Digital Disaster! Read online

  “It was okay and it wasn’t a date,” I murmured, and piled up my books in my locker. I surveyed the pile—six textbooks one on top of the other stacked a foot high. Maybe Cherry Valley Middle School students were under more pressure than I allowed myself to think.

  “Just okay?” Hailey said, jumping in between me and my locker to get me to look at her. “Did you have your orange juice this morning?” she asked me, her hands on her hips, head leaning to one side.

  “Yeah, why?” I said, still in my own thoughts.

  “You seem a bit blah.”

  “I don’t know what I was expecting from last night,” I said. “I guess I just hoped it was going to feel more special than just working on the paper. He did make banana bread, though,” I said, now putting my language arts anthology and a science textbook in my backpack.

  “Well, I have never, ever had a boy make me banana bread,” she said, grabbing some of her books and stuffing them into her backpack. “So that’s something.”

  “It was really yummy,” I said, and smiled. “And I think he did make it just for me. He knows how grumpy I get without good snacks around.”

  “Sam!” said an urgent voice behind us. I looked around. It was Michael, sneaking up on me again. I wondered if he’d heard anything.

  “Why are you calling me my actual name?” I asked.

  “Where’s the fire, Lawrence?” Hailey asked.

  “What?” Michael said to Hailey, with a confused look in his eye. He turned back to me and said in a low tone, “Sam, can I talk to you for a sec? In private?”

  “Just my stupid attempt at a joke,” Hailey said.

  “Oh right, fire. That’s funny,” Michael said, turning to Hailey, mustering a distracted smile. “Sorry, Hailey. It’s about the story we’re working on.”

  “Uh, sure,” I said, raising my eyebrows at Hailey. She shrugged back and motioned for me to go with him. “Everything okay?” I asked Michael. I couldn’t imagine what was making him act so weird.

  “Yeah. I . . . just a sec,” he said, and grabbed my arm, pulling me away from Hailey and down the hallway around the corner. We stood in a quiet space near the boys’ bathroom.

  “You’re kind of freaking me out, Michael,” I said, now getting a little annoyed. “This had better be good.” Then again, he’d grabbed my arm, which was still kind of tingling.

  “I got a quote from Will Hutchins,” he said. “Here. Look.” He thrust out a piece of paper. “I didn’t want anyone to see it yet.”

  I looked down at his narrow, almost illegible handwriting. Michael wasn’t perfect in every way. He had some of the messiest handwriting I’d ever seen. Question: it said. I read out loud what I could make out underneath. “What do you think about the bath rest security beach?”

  “No, no,” Michael said. “Math test security breach!”

  “Right, of course. Sorry,” I said, looking back down. Boy, I needed some orange juice.

  “Oh, let me just read it to you,” he said, and grabbed the paper out of my hands. “So I asked Will what he thought about the—”

  “Bath rest security beach?” I said, grinning.

  “Very funny. This is what he said, though: ‘I think in some ways the hacker opened up two important issues. Our school has to think about why some kids might be so stressed out, and it also shouldn’t be so easy to hack into the exams on the school server,’” he read to me from the paper.

  “It almost sounds like he knows who did it,” Michael said. “And seems to put the entire blame on the school.”

  Whoa. Two Middle School Reporters Crack the Case. Were we reading too much into this, or could we actually be on to something? “Should we tell someone?” I said in a hushed tone. “It does sound like he’s really close to the issue, like he has something personally invested in it. Could he have been the hacker?” I said, now feeling the excitement and urgency Michael was feeling.

  “I do think we should tell someone, but who? I don’t want to get the guy in trouble if he’s just speaking his mind.”

  “Let’s start with Mr. Trigg and see what he thinks,” I said as the class bell rang.

  “Good idea. I’ll meet you in his office after school,” Michael said to me as we started down the hallway toward our classes. “And keep it quiet. I wouldn’t even tell Hailey. Rumors can spread like wildfire.”

  “Okay. I promise,” I said, not quite sure if that would be possible. Technically I had already told Hailey that I thought Will was weird. Uh-oh. But I wouldn’t tell her that we had a quote from him. Hailey might feel the same temptation to tell just one other person and so on and so on until the whole school would suddenly start thinking Will Hutchins was the hacker. But was he?

  Hailey came bounding down the hallway obviously looking for us.

  “Well, if it isn’t Clark Kent and Lois Lane. What’s the big emergency?” she asked, looking back and forth from me to Michael.

  “It’s nothing,” said Michael. “I’ve got to go.” With that he rushed off to class.

  “What’s with him? Can you tell me what’s going on?” Hailey said.

  I really, really wanted to. It was hard enough keeping my Know-It-All drama from her, and now this. I took in a deep breath and counted in my head as I let it out. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. “This is all I can tell you. We got a suspicious quote from someone for the article and we need to talk to Trigger about it.”

  “From who?” she asked, and leaned toward me. “From Will Hutchins?” she whispered, her eyes aglow with the possibility of scandal.

  “That’s exactly why I can’t tell you, whether it was from him or not. It’s too big a deal to start rumors. We could really mess with someone here.” As I was saying it, I realized how big a deal this really was. “I hope you can understand, Hails,” I said.

  Hailey looked down at the floor. I didn’t want to hurt her feelings. Then she glanced up.

  “I won’t tell a soul. Don’t you trust me?”

  I bit my lip and thought about it. If I told just Hailey, what harm would it do? But then what if she had the same thought about another friend and they thought that about someone else? . . .

  “I promised Michael I wouldn’t while we were working on the story. It’s not that I don’t trust you, but I want Michael to trust me.”

  “Fine. I get it. I guess Michael and the paper are more important.” She walked off in a huff, leaving me standing there, my arms dangling by my sides. Was I putting Michael and the paper first? I wasn’t sure. I walked to class alone. Why did Hailey have to be so sensitive about things? Sometimes when stuff with the paper heated up and I had to work with Michael a lot, she got upset about something. Maybe she was jealous about the time I spent with Michael, but it was always the worst time for me to have to deal with friend stuff when I was dealing with Voice stuff.

  At the end of the day, Michael and I met outside Mr. Trigg’s office and knocked on the door.

  “Come in,” he said. We shuffled into the office. His feet were up on his desk and he was enjoying one of his classic cups of tea. “Well, Ms. Martone and Mr. Lawrence! What brings you here on this glorious day?”

  It was actually kind of cold and rainy. “Glorious” would not be the word I’d use.

  “Reminds me of London weather,” he said, as if reading my mind. “I love those gray days that make you want to curl up with some biscuits and tea and a good newspaper.” He took his legs off the table and sat up. “I’m glad you’re here. I wanted to ask you how the new online system is going. I have a feeling it’s going to make things a lot easier.”

  “I’m excited to use it, but we haven’t finished the article yet,” I said. “It’s shaping up nicely, though.”

>   “Um, yeah, except that,” Michael said, getting right into it, “we got a quote today that seemed . . .” He looked at me, suddenly at a loss for words.

  “Troubling,” I said.

  “I see. What kind of troubling?”

  Michael handed him his notes. Mr. Trigg put on his reading glasses and squinted at the paper.

  He stumbled through Michael’s handwriting. “What do you think about the bath . . . rest . . . Sorry, chap. I can’t quite make this out.”

  “It’s okay. I’ll read it,” Michael said, sighing, and read the quote out loud.

  “Well, that’s a juicy bit,” Mr. Trigg said, smiling. “Good work!”

  Good work? Had Trigger gone off the deep end? I cleared my throat and spoke. “Yeah, but he sounds like he’s almost trying to defend himself or might know the person who did it,” I said a little louder than I should have.

  “Ms. Martone,” Mr. Trigg said. “It’s up to you to cover the story from all angles and present it as objectively as possible. Don’t go jumping to conclusions. There’s a team of people investigating the breach. That’s not your job.”

  “But what if he did it? Is it okay that we do nothing?”

  “He just gave an opinion. He didn’t confess anything,” Mr. Trigg said. “I appreciate you telling me, though. I just don’t want to start a witch hunt. Is that all?” He got up to press the button of his electric teapot.

  “I guess so,” Michael said.

  “Well, it looks like your article is on its way to being brilliant. Keep going.”

  Michael and I walked out of his office and into the hallway. We both didn’t say anything for a moment.

  “That was weird,” Michael finally said.

  “I know. Not what I expected. I thought Mr. Trigg would definitely want to alert the authorities.”

  “Maybe he knows something we don’t.” Michael rubbed his chin in a particularly cute way.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Maybe he knows who might have done it, and he knows there’s nothing to worry about where Will’s concerned.”

  Huh. I never thought of that. “That would make sense then. But how would he know something that we don’t?”

  “Who knows what happens in faculty meetings? All the teachers probably know things that we don’t about this and everything else.”

  I nodded. I just couldn’t shake some sense of responsibility I had, probably because we were the only students actually investigating this story.

  “Well, got to go to practice,” Michael said. “I’ll catch you later!”

  I walked home in the rain. Luckily, I had taken Allie’s super-cool plaid green umbrella, which she would probably be looking for right about now. Whoops. Still, I felt soggy and tired when I came home. Allie wasn’t home yet. I said hi to my mom, who was huddled in her office, made myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, poured a big glass of milk, and sat in my desk chair. I took a bite of my sandwich and twirled around a bit. I wasn’t sure if I should call Hailey. I kind of wanted to wait until she was less mad.

  I lingered over a few of my go-to news Web sites. I knew I was trying to avoid the stack of homework piled up on my desk. I had a vocabulary test, some math homework, and a book report due tomorrow. If I felt overwhelmed, though, which I sometimes did, I asked my mom for help. She always knew what to say to keep me calm, organized, and moving forward. I always felt proud when I finished something I thought I couldn’t. If I cheated on a test or had someone else write my book report for me, I would never feel proud, just bad and guilty. How did the hacker and Rock Star feel right now? Maybe they just didn’t care about feeling that way. I decided to take another crack at the Know-It-All letter.

