Double Dare (From the Files of Madison Finn, 14) (2 page)

“A wiener?” Madison laughed out loud. It was a funny comment coming from someone whose entire family were vegetarians.

“Yeah, a wiener, not a winner. A real DOG!” Aimee added.

Madison was happy for the comic relief, but she needed more than Aimee’s cheering up to get through this. She needed
real
advice on what to do next. How could she enter the computer contest without Egg? Who would she find as a partner with only two weeks to go? And how could she possibly win?

Madison distracted herself from thinking too much by rummaging through Aimee’s closet. She needed to borrow an outfit for dinner, since her dad and his girlfriend, Stephanie, would be picking her up in an hour or so. Aimee lent Madison a peasant skirt (which looked great with Madison’s yellow top) and ylang-ylang perfume (which made Phinnie sneeze when he smelled it).

After Madison got dressed, she went in search of the best advice she could find. She had some time to kill before Dad’s arrival. Aimee was busy practicing some ballet moves in the basement, so with Mrs. Gillespie’s permission, Madison hooked up her laptop to go online upstairs. She hoped to find her keypal, Bigwheels, hiding out in a chat room on TweenBlurt.com.

Madison had met Bigwheels on the website during the summer, and they’d connected right away. Even though her family lived all the way across the country in Washington State, Bigwheels had a lot in common with Madison. They met in chat rooms regularly—and e-mailed even more often than that. Madison even knew her real name—Victoria. They were both in seventh grade now, and Bigwheels always had great advice.

Madison clicked on
NEW MAIL
and started to type.

From: MadFinn


To: Bigwheels


Subject: Need Your HELP!


Date: Wed 13 Sept 4:36
PM


What’s gnu? I have a few school dilemmas.


I was counting on my pal Egg to do this computer contest with me, but he bailed out. What do I say to him? I want to enter and win all this stuff, but I have no one to do it with. And not only that but I’m working on the school website as the elections coordinator, and I have way 2 much 2 do!!!


Mom is away again. I miss her sooo much. Do ur parents ever go anywhere? Mine are always super busy with work.


Send me some valuable advice like u always do, pleeez?


Yours till the water falls,


MadFinn


Before sending the e-mail, Madison marked it “priority” with a little red exclamation point. Everything was happening so fast—and Madison needed advice
faster
than fast.

After sending the e-mail, she opened a brand-new file.

The Contest


Rude Awakening:
Just when I think I can be a real winner, all my hopes byte the dust.


Why do I always over-think life? I can find another contest partner, can’t I? With my luck, I’ll probably end up with Lance the loser from the back row. Well, he’s not exactly a loser, but I don’t want to be part of his pair and that’s that. Ugh.


Madison hit
SAVE
and contemplated her contest fate. Phin pounced onto the edge of Aimee’s trundle bed where Madison was sitting.

“What’s happening, Phinnie?” Madison thought to herself, nuzzling his head. “It’ll all work out, won’t it?”

When Phin barked “Rowroooo!” on cue, Madison knew it would.

M
ADISON GAZED UP AT
the wipe-off board announcing Thursday’s school lunch menu.

Meatball Loaf

Vegetable Lasagna Deluxe

Chicken-Fried Chicken

Salad Bar

Peas and Carrots

Mashed Potatoes

Lime Jell-O

“What’s chicken-fried chicken?” Madison asked Fiona.

“I have
no
idea. Is chicken-fried chicken different from regular fried chicken?” Fiona replied.

“Forget that,” Aimee said. “Have you ever heard of meatball loaf?”

Fiona giggled. “I’m getting a salad.” She moved down the line with her cafeteria tray.

Gilda Z the Lunchroom Lady grinned at the girls as they passed by. “Try the lasagna, it’s delish,” she said, scooping some onto a plate.

Aimee grabbed the dish and kept moving. She hoped the vegetables would taste okay, even though what was on her plate looked more like rainbow mush. The three friends walked toward the back of the room where they’d scoped out “their” table since the start of school. It was bright orange—Madison’s favorite color in the world.

The lunchroom was packed with seventh graders, including Madison’s mortal enemy, “Poison” Ivy Daly. Since third grade, Madison had been shooting glares and swapping barbs with Ivy. Junior high had been even worse.

Ivy sat in the middle of the room at a yellow table with her drones, Rose and Joanie, a pair of girls who followed Ivy wherever she went. As they passed by, Aimee and Madison purposely looked away. But Fiona said a cheery hello.

Ivy smiled back. “Why don’t you sit with us, Fiona?”

Aimee grabbed Fiona’s elbow gently—and shot Ivy a look.

“Uh …” Fiona stammered, glancing over at Madison, who shook her head.

“What’s your problem?” Madison asked Ivy.

“What’s
yours
?” Ivy snapped.

“Fiona already has a place to sit,” Aimee said with a sneer.

Fiona and her salad just kept on moving.

When the trio got to the back of the room, they were greeted by a bunch of boys flicking peas and carrots across the table. The lunchroom lady had stepped away, so no one would be caught for this particular lunchroom violation. Egg was in charge of the miniature vegetable shooting. Of course.

Just seeing Egg, Drew, and Chet together made her stomach flip-flop. Madison sat as far away from them as she could. Chet was laughing really loudly too, which made the whole scene even worse. He sounded like a siren.

“My brother is such a geek,” Fiona whispered. “I don’t know how I can possibly be related to him.”

“Didn’t you say your birthdays were coming up soon?” Aimee asked.

“Yeah, a reminder that we are twins,” Fiona groaned. She rolled her eyes. “And it’s not too exciting, believe me. We’ll just do what we usually do. Eat a boring family dinner. Blow out the candles on a plain vanilla cake with chocolate-cream frosting. Try to keep sane as all my aunts and uncles call and ask the same things. Mom will buy us some dumb twin gift, like a matching outfit or something. She’s been doing that since we were babies.”

“That sounds kind of cool to me,” Madison said. Since she was an only child with divorced parents, any kind of major “family” event sounded cool to her. She’d always wished for a brother or sister.

“I know what you mean about family events, Fiona,” Aimee said. “I get so sick of my brothers when it’s my birthday. They tease me a lot.”

From the other end of the table, Chet let out another loud laugh. Fiona yelled at him to shut up, which got the entire table into a shouting match.

Madison stared off into space, watching and listening to everything like it was in slo-mo. She stared down at her slab of vegetable lasagna, which tasted like wet paper with tomato sauce, and turned once more to look at Ivy. Her enemy stood flipping her hair before a group of girls. Poison Ivy would figure out a way to create a winning webpage, Madison thought. If only—

“Maddie?” Fiona interrupted. “Are you entering that computer contest?”

“What?” Madison turned to Fiona, a little surprised. “What did you say?”

“My brother, Chet, told me about the contest last night. He told me that he’s doing it with Egg. Like he even has a chance! I mean, it sounds way more like
your
thing than his—”

Madison smiled. “Thanks. I just wish I had someone to enter the contest with me.”

Fiona grinned. “Um …
hello
?”

Aimee laughed out loud. “Yeah, Maddie. Duh.
Double
duh.”

“What?” Madison cried, looking at her friends. She didn’t know why they were teasing her.

“Think, Maddie,” Aimee said. She motioned toward Fiona.

Madison bit her lip and looked over at Fiona. “Would you want to do it? I thought with soccer practice you wouldn’t have time.”

“It’s true, soccer is my life,” Fiona said, giggling. “But I still love computers!”

“Problem solved,” Aimee said emphatically.

“Do you really want to enter … with me?” Madison said.

“Are you kidding? Chet keeps bragging about how he and Egg are going to win. I would love the chance to show him up. Ha!”

From across the table, Fiona made a face at her twin brother. He blew a raspberry back at her.

“Hey, Chet!” Fiona yelