My First Love and Other Disasters Read online

  “Are you kidding? They’d go wild. They love kites.”

  “Terrific. I’ll get the kite and meet you down at the bay beach in about three-quarters of an hour.”

  “No good,” I tell him, “the kids hate the bay beach.”

  “Well, just tell them that’s the only place I can fly the kite.” And he starts to open the screen door. “See you at one thirty.”

  And he’s out of the door.

  “Wait! Wait up!” I run to the door and shout.

  He stops and turns to me. “What’s up?” he says.

  “It won’t work. DeeDee’s terrified of the bugs and things on the bay beach. She absolutely won’t go.”

  “Then you want to forget the whole thing?” Suddenly he’s angry. And I know he’s talking about a lot more than the kite and the beach. And then it hits me what’s been bothering me about him since yesterday, maybe even from before that but I guess I didn’t know. I think he may be a little spoiled.

  Actually a lot spoiled. Spoiled rotten, I think that’s what they call it. I told you how he was so fantastic looking, really gorgeous, and that he has a very channing personality—you know, charisma and all that. So naturally with that combination people are always fighting to be with him and catering to him, and by now he’s come to expect it all the time. He’s the guy in charge of all the hanger-on-ers, and it bugs him if someone doesn’t do things his way. Like now about the beach or even yesterday when we were searching for the kids. As soon as he saw he wasn’t in charge he didn’t really want to be part of it, and it has nothing to do with his being afraid of the storm. He is definitely not a coward. It’s worse.

  He’s arrogant. We bruised his ego, Barry and I did, just because we didn’t let him run the whole show. The fact that we were trying to actually save people’s lives, little kids’—that was secondary. The big thing to Jim Freeman was who’s running things, and if it wasn’t going to be him—well, then, forget it, and that went for the kids too.

  I don’t know how he and Barry could be such good friends. I mean, they’re so different. Like yesterday. Barry didn’t even give a thought about his boat or himself or anything. All that mattered was finding those kids.

  Funny how I guess I never looked much deeper than Jim’s good looks. I suppose I’m pretty much like everybody else that way, but now, knowing what kind of person he really is, I’m beginning to think that maybe he isn’t so gorgeous after all and that I don’t want to go to the beach with him today—or any day.

  He’s still standing there, good old arrogant Jim, waiting for my answer, and you can tell just by looking at that confident face that he expects me to crumple up and practically beg him to let me go with him to the bay beach.

  “Okay,” I tell him, “then let’s just forget the whole thing.”

  Beautiful. For half a second even his suntan turns ashen, but Jim Freeman types recover fast.

  He shrugs a kind of your loss shrug and turns and starts walking down the street.

  Watching him walk away, I have a sinking feeling in my stomach, and I almost want to call him back but I don’t. Am I making a mistake? God, I hope not. I let this great thing walk out of my life when I could absolutely have him (nobody’s going to believe it, anyway) and I don’t do a thing. This just isn’t me.

  Or is it?

  Because it feels right.

  I walk back into the house and sit down on the bottom step and try to decide whether or not to cry. After all, it’s not every day you fall out of love for the first time. It’s not such a bad experience. Disastrous, but not really too bad. So I decide not to cry.

  And I make another decision.

  I go right to the phone and I’m just about to dial when I see this note propped up against a little vase on the table. I open it. It’s from Cynthia. I didn’t even know she wasn’t home. It’s another one of her cuties. It asks me “pretty please” will I give the kids and Mr. Landry lunch and put in a load of laundry and then there’s a shopping list for when I get back from the beach and could I be a “positive pussycat” and iron her white pants outfit. If the “best little shrimp cleaner in the country” wants to clean the shrimp in the refrigerator she has no objection. The note ends saying I’m a doll and she’s over at the Walkers’ for the afternoon. It’s signed, “Love ya to pieces, Your Summer Mother.”

  It takes me about ten seconds to decide what I’m going to do. I grab the pen next to the phone, turn Cynthia’s note over, and the new me writes:

  Dear Summer Mother,

  Could you Pretty please hem my pink skirt and my black pants and I’m Missing four snaps on my white blouse, two buttons on my jacket, and the zip on my red shorts is stuck. Could you do them before the weekend? I would be forever qrateful if you could spare an itsy—bitsy 45 Minutes every evening to help me with my loqarithms for extra summer credit. Love ya!

  Your Summer Daughter

  Victoria

  Now I dial, and as I listen to the phone ringing at the other end I begin to feel very happy about a lot of things and more excited than I expected about making this phone call.

  Yes, going to the beach with someone today is definitely a terrific idea, but Jim just happens to be the wrong person.

  “Hello,” the right person’s voice says.

  “Hi, Barry. You dried out yet?”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Francine Pascal is the creator of the phenomenally successful Sweet Valley series: Sweet Valley Kids, Sweet Valley Twins, Sweet Valley High, and Sweet Valley University. First launched in October 1983, the series now sells in twenty-two countries and has been translated into fifteen languages. Francine has also written for adults, including fiction, nonfiction for magazines, and TV scripts.

  Francine has three grown-up daughters and several grandchildren. She draws much of the inspiration for her books through her own experiences and memories of growing up in New York. She says, “I was a very optimistic teenager and my conflicts were the stuff of everyday teenage trauma: loyalty, friendship, sacrifice, honor, truth, and love.”

  She divides her time between New York and her second home in France.

  Read all of the books in the Victoria Martin trilogy.

  My Mother Was Never a Kid

  My First Love and Other Disasters

  Love & Betrayal & Hold the Mayo

  Available now from Simon Pulse

  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.

  First Simon Pulse edition May 2003

  Copyright © 1979 by Francine Pascal

  SIMON PULSE

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster

  Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

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

  Designed by Ann Sullivan

  The text of this book was set in Goudy.

  Library of Congress Control Number 2002112343

  ISBN 978-1-4424-5234-3

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4424-9952-2 (eBook)