  Dear Rock Star,

  I understand that you may think a rock star doesn’t need to know how to write well, but how do you know you’ll actually be a successful rock star? Anyone with half a brain in their head needs to know how to write. Plus, you’ll be writing songs. To write great songs you need to write well. Also, I’m wondering if you realize that you put your friend at a huge risk when you asked him or her to essentially cheat with you. It’s one thing to make your own stupid decisions, but it’s even worse to involve other people. Why don’t you try writing the paper yourself for once? If you do badly, following your argument, it won’t matter since you’re planning to be a “rock star” and all. Then you can be honest about your choices and leave your poor friend out of it.

  I sat back and read what I wrote. It was clear, direct, and to the point, and exactly what Rock Star needed to hear, at least in my opinion. And I was proud that I hadn’t written “YOU’RE AN IDIOT!!!” anywhere, which was what I really wanted to say. I would show it to Mr. Trigg the next day and cross one more thing off my list.

  Chapter 6

  Girl Saves Friendship with a Sleepover

  I didn’t see Hailey until lunch the next day. When I walked into the cafeteria, she and Michael were sitting with Jenna and Kristen, Frank, and a couple of other people. I approached them with my tray. Hailey looked at me and then kept right on talking to Michael. She might as well have punched me in the stomach. I sat down quietly at the other end of the table.

  “Hey, Paste!” Michael said when he saw me. “Why are you sitting all the way over there? I saved a seat for you.” He patted the empty chair next to him.

  My heart sped up a little. Banana bread and saved seats. Is this how all guys treated their “friends”? I wasn’t sure if I felt comfortable sitting right near Hailey, but how could I pass up an offer like that? I managed a little smile and moved over. I picked up my veggie pizza and took a bite. Yum. It was one of our most delicious options from the organic table. I don’t know how the chef made whole wheat crust and broccoli taste so good, but she did. I chewed quietly for a moment.

  “Hi,” I finally said to Hailey, and waved my hand at her. I was tired of this ridiculous silent treatment. I hadn’t done anything wrong. I was just trying to keep my promises.

  “Hey,” she said, and turned to talk to Jenna. The blood rushed to my face. She couldn’t be serious.

  “Did you hear that a special teacher/parent meeting is planned for next Tuesday to discuss the retest?” Michael asked.

  I snapped out of my Hailey thoughts and looked up. “Really? When did this happen?”

  “My mom told me last night,” Michael said. “It was e-mailed to all the seventh-grade parents yesterday. I was surprised too.”

  “Oh” was all I managed to say. I wondered why my mom hadn’t told me. I thought of her last night, doing work in her office. She was probably so busy she forgot. Normally, I understood when Mom had a lot of work, but I couldn’t help feeling a little angry and embarrassed that as a reporter for this story, I was the last to know. Maybe she needed to do a little rebalancing.

  “So, we definitely need to be at that meeting,” he said, seeming kind of surprised by my lack of words.

  “Yeah, definitely.” I was trying to focus on Michael and the meeting, but I had too many thoughts swirling around my head at once. I saw Hailey look at me out of the corner of her eye.

  “Hailey,” I said a little louder than I meant to, “can we talk for a minute?” Suddenly everyone at the table was looking at me.

  “Uh, sure,” she said, surprised.

  “Over there.” I motioned to an empty table. She followed me and sat down. I sat across from her.

  “Are you really this mad at me?” I asked, “because I don’t get it, Hailey.”

  Hailey swung her legs back and forth and looked down at the table before answering.

  “I just feel like every time you work on a big story for the paper with Michael, I become second fiddle. I mean, when
was the last time we had a sleepover or just hung out all weekend and went to the movies? I know I’m busy with stuff too, but we should always be able to make time to have fun.”

  I took in a deep breath. Hailey was right in some ways. I did get a little obsessed with the paper sometimes and it had been a long time since we had just hung out all weekend.

  “Why couldn’t you just tell me that? I wanted to keep my promise to Michael just like I would keep a promise to you,” I said. “I don’t know why you had to get so mad about it and give me the silent treatment.”

  Hailey’s face changed from angry to a little sad. She looked down at her lap. “It just made me a little jealous that you had a secret with Michael and not me. I know. That’s pretty stupid.”

  It’s true that I didn’t really have to share Hailey with anyone else. We had other friends, but no one that made me feel “second fiddle,” as Hailey had said.

  “I have an idea,” I burst out. “Next Friday we should be done with the article, and now that the paper is online, it’s going to be even quicker to post it. Let’s plan a sleepover/movie night, okay?”

  Hailey smiled her big sparkly smile. “Okay!” Girl Saves Friendship with a Sleepover. Now I could cross off two more things on my list: 1. Dear Know-It-All letter, check. 2. Making up with my bestie, check.

  “Hails,” I said, grabbing her shoulders, looking her right in the eye. “You’re irreplaceable, okay? Not second fiddle at all. And you know all my secrets that really matter.”

  She nodded again and smiled.

  “Want to go back to the other table?” I asked. She said yes, so we walked back over and sat down. Everyone was suddenly quiet with blank expressions on their faces, as if they hadn’t been discussing mine and Hailey’s drama at all.