEAKER_06

A lifelong chronic illness. Exactly. Yeah. Sweet Valley High probably has somewhere with a lot of people. We just haven't gotten to it. We should we should look that up. They probably directly address it.

SPEAKER_09

Especially when we got to those like university levels names of university.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah. Honestly surprised Degrassi never did anything with anybody having like HIV AIDS, so they definitely touched on like uh that's interesting. It definitely touched on uh I think was it chlamydia or the clap? Yeah. There isn't enough antibiotic in the world that would make me kiss you. So m f sorry to this is kind of parallel, but not like I think when I think about stuff like Sweet Valley High and Babysitter's Club, I also think about like Degrassi, especially because like I watched like Degrassi Junior High and Degrassi High, and then I watched like, you know, like the The Next Generation.

SPEAKER_05

Um but I quickly looked up the Sweet Valley High, and it seems like there is um they do touch on HIV AIDS. So you know they they went there on that. Yeah, they went there, yeah.

SPEAKER_07

Like Babysitter's Club.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, I think just the age difference probably made it more palatable because like there was this show I was on my kid. Life goes on, and it like ran all the time in like syndication, like you just see the reruns all the time. But in that show, one of the not the original characters, but who joined later was Jesse, the guy with with AIDS, who was played by Roblo's brother, Chadlow. And it was like a big deal, like at the time that oh, they made this high school student have AIDS on the show. Um, but he did keep it secret initially when he moved there. So there's this like very like pivotal moment where the main girl's love interest and then the guy with AIDS, who's like her new crush, start to get into a fight. Do you remember? Tyler, get off of me, right? Yes, boyfriend Tyler. And she's like, No, Tyler, he has AIDS!

SPEAKER_09

Oh my gosh. And then everyone's like, that was musty TV. You don't understand, okay? I am personally offended that they have not put that on a streaming network. Oh yeah, for sure. No, come on, I would watch. Oh, so good.

SPEAKER_06

You wanted to pitch to Tube. Yeah, one of the other, the like main boy character had Down syndrome. So that was quirky, yeah. But he that was awful. So good. Yeah, I loved it. No, love it. We're just gonna oh blah the obla that and watch our life goes on. Yeah, it was it was great. So I mean, that was definitely a thing that was in the zeitgeist at the time, but I I agree with you. I bet they just told Anne, like, no, these are for eight-year-olds. Like, you can't do that here.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, I feel like when we read, when we read, it's been a minute since we read interviews, but I think she was she was trying to bring she was trying to portray like single parent households. And she was she was trying to bring some more reality into like children's experience than maybe was common. Yeah. And Anna Martin. Yeah.

SPEAKER_09

She did okay, there were a lot of divorce people. Yeah. You're like divorce epidemic.

SPEAKER_06

Like we had so many families where it's like, and my mom married Watson and then they adopted someone else, so we got seven kids. Oh, and then there's this hyphenated family. Yeah, and they've had nine kids.

SPEAKER_05

You had to be a millionaire for them to be a seven kid household. Yeah, it's all real.

SPEAKER_04

So does his kids live with them too? On the weekends. On the weekends, okay. Yes. If I was a mom, I'd be like, You're a millionaire. You can have more.

SPEAKER_09

Let me stop. I feel like Karen and Andrew were like living in an apartment and Watson's like in this big mansion with his like newbie wife.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, we didn't get enough of Karen in these books. Karen's awesome. Karen. Money bags, Watson. Yeah, he's old money. He like went to a prep school, I bet. What is the backstory on Watson? I don't know. He probably went where that Cynthia girl or whatever goes in the second book because she went to like a boarding school or something. I don't think we ever learned much about Watson. He's a weird guy. Like, why, when you're getting rid of your cigarettes, do you go put a tux on?

SPEAKER_07

Like, that's not a funeral. That's not fun. Exactly. Like, why compare that to a funeral? You wear like a suit. Like a suit if you're a big thing.

SPEAKER_09

If you're gonna marry your cigars. Nice respect for a suit. Like, this is not as he was like, I'm having a ceremony. And then you could tell he like really needs those cigars because he's like, hey, Sam, Charlie, poor like I'll dig them up. What? You have a whole ceremony and you know you don't have any willpower. So you're like, yeah, because I will do this at midnight. I'll come out here and shovel.

