Access Denied (and other eighth grade error messages) (7 page)

REEDE WAS STANDING AT OUR locker the next morning, applying mascara.

“No adoring fans?” I asked as she stepped aside to make room for me.

“No, thank God.” She straightened up and did another eye-scan over my body.

“Would you mind not staring at me?” I said as I opened my backpack.

“Sorry.” She shrugged and looked back at the mirror. “I kind of have this ability to make someone over in my mind and sometimes
I do it without realizing it. You don’t need much of a makeover, I just see you with—”

“Not interested,” I interrupted, grabbing the books I’d need for my next few classes. “It’s not all about looks, you know.”
Even as I said it, I was hearing her words echo in my head:
You don’t need much of a makeover.

Reede raised an eyebrow. “No. But they help.”

I closed the locker just as Mark and Kara walked towards us down the hall.

“Hi, Erin.” Kara’s voice was bright, but she didn’t look at me.

“Swift,” Mark said, pointing at me. “Get ready to die at the Y.”

I shook my head, smiling. That was his new phrase whenever we played basketball, which we were supposed to do this weekend.
“You’re the one who’s going down,” I said.

Kara’s smile flipped to a frown.

A familiar twinge of guilt-annoyance pinched me. Kara claimed it was fine that Mark and I played basketball together, that
she knew we were only friends and “totally trusted” us. But here she was looking pissed at the mention of Mark and me going
to shoot hoops.

When I had asked Jilly about it, she had said of course it was fine because Mark and I had been playing together before he
went out with anyone. And he always invited her.

“You’re lucky because there aren’t too many girls who have a friend who’s a boy—that they do stuff with outside of school,”
she had said. Then she had said something really cool: “You shouldn’t have to give up a good friendship for anyone.” The way
she had looked at me, I knew she was thinking of last year, when she told me I had to pick between my friendship with her
and my friendship with Mark. Thankfully, we had worked it out after a big fight. But it was cool that she could bring it up.

“Who’s the hottie with the hair?” Reede’s voice brought me back to the hallway.

I frowned. I really didn’t want Mark on Reede’s radar. He seemed like the only guy who was immune to her. “Just another infant,”
I said, using her word.

“That one’s an exception,” she said, looking at me. “So, who’s he to you?”

None of your business,
I wanted to say but instead I said, “a friend.”

She snorted. “Does he know that?”

“What do you mean?”

She glanced down the hall. “You didn’t catch that little energy surge he sent your way?”

“Energy surge?”

Reede tucked her books against her hip. “He likes you, girl.”

I furrowed my brow. “Um, hello? He had his arm around his girlfriend?”

“Who, by the way, is totally and completely jealous of you,” Reede said. “And she’s history.”

I glanced down the hall where I could just make them out in the crowd.

“I give them another week, tops,” Reede said.

“What?” I said. “You don’t even know them.”

“I don’t have to know them to know how they feel,” Reede said, with an authority that made me believe her. “He likes you,
she can feel it, and she’s totally jealous and trying not to show it. Didn’t you hear how fake her ‘hi’ was?”

I didn’t know how to answer that. If I said I had noticed, then it would be like I knew she was jealous of me and that sounded
self-centered. But if I said I didn’t notice, it would seem like I was a totally unobservant dork who couldn’t read anyone’s
body language.

“Play the innocent bystander if you want, Erin,” Reede said. “But that guy is totally into you and his little girlfriend is
going to be solo very soon.”

I looked at her.

“I think I just made your day,” she said, walking backward down the hall. “You can thank me later.” She turned around and
picked up her pace, leaving me shaking my head. How could one person be so complicated? One minute Reede’s dissing my look,
the next she’s saying Mark is sending me “energy surges” and is going to break up with Kara. I was so confused as I looked
for Mr. F that I nearly barreled into Puppet Porter—I mean Mrs. Porter—our principal.

“Watch where you’re going, Miss Swift,” she said, as she placed a hand on my shoulder to steer me out of oncoming traffic.
“Staying out of trouble so far, I hope?”

