Digital Disaster! Page 7

  I saw Hailey walking down the hall in front of me when I left the Voice office and Michael had already left for a late game he had. “Hails!” I called behind her. She had just gotten done with soccer practice and was ready to go home. “So glad I caught you. It’s Friday! Movie tonight? Or a sleepover?”

  “Both!” she said, and linked arms with me. We walked straight out of school into a day of freedom. On the way out, I saw Will Hutchins holding his backpack tight on his shoulders.

  “Hailey, hold on a sec,” I said. The girl may leave reporting for a bit, but the reporter never leaves the girl.

  She sighed at me and rolled her eyes. “You’re obsessed,” she hissed at me.

  “A little,” I said. “Don’t worry. I promise it will be short.”

  I walked ahead of her to catch up with him. “Hey, Will. Do you have a minute?” I called to him as sweetly as I could. He peered at me out of his hood.

  “Yeah, I guess,” he murmured. “Are you gonna take notes?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean do you want another quote from me for the paper?” he asked.

  Maybe I was obsessed. School Reporter Comes Dangerously Close to Stalking Student. Not really, but after this I promised myself I would back off. “No. The article’s pretty much done,” I said, trying to sound mellow. It was true, sort of. We certainly could add anything we wanted up until Tuesday.

  “No, I’m just interested in your point of view since you’re a student and . . .”

  “And what?”

  Good question. What was I going to tell him? You’re a computer expert and have acted suspicious during this whole incident and I want to see if you did it?

  I stood up tall and gathered myself for a second. “And you’re a computer expert,” I said slowly. “And you seem to have some strong opinions on the subject. I noticed you were at the parent/teacher meeting. What did you think of the outcome?” I asked, hoping I wouldn’t chase him away.

  “I thought”—he paused and took off his hood—“I thought that things are messed up.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean what I just said. It’s too bad for everyone—the hacker, the students, the teachers, the parents. It’s just messed up.”

  “So you do think a kid at this school was the hacker?” I asked, slipping into investigative reporter mode.

  He just looked at me. “I gotta go,” he said in a low tone and hurried away.

  Hailey walked up to me. “He’s strange.”

  “He certainly acts like he’s hiding something,” I said, shaking my head. “But I don’t think I’m ever going to find out what it is.”

  “Maybe not,” Hailey said. “But it’s not your job. Right now your job is to have fun with me.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I replied, and we linked arms and sang “Follow the Yellow Brick Road” while we skipped home like lunatics. The Wizard of Oz had been one of our favorites in elementary school. Hailey and I have probably seen it together twenty times.

  Hailey came to my house and a little later her mom dropped off Hailey’s stuff. Allie was at a friend’s house, so we didn’t have to worry about her yelling at us to turn the music down or being nosy in general. First we checked out Buddybook. I refuse to actually be a member since I’m afraid I’ll get nothing else done if I am, but I keep track of things through Hailey so I’m not completely in the dark. We checked out Michael’s page and sifted through some cute baseball pics that some of the team members tagged him in. There was one of him pitching that I kept going back to. He looked so intense and serious. I loved how Michael really put his all in everything he did.

  “Hey,” I said. “Do you know if Will Hutchins on Buddybook?”

  “Uh-oh. Here we go again,” she grumbled, but looked him up anyway.

  He was. There were lots of pictures of him and his dog and a few of him skateboarding. He actually posted a lot, mostly song lyrics and inspirational sayings. He had a lot of “buddies,” which surprised me, and he didn’t keep his posts private, which meant you could see them even if you weren’t his buddy. They were all public. He seemed like such a loner at school. This was another time things weren’t exactly as they appeared. His most recent post, which he made yesterday, really caught my attention, though.

  Getting close was all it said. A bunch of people, mostly kids in the IT club, gave a “thumbs-up” to his post, but nobody made any comments.

  “Huh,” Hailey said. “I wonder what that means.”

  “See? Now you’re getting why I’m obsessed,” I said.

  “Well, I’ll keep tabs on his posts for you,” she said. “But now let’s get ready for the movies!”

  We tried on a thousand outfits, blasted our music, made up some really awful dance moves, and acted just like two girls who didn’t have a care in the world.

  Chapter 10

  Missing Reporter Finally Found Having Good Time!

  Hailey slept over Friday night and then I went over to her house on Saturday. We spent the day at the mall picking out lip gloss, an awesome new shade of nail polish called Watermelon Slushy, and flip-flops in anticipation of the warmer weather. On Sunday it was so nice outside, after her soccer game Hailey called and asked if I wanted to go on a ride along the bike trail. I was thrilled at the thought of doing something outdoors.

  “Sure!” I replied. I couldn’t remember the last time I just “played” all weekend long. It felt really good.

  “Don’t you have a deadline for the paper?” Mom said when I told her I was going on a bike ride. I could tell she was surprised that I suddenly had some free time.

  “It’s online now, so I have a couple extra days,” I said. “We’re basically finished.”

  “If you say so,” said Mom, but I could tell she was a little concerned, probably because she was used to me stressing out all the time about the paper. “Your bike helmet’s in the garage.”