SPEAKER_04

He was dedicated.

SPEAKER_06

He's also rich, though. Like he would just buy more. You know what? Hello. Fair. Like, why are you gonna dig up the cigar? Such a good point.

SPEAKER_04

He was he was just putting on the from the outfits to telling everybody to go get dressed, making it a secret. Like they was rushing to finish breakfast because they wanted to know what this man had up his sleeve.

SPEAKER_09

Okay, so Watson's lying. Because now that I think about it, you want to be seen. So, like, so like you put on this tux, now we have a whole ceremony, like, oh, it's the Watson show. You know, you have like 30 cigars in the back. You just want some attention.

SPEAKER_06

That guy has like 50, 11 cigars in his humidor, thermodynamic, what do you call it?

SPEAKER_09

That can I keep your cigars at the club? Karen's mom didn't divorce money bags, Watson, for nothing.

SPEAKER_07

Okay, like also, and maybe this is I don't know, maybe this is me being subversive and unhealthy, but I I don't smoke cigars. Let's let me start off with this. But aren't cigars the thing the ones that you don't actually inhale? I would think that that's not the huge smoking risk because that's like a special occasion. Light the thing and don't inhale it as much. I mean, sure, being around is not I don't know. There's like smokers' lounges for cigars.

SPEAKER_06

No, like you can like join a club, like a country club, but it's cigars, and you keep your special cigars there in a special, like you want to marinate in a cigar room so that they don't go bad, and then you hang out with your other dude friends that also smoke cigars, and everybody is just like inhaling all of the smoke. You wear you wear your tux and you're I think it's very carcinogenic.

SPEAKER_04

Because my initial thought was like, I didn't realize the cigars was as deep as cigarettes, but okay.

SPEAKER_09

No, I feel like you guys have been like influenced by media where people are like, I just had a baby boy. You never see them smoking. They just like put it on the corner of their mouth and then it's like a problem.

SPEAKER_07

I think you're right. Baby boy.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, no. I feel like we had a conversation about cigarettes before because didn't we take a quiz about what cigarette brand are you or something? I swear you like oh why did we do that?

SPEAKER_07

Oh yeah, did we skip it? Because we were like, oh, we're gonna do something. No, but why? No. Which book was this?

SPEAKER_05

That's where Heather, you said that that's what you used to smoke when you were younger, right? Probably. She said it in a different episode. I'm not outing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06

No, I don't even remember that conversation, but yeah.

SPEAKER_09

To be fair, I, you know, I believe that the babysitter's club might be responsible for like the reduction and weird teams. I mean, those PSAs were cheesy, but like, do we see people smoking cigarettes today? Right. That's all I'm saying.

SPEAKER_04

When when I uh was in school and we had like, we had like the Dare program, and then we also like they came and they gave out like these like magnets that you put on your fridge. And the one that always stuck with me said, uh, kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray. I remember that. I'm just like.

SPEAKER_09

You know what I remember about Dare? The police officer came and told us that the your first high will be the best high of your life. Everyone just wanted to go try it. Well, I wasn't thinking about doing drugs, but you said like you felt pretty late. That seems like a weird way to frame it. I need to hand them a babysitter's club book. This is how UPSA. Right. Don't entice them.

SPEAKER_00

Remember, winners don't do this.

SPEAKER_09

That's okay.

SPEAKER_06

When we were like looking through stuff that was in the vertical file and stuff when we were moving things. Oh, the marijuana program photos. No, the Hyattville branch in the late 60s, I guess, had what was basically a DARE program, and the police department came in.

SPEAKER_07

It looks so painfully earnest.

SPEAKER_06

But would have simply just stunk up the whole branch. Like, I don't because they did it in the meeting room and it was like why?

SPEAKER_07

Oh my god, they it was the photos were amazing because like they were like they could not look any more like 60s law enforcement. Oh, they were like, you know, tie but like you know, not like in the white shirt, you know, little skinny. They just looked so painfully straight laced. It was we we saw these photos and we're like, and this was for kids? Like it was like those anybody, the youth, you know, they were trying to like warn people against the devil's lettuce, I think. Yeah.

SPEAKER_09

And this was in the 60s, because the 70s they went even harder.

SPEAKER_06

Okay. I think it's very funny that they called themselves the agency. Right. It's not it's more mature. Totally. Okay, but like they were evil.