“Yes, Mrs. Porter,” I said. “That’s my plan.”

“Excellent, excellent,” she said. “And how are your puppets?”

“I don’t have any puppets, Mrs. Porter.” I sighed. Ever since I’d hit Serena last year for calling me a puppet and had to
talk to Mrs. Porter, who had a whole collection of puppets, she thought I had a collection, too. “But how is
your
collection?”

“I added another marionette from Germany,” she said. “You should stop by.”

“Maybe I will,” I said. “Right now I need to go.” I ducked down the hall toward the gym where I spotted Mr. F outside one
of the larger custodian closets.

“Running from trouble?” Mr. F said when I arrived, out of breath.

“Just my past,” I said. I glanced at the open door, noticing several photos taped to it. “Were these up last year?”

“Same kids, different photos,” Mr. F said.

“I can’t believe I never noticed,” I said. “Who are they?”

Mr. F emptied a box of paper towels and looked up. “Some of the best kids around.”

“Better than us?” I joked, placing a roll of paper towels on the shelf next to the others.

He chuckled, then pointed to a young girl, whose toothless smile filled her face. “That’s Olivia. She’s seven.” He shook his
head. “Sweetest smile you’ll ever see and the best hugger I’ve ever met.” He picked up the empty box and set it in the hall.
“They’re kids at a place I visit.”

“They’re cute,” I said. “I’d like to meet the best hugger.”

“Maybe you will someday,” Mr. F said. He offered me a Tootsie Pop from his jar on the shelf. “But I bet you didn’t come here
to talk about pictures. What’s on your mind?”

I unwrapped the Tootsie and settled on top of a step ladder near the door. “There’s this new girl.”

“Reede Harper,” Mr. F said. Now he was cleaning scrub brushes in the big sink, rubbing them together so the soap squished
and squirted.

“How did you know?” I asked. “Aren’t there a lot of new people every year?”

“Just a hunch,” Mr. F said. “Go on.”

“Well,” I said, “at first she seemed really stuck up, like she was too cool for everyone, but then she says things that are
the total opposite of that.”

“Sounds pretty normal,” Mr. F said, raising an eyebrow. “Is that all?”

I concentrated on peeling the wrapper off my Tootsie Pop. “Reede thinks this one guy is going to break up with his girlfriend
and that he likes someone else.”

Mr. F smiled. “I don’t know if Mark will break up with Kara but I do think he likes you.”

I almost fell over backward off the step ladder. “Would you stop that?”

Mr. F laughed, rinsing one of the brushes. “So, what’s the problem with this situation?”

I put the Tootsie Pop in my mouth. “I don’t know,” I said, the round sucker pushing my cheek out. “I guess it’s just, well,
weird.”

“Because of last year?” he said. “How you liked Mark and he liked Jilly but you stopped liking him and didn’t think you liked
him that way anymore. Only now that you’ve found out he might be interested in you, you may be taking a second look?”

I shook my head in amazement. “Are you sure you aren’t a middle school girl under that gray hair?”

Mr. F chuckled. “I listen and observe, that’s all.”

Sighing, I folded the wrapper into a tiny square and tossed it into the garbage can next to the door. “So, I don’t know what
to do.”

“Why do you need to do anything?” Setting the brushes carefully on the shelf above the sink, Mr F adjusted them in a neat
row. “Nothing’s happened yet. Why don’t you let things go the way they will and then decide what to do.”

I frowned. “But I want to be prepared.”

“For what?”

“If they break up,” I said. “If Mark likes me and asks me out. If Kara hates my guts.”

Mr. F laughed. “That’s a lot of ifs. I think you’re much better off living right here, right now, and not preparing for things
that may never happen.”

“But what if they do?”

Mr. F put some cleaning supplies in the bucket. “Then you’ll handle them with your usual good sense, Erin P. Swift.” He lifted
the bucket and turned to face me. “Lunch is almost over so if you want to eat, you’d better get going. And I’ve got to get
to work.”

“Thanks for nothing, Mr. F,” I said as we knocked fists.

He laughed. “You’re welcome.”