  I wasn’t lying. We were basically finished with the article, but I still had to get going on another draft of the Know-It-All letter and e-mail it to Mr. Trigg on Sunday night. Still, I definitely had time for a little fun.

  Sunday night arrived and I had to come back to earth. The first thing I did was check my e-mail. I hadn’t looked at it all weekend, a first for me, at least since I got my own e-mail account. Michael had sent me a message on Saturday and then another one this afternoon.

  Are you sure we’ll have enough time on Monday to put in the changes we want? Maybe we should meet Sunday afternoon?

  And then the next one said,

  Where are you, Sam? Did you get my e-mail?? I guess we’ll have to take our chances with the article. . . .

  I felt bad that I hadn’t gotten back to him, but I didn’t regret taking my little staycation with Hailey. Missing Reporter Finally Found Having Good Time!

  I decided to message him:

  Sorry, Mikey. I was just having too much fun this weekend and my e-mail got away from me. Don’t worry. The article will be fine.

  After a minute, he replied. I thought you left the country!!!

  Nope, just my computer I typed back to him. I smiled, wondering if he’d missed me. I stretched out my arms and fanned out my fingers. Okay, now it was focus time. My head did feel a little clearer after taking a break. I thought about Rock Star and remembered what Mr. Trigg had said. I needed to pretend that Rock Star was eighth-grader Allie, overwhelmed with her work and not sure what to do.

  Dear Rock Star,

  It sounds like writing papers is not your favorite thing. I get that. I really do. There are plenty of times I’m not excited about doing a paper or studying for a test, and I have definitely been overwhelmed
by schoolwork. I think a lot is expected of students at our school. Still, what if your friend gets in trouble on your behalf? Or what if she or he makes you look like a better student than you are and then even more is expected of you? The pressure will only increase and the cheating will catch up with you. It always does. Maybe you can get help with your next paper from a tutor, or your parents, or even a friend (who helps you do your work, not does it for you). You don’t have to be in it alone. I wish you luck on your road to being a rock star. Good writing skills may or may not play into it, but a clear conscience can only help you be the best at whatever you want to do.

  When I finished the last word, I jumped up and threw my hands in the air. “Yes!” I yelled out. I knew I had struck the right note this time.

  “What’s up with you?” Allie said, suddenly standing in my room. She leaned in a bit in order to get a better look at my computer screen.

  I froze. I had the presence of mind to quickly close out my Know-It-All document before I whipped around.

  “What did you just close out of?” Allie asked suspiciously, waving a finger at the computer, not missing a trick.

  “Nothing,” I said, still gathering my thoughts. “I didn’t close out of anything.”

  “Liar, liar, pants on fire,” Allie said, taunting me. “Writing a secret letter to your boyfriend?”

  I crossed my arms over my chest. “Seriously, why don’t you ever knock?” Not only had Allie ruined my moment of victory; now I was being forced to lie when I just wrote about clearing your conscience.

  “Ah-ha! So it is a letter to your boyfriend.” She turned and walked out of the room.

  “I don’t have a boyfriend,” I yelled after her. Then I stopped. I needed to let her believe whatever she was going to believe. Better that than her insisting she look at my computer. And it wasn’t a total lie. I’d just IM’d Michael, who wasn’t my boyfriend, and an IM isn’t exactly a letter. But that’s my story and I’m sticking with it! I quickly got back on my computer and sent my DKIA letter to Mr. Trigg and then closed out the file immediately. Nosy Sister Almost Discovers Secret Identity. Maybe I should be a CIA agent instead of a journalist when I grow up!

  At school the next day when I was walking with Hailey, I saw Mr. Trigg in the hallway. He smiled and gave me a thumbs-up. “Nice work on that piece,” he said, obviously trying to be ambiguous about it, and then hurried off in his usual speed-walking way before I even got a chance to respond.

  “What is he talking about?” Hailey asked.

  Oh brother! Here we go again. “I just sent him a part of the test scandal article I was having trouble on,” I said without blinking an eye. It was a little scary how good I was getting at this.

  “Oh cool,” she said not thinking much of it. “I’m so psyched for Spring Fling!” she said.

  “Me too, but I’m not psyched for the math test tomorrow.” My stomach did a little flip thinking about everything that was going to happen in the next three days. We were going to finish up the newspaper this afternoon, and the dreaded math retest was scheduled for tomorrow. Then we were rewarded with Spring Fling on Wednesday. I should have made a spreadsheet to keep track of it all.

  “Well, technically we’ve already studied for it. It’s just reviewing stuff,” she said nonchalantly.

  I was surprised Hailey was being so relaxed about school. Maybe taking tests a second time really did work for her.

  “I just hope I don’t do worse the second time around. But I guess I’ll never know if I do,” I said. The math department had decided not to let us see our grades because some of them could have been invalid and also so people wouldn’t be upset if they did do worse the second time.

  “The chances of that are pretty low,” Hailey said. “You’ll be much more familiar with the concepts now, even if the questions are different.”

  I laughed because it sounded like something Mom would say. “I hope you’re right,” I said, picking up the pace. The five-minute bell rang and I didn’t want to be late for math class today of all days when we’d review for the test.

  “And anyway,” Hailey said brightly, “before you know it, we’ll be screaming on a roller coaster and stuffing our faces with cotton candy.”

  I was starting to catch her enthusiasm. “Maybe I’ll even get to ride the Ferris wheel with you know who,” I said dreamily. The Ferris wheel was the most romantic ride I could think of.

  “Yeah. And if you get scared at the top, you can grab on to his arm. Better yet, he could grab on to yours!” She was laughing now. “Oh, Sam, my love,” she said in a deep voice, between laughs. “Protect me from this frightening Ferris wheel!”

  I doubled over and started cracking up so hard I couldn’t speak. Hailey makes me laugh harder than anyone on earth. In my opinion, this is a superimportant quality for any bestie.

  “Oh no,” I said, suddenly straightening up. “We’re going to be late!” With that we took off to our separate math classes.

  After school I headed to the Voice office as soon as I could. I had a few changes I wanted to make to the article and I was sure Michael did, too. Now it was time to get serious and finish our article.

  “Well, if it isn’t Ms. Leisure,” Michael said, coming in right after me. Nobody else was there yet.

  “Hilarious. Can’t I take a little break?” I asked, putting my stuff over at one of the computers and pulling out a chair. I sat down and pulled up the Voice template.

  “I’m just kidding with you, Paste,” he said, his eyes twinkling. “I’m just used to you bugging me about the story. It was a little spooky the other way around.” Michael put his backpack down and pulled a chair over to mine. When he sat down, he was so close, we bumped knees. It felt like an electric current ran through me when his knee touched mine. I stared at it.

  “Oh sorry,” he said, sounding a little nervous, probably because my eyes were fixed on his knee.

  “It’s okay,” I said, and the image of Michael grabbing my arm on the Ferris wheel just kind of popped in my head. A smile started to spread over my face.

  “What’s so funny?” he asked.

  Like I could even explain. “Nothing. Just excited to put the finishing touches on the story.” We took turns adding a couple of things, fiddling with this sentence and that and making sure both of our sections flowed together. Then we read it over for the millionth time.

  “Nice work, Sam,” Michael said when he finished.

  “Couldn’t have done it without you,” I said, smiling. When Michael called me Sam, I knew he meant it.

  After a little bit, the rest of the Voice staff started to come in and poke around at their stories. Then Mr. Trigg came in and gave everything a last look before he officially previewed the entire paper.

  “Okay, guys, we want it perfect,” he said, standing in the middle of the room. “Just because we can launch the paper in the blink of an eye, instead of waiting two days for it to be printed and delivered, doesn’t mean we can be any less professional about it. Once it’s out there, it’s out there. We can’t have any trigger fingers.”

  Just as he finished speaking, an ominous crack of thunder shook the room as a rainstorm started rolling in. Everybody jumped a little bit at the sound.

  “Okay, so let’s get ready to preview this thing and see how it looks! I will hit publish at six a.m. sharp tomorrow morning, so we’ve got to put this to bed today. I don’t want people e-mailing me changes at midnight.” He clicked the preview button. A murmur of admiration ran through the room as we saw the paper on the screen the way everyone at school would see it. It looked fantastic.

  “A smashing success,” Mr. Trigg said. “Superb work everyone!” Another blast of thunder shook the
room. The lights flickered for a second and then we heard a pop. Suddenly we were standing in darkness. There were a few shrieks, giggles, and screams. At first I didn’t understand what happened. One moment we were all cheering the paper; the next we were jostling each other in the dark. A warm hand touched my arm.

  “Don’t worry, Pasty,” Michael whispered in my ear. “Everything will be just fine.”

  Now I wanted to scream. Wait until Hailey got a load of this—me standing with Michael Lawrence in the dark while he whispered in my ear—even better than being at the top of the Ferris wheel.

  “Stay calm, everyone,” Mr. Trigg said. “I’ll call the front office if—”

  But the lights flickering once more interrupted him. Then they went back on and stayed on. Everyone clapped and cheered.

  “Okay,” Mr. Trigg said. “Now, where were we?” The computers had shut off in the power outage. He turned on the one we were all looking at again.

  “Here we are,” he said, opening the file for the Voice layout again. The masthead came up, but nothing else did. All the text boxes were blank.

  “Did I click on the wrong file?” Mr. Trigg asked, bewildered,

  “Here. Let me see,” Susannah, the editor in chief, said. She closed it down and clicked on a few things. The template came up, but with no text again. “Ummm,” she said in a flat tone. “It looks like everything’s gone.”

  Gone? How could that be? Things didn’t just disappear like that, or did they?

  Mr. Trigg sighed. “An unfortunate accident, but one obviously beyond our control,” he said. “I’m sorry. We’ll have to stay here just a bit longer than planned. Okay, everyone, let’s retrieve our backups and load them in again.”

  A tingle of fear rippled through my body. Michael and I looked at each other. Backup? I mouthed to him. He shrugged. Gulp.

  Jeff, the photographer, seemed unfazed. “I still have all the photos I took in my camera,” he said. “I’ll just download them again for the stories. No biggie.”