SPEAKER_09

Can I say that um before all the bad stuff happened? You saw the appeal? I was like, Christy, somebody's allowed to babysit other than Christy Thomas. You are a hater, and stop it. You don't have a monopoly on babysitter.

SPEAKER_04

And you must be the monopoly guy. Especially when it comes to actual babies, right?

SPEAKER_09

Actual babies that like no one's gonna That's true. They hadn't yet established that they're gonna be.

SPEAKER_06

Babysitters uh two in the morning Saturday night again. A baby with a head not even stable. Yeah. And one of them, it was we're going to our cocktail party at 4 p.m. We'll be back at six. And it's like, what? Like, I'm gonna get wasted.

SPEAKER_04

Like, what a waste of a babysitter at that time.

SPEAKER_09

Was it Charlotte's mom? Oh okay, who had the baby? It was the little boys yet. Jamie Mom. Jamie's mom did a lot of going. I'm not saying mom shouldn't go back to work. I fully support that, but she needed a babysitter quite frequently.

SPEAKER_06

Well, and with a brand new baby. Yay! Like she's not like going out of time.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, she needed, I feel like she needed a maternity leave and like some support. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05

And the fact that they were like so excited to like babysit an infant. I'm like, it's an infant, though. And though the agency wasn't that much older.

SPEAKER_09

Like they're they're they're entirely like they're in brain. Yeah, they were like 13. Ah! Yeah.

SPEAKER_06

But like having maybe a couple of high schoolers. I liked how that was like part of the I bet they even got high school or something.

SPEAKER_07

Calm down, Christy. I was reading this book and I'm thinking, like, I'm an adult, I would be a little hesitant to watch somebody's newborn. You know, like that's a newborn.

SPEAKER_06

Because Jamie is like the book. Yeah, when this girl came, she did this. When this girl came, she did this. So it's like they've had multiple sitters for this.

SPEAKER_05

But also, Jamie's three. So, like, how are you speaking this much? How are you retaining all this information? Yeah, judging people, and like, yeah, he was doing a lot.

SPEAKER_06

She brought her boyfriend over. She but this was burnt a hole in the sofa with the cigarette.

SPEAKER_04

Like, what's a boyfriend? Am I your boyfriend?

SPEAKER_09

Am I your boyfriend? You guys remember that? He's like, What's a boyfriend? Am I your boyfriend? She's like, uh next.

SPEAKER_04

No. She was like, I was not expecting to have this conversation with a three-year-old right now.

SPEAKER_09

I wanna say, until the agency, you know, spiraled out of control, they had some pretty good like PR stuff going on. Like, you have balloons, you have this and that. I am not a Christy Thomas fan. Okay, I'm gonna tell you right now, like, she gets under my skin. So I'm like, okay, you're oh, you're the president, you're always like, oh, I'm the president. But like Stony Brooks' not that big. She made them wear those like sandwich lines. I wouldn't go with a sandwich. Sandwich line. Oh my god, what the hell? And people are like people are like, what's the babysitter's club?

SPEAKER_06

So obviously, you didn't do such a good job and like promoting the job is like they just sit for the same like five families over. Right.

SPEAKER_09

That's I felt like that was mean. Because what if the agency was good?

SPEAKER_04

Because I thought it was gonna be like a thing where the agency was good and it was gonna be like, well, there could be two babysitters groups in this town.

SPEAKER_09

No, she said this town's not like two.

SPEAKER_04

Now it's a gang war because like Christy. She said she literally was like, This means war. And they're like, we won the battle and the war.

SPEAKER_07

So if having diabetes means you have to move out of town, diabetes, because socially that's just like death. But you can wear sandwich boards to school and be fine. I don't know. Because Connecticut is not New York. You're right. I'm sorry. New York is different. Stacy Stacy was let's let's do that again.

SPEAKER_04

Was it Stacy who um she was like, I have the the the sort of boyfriend?

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04

And then he was embarrassed. Yeah. First of all, I was like, what the hell's a sort of boyfriend? Because middle.

SPEAKER_06

I mean, it's not like they really can go on dates. Okay, did y'all think it was weird how like quickly Lane and Stacy patched things up? Yeah. Like that felt like pretty significant betrayal on both ends that they would be feeling to like just be like, yeah, cool, we're besties again. Is there's feeling some guilt?

SPEAKER_09

I mean, and also Stacey sort of just like forced that because she knocked on the door. Lane did not say come in. Yeah. She was like, you know what, whatever, my stuff's on the bed.

SPEAKER_04

Like I'm ready to talk about it. And then in the movie is when they're like, the people are like, shh. Yeah. She's like, Oh, thanks for asking me if I would.

SPEAKER_05

That's her New York attitude.

SPEAKER_04

You know what?

SPEAKER_05

Maybe. I thought it was cool. She's gonna really oh sorry, I was just gonna say she was very uh critical of people. Like there was times where I was like highlighting because she liked fat shame that the mom stacey's super judgy. Yeah, yeah. I was like, she just had her baby and she's like I'm surprised she still looks fat.

SPEAKER_09

I was like, so girl, please. The 90s, the 90s had a huge problem with fat representation. Um, like Uncle Phil from like, you know, like justice for Uncle Phil from the Fresh Prince. But like, why are you guys in middle school drinking Diet Coke?

SPEAKER_00

Just for the taste of it, diet coke.

SPEAKER_06

Like, what do we do? Other than say who has an excuse because she's diabetic. But like everyone else is picking diet. It's not even good.

SPEAKER_04

And like it wasn't even just like with the models, like, even like with the friends when they were having their snacks and their stuff like that.

SPEAKER_06

Like, they were just in the I assume like some of like if it was just the babysitters club girls, it would be like, oh, well, Stacey can't have these things, but they eat all this other junk that she can't have too. So it's like you need to give her salt, they give her salt. You aren't particularly thoughtful about her diabetes.

SPEAKER_07

You're like, we're going to eat Skittles here. You're saltine, Stacy, which I'm just saying. I know, like, and I think they said they were like saltines, people are eating candy too. Yeah. Like they they're not even like fresh saltines, they're like, yes, squaw squashed, you know, body salt scars broad.

SPEAKER_09

This is what I should be eating, but I'm gonna take my scarf. I've got my secret Skittles.

SPEAKER_07

I thought it was really crappy of the parents just like sneakily take her to her old friend's place without warning her.

SPEAKER_06

Because they had to have known that she was like, I just don't think they cared. They were like, these are our friends, we're gonna hang out, figure it out.

SPEAKER_05

But right because they knew they had a falling out, yeah. They just didn't care. She wet Lane's bed.

SPEAKER_09

Yeah, like don't bring her back with her in it. With her in it.

SPEAKER_07

Why are you bringing her back to her place of trapper? Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, like I I'm sympathy for Lane and that it's unpleasant for that to happen. But also, like, if that happened while she was sleeping, that was obviously not intentional on Stacey's part.

SPEAKER_06

Um, but no explanation or uh, hey, sorry, I got this medical diagnosis and I guess this is part of it. Just she just kind of let it lie.

SPEAKER_07

And it's weird she wouldn't have told her friend.

SPEAKER_09

But what if she was a bedwetter? And this is where I blame Lane. Are you my friend or are you not my friend? Because some people wet the bed.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, but I feel like you need to like if you know that about somebody, that's a different because like they've presumably they've been best friends like their whole childhood because their family's so like she wasn't wetting the bed when she slept over when she was seven, and now she's 12 and she is, and like I don't know. I mean, I'm not saying Lane was in the right, like, don't drop your friend over that, but like also with no explanation, at some point you're just like, I don't even know what's happening here.

SPEAKER_07

I feel like at that point they both say could have been, I'm really sorry that I don't know why this is happening, or this is why that's happening, and Lane could have been, are you okay? Like there there could have been compassion offered towards I blame Stacy. It's an embarrassing thing to happen. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06

Why didn't they tell the parents? Like, if you're sending your child over there, yeah and there's been an accident, at that point you say, Hey, we've been going through it with Stacey, she has all this going on. And they never do because they don't want to be embarrassed by their diabetic daughter.

SPEAKER_03

Diabetes.

SPEAKER_06

It's so weird. I hate them.

SPEAKER_09

I don't know if they are just the pants of trash. Yeah. I I just remembered something. They called back this bed wedding incident at camp. So in that super, in that super special like camp book, right? Somebody put in the 90s, people used to do this really terrible thing. They would like whoever went to bed first, they would hit your hand in the water. And somebody did that to Stacy and she wet and she's like, oh no, because you don't understand when I and I went to bed. And I'm like, oh no. Poor Stacy. Where am I making that out? No, I no, I I do think that happened. Sleepaway camp. Okay. Yep. It happened in a sleep away camp.

SPEAKER_05

Damn, they just reopened her trauma like that. Right, right.

SPEAKER_09

And that was a callback to the truth about Stacy when they actually explained it.

SPEAKER_04

I love that you like remember that in like detail.

SPEAKER_09

Because in my you don't I live for drama. I try to write drama in my books based on all the drama, all the like preteen soap opera stuff that I enjoyed as a kid. And I was like, whoa, like, you put her hand. And then I like tried it. I was like, like, I put my hand in my little urge. Like, what's going on?

SPEAKER_04

That is boots on the ground journalism. No, I actually love having the perspective of an author here, because like we always talk about, like, you know, we do eventually talk about like what the writing was like, and do we feel like they did a good job writing for like that age group? So like I know that you're a fan, so I you must feel like she oh no, I I was I was the biggest critic of these books.

SPEAKER_09

I like on one hand, I was like, please, especially. So the truth about Stacy, they were keeping it a little hinged. By the time we got to fashion, you were stealing lines from Forrest Gum. I'm sorry, Ghostwriter, I love you.

SPEAKER_07

But like you're you're oh, was it this was a ghostwriter one? Yeah.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, I think they were fully into ghostwriters by then. I think the first four books were written by Anna Martin. And then I think we're doing a deep dive on this. We were gonna figure it out, but I think that is the other thing.

SPEAKER_09

You will die. And I'm like, what? Like it was so over the top, and I know I go over the top in my books all the time, and my editor's like, Really? Soften this up. This is a little much. Yeah. Who was saying? I I honestly think by this point the books were making so much money, they were like, leave it. People are gonna buy it regardless.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, they were like, hey, this is what sells. Like they did have some like people who went on to be like real authors that were the ghostwriters too. But yes, the first 22 novels were written by Anna Martin. And then after that, it was a hodgepodge.

SPEAKER_04

Does this look like no? And it's so funny because when I saw the cover, I was like, oh, like maybe they're like a l a lot older now. I'm thinking maybe she's like 15, 16.

SPEAKER_05

Well, are they 13 at this? I don't know. Yeah, they're 13. Because they said it in that one that Claudia stayed back in seventh grade, and so they're all in eighth grade.

SPEAKER_06

I'm sorry. When did Claudia stay back? I know, but I guess it's because she's dyslexic, so we're gonna just keep shaming her over her school problem. No, but was there a thing?

SPEAKER_04

Was that always a thing? Was there a book dedicated to this?

SPEAKER_06

Was Claudia's dyslexia? There must have been, but I didn't remember that either. And I was like, boy, they really go hard on the dyslexia thing for her. Like that's kind of extreme.

SPEAKER_09

So they're all in eighth grade and Claudia's in seventh?

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, I totally didn't remember that happening, and I was like, wait, what? Justice for Claudia.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, for real.

SPEAKER_09

I'm not gonna deal with it.

SPEAKER_04

Because then, like, when they go to high school, they're gonna be like, oh, that's they're gonna be using the biggest.

SPEAKER_06

And I think Claudia's school woes are a thing throughout. Yeah. But like it's because she's making like C's, not because she's like straight up failing. You're not even failing. Like, I don't understand why she would have been held back. Because she was just reading Nancy Drew books. Insubordinate and churlish. Yeah, she should have been doomed.

SPEAKER_04

Even though her mom was a librarian, right? So I already hated a Nancy Drew so hard. And it happens consistently. Because I feel like we talked about this before. It's in both of these books that we read. So like.

SPEAKER_09

But that is that is a thing that happens though.

SPEAKER_06

Like From Librarians is really. Her mom is running the public library in Stony Brook, but won't let Claudia have Nancy Drew books.

SPEAKER_09

People, I guess, like wanted kids to like. They wanted kids to read like these very literary highbrow books. And we're like, look, we want, we want drama, we want so. I was anybody else a little thrown off that like I don't know, Stony broke the fashion capital of the world. Um that was a really weird. Like these models are like chain smoking.

SPEAKER_06

Yes, yeah, and they're 13, 14 years old most of the time. Like you're modeling at the mall one time.

SPEAKER_04

Like right. So like at this point, they're not even like, it's not even like, oh, they're kids that are smoking and trying to hide it. They're like openly taking smoke breaks because they're models.

SPEAKER_09

I'm a supermodel. What do you expect? I imagine the mall. One time. They weren't on the cover of Vogue.

SPEAKER_06

Like they were in stuff. There was like one actual model there, and even she didn't sound like she was.

SPEAKER_07

She's she felt like she was on aware. How many of them do you think ended up in America's uh next top model?

SPEAKER_08

Oh no.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, but like that whole the whole mystery, but like I I'm not gonna lie, I thought I knew who it was. I thought it was um, I thought it was the the daughter of the I thought it was Emily.

SPEAKER_06

That'd be funny if it was the eight-year-old that was sure or 10 or however old she was.

SPEAKER_04

I'm like, she's a diabolical 10-year-old. She was, I was like, my logic was she was mad because her mama wasn't paying her attention, she couldn't be in the show.

SPEAKER_08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

Um, yeah.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, I didn't, okay, so I have some issues with that plot line. But really, just this whole book, there were some weird things. So I I knew from jump that Harmony was doing it because it's like she didn't get poisoned, she's just not eating. But then it turns out she did poison herself. With what? They didn't complain. I guess you don't have diarrhoea. You're lacking. No, she hasn't slumped over. Bad, like, she's like poisoning athletes.

SPEAKER_05

And the thing is, she could have just faked it exactly and accomplished the same thing, but she just slumped over.

SPEAKER_07

They said her they said that her face was white, and they they said that she had to deal with stomach cramps. So I'm assuming she gave herself lactative. That's that's what I'm getting. It's a weird thing to poison your face.

SPEAKER_04

And she was so sure she didn't want to take the ambulance. But I'm just like, honestly, had you gone to the doctor, maybe you could have been like, I'm sick enough to not have to do this anymore. You could have accomplished your goal. But also, like, girl, and she was they were so sure she was poisoned. I'm like, if you're really so sure that she was poisoned, like they did nothing about it. They were like, You don't want the bad, you don't want the bad PR.

SPEAKER_06

Someone poisoned a child and they didn't call the police. I that was wild. And then Emily's little story where she just, oh, she just wanted to be part of it. She wanted to be part of it. And her mom, who was like, no, this is like unhealthy, but then turns to her colleague and was like, Your daughter's perfect for this game. Like, I don't want my daughter participating in this. She's too young, and this is bad for her. But Stacy would be perfect. That was weird. And then at the end, she's like, Yeah, okay, I guess if she's gonna be no, I'm sorry, a superstar, she can do it. And I was like, No, this is creepy. This agent guy that's like, I can tell your 10-year-old's gonna be super hot.

SPEAKER_07

Yeah, that was weird.

SPEAKER_09

I was like, no, that's the moment. The ponytail and the mirror glasses, Dylan True Heart, true love, true.

SPEAKER_04

He was Koki's agent, right? Yeah. And then he said he was gonna be her agent exclusively forever?

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, no. No, that was a disaster. He's gonna marry her at 17. It was I just was like, what's look, Maslin, what are you doing here? Rhenesme imprinting on Jacob.

SPEAKER_07

Oh no. You imprinted on my daughter? It wasn't my choice. She's a baby! It's not like that.

SPEAKER_06

Toky Mason? What is this? No, what kind of name is it? Right? Okay, so all right. This one, I have a note about this because I was like, what is happening here? I say, why is the photographer named Jamie when we already have a main baby sat character named Jamie? That's really confusing. Call him something else. But then they go with Cokie? Like, if you can come up with Cokie for a character, I'm sure you could have come up with like Joseph or something for Jamie. And then, like, also Blaine and Lane?

SPEAKER_04

Like two Emily's right, because Emily, Emily, Michelle, the baby and the kid. The baby they adopted from Vietnam.

SPEAKER_06

Someone needed to buy this ghostwriter a baby name book because they were struggling. There's some names in the book. I tell you, her name. Behind the scenes.

SPEAKER_09

The editors, they don't even want you to have names with the same letter. Like if I say, like, look here in lane. Because it could be but evidently in the 90s in 97, you could be like, deal with it.

SPEAKER_06

Figure it out. Read comprehension. You'll figure it out. That was super weird. I I don't know. There were a lot of strange things happening in this book. So I know Stony Brook is not Paris, but like, you know, it is the fashion capital of the world. Some of the things that they were getting excited about, I was like, I don't think they would have been excited about this even in the like 90s. Stacy gets super excited about a brown tweed skirt.

SPEAKER_04

I saw that. And she was like, it just makes me think of like autumn and fall and all of the things. And seriously? Yeah.

SPEAKER_06

I was like, really, Stacy? And then she's like, no, we can't use those chick clip buttons. We gotta go with like gold military-inspired buttons. And she's like, Yes, everyone's gonna be wearing gold buttons in the fall. And I was like, Yes.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, so we're probably gonna have to cut this out. Um, but it makes me think so. I've seen a couple of videos where people are like, Yeah, I'm reading books, and the author is like describing the outfit, and they're like, No, this person does not have that channel on because it's not a cute outfit. Like, what are you describing?

SPEAKER_06

No, well, there were a lot of things like that because also they were when they were doing the workwear, the sportswear workwear shoot, Stacy's in a romper? A romor.

SPEAKER_07

In a romper when you're 13. There's probably some jobs you can wear a romper too. Not many. You're not gonna categorize it as work wear. Right. I wear rompers as the book of it sometimes.

SPEAKER_09

I'm like, right.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, I'm not in the office. Yeah. Talking like but yeah, if you're a middle-aged woman receiving a workwear catalogers, I don't know, scrunchies are a 13-year-old. Scrunchies?

SPEAKER_09

Yeah, scrunchies were a big thing in the night.

SPEAKER_07

They were the things that were I don't know. Are they still back? I don't know. I can't keep I can't keep up.

SPEAKER_06

I can't keep up with not that I'm I think it depends on like what your what circles you move in. Okay. Like I think there are still some scrunchy girls.

SPEAKER_07

We need to consult your your teenage daughters.

SPEAKER_06

But yeah. And why is there a princess of the show? It's not a pageant.

SPEAKER_04

Right. It was giving pageant at that point.

SPEAKER_05

Don't they do that at the end of fashion shows? They always have like the last look. But that's just like the girl that closes the show.

SPEAKER_06

They don't put a tiara in a like sash that says princess belly. This is a beauty pageant, like on top of Loki, like with the like beauty pageant mom of Harmony's mom was just terrible.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, but like so terrible that she felt like she couldn't talk to her mom to the point where she had to take the screws off the things and they fell off of the roof.

SPEAKER_09

He ended at falling off the roof. I don't care if you fell until the second part of the book. Who felt? Like, they were like, okay, everybody, just gather up. Come on, hit that stage.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, that was like deeply unsafe. And then it like made me question because then Harmony was like, oh no, sorry. Where she clearly didn't think it was gonna impact anyone but her. Was her plan to die via falling off the roof? I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_07

No, she wasn't. She knew it was okay. She said she knew she would fall into the awning. Yeah. But she didn't think anybody else.

SPEAKER_05

But the thing is, you knew the schedule ahead of time, so you knew you were gonna do a like a within with someone else, with Stacey. So I was like, But like, what did there was always a possibility she could get hurt?

SPEAKER_04

And you knew when came in and you didn't stop like from incorporating anybody else into that.

SPEAKER_07

Like people lean on things. That's what people do. If there's somebody to lean on, people are gonna lean on it.

SPEAKER_04

Also, like when I heard they were going up to the roof, I was like, this is first of all, like, is the shoot that serious that y'all have to be on the roof for this? Like, y'all didn't have anywhere else where y'all could stage. You know that didn't look good.

SPEAKER_06

There's there's light outside of a random department store in a suburb. Like, what is the view?

SPEAKER_05

In the middle of the day with like harsh lighting. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

What was her plan had they not agreed to switch up?

SPEAKER_05

Yeah. Plan, I don't think. She would have found her way to that ledge one way or another.

SPEAKER_04

No, when the chapter ended and they were falling, I was like, and then I was like, I had a technical.

SPEAKER_05

Well, no, because they foreshadowed it already. Because Stacey was like, I almost died. Well, actually. She's like, I'll explain it in a bit. They have to foreshadow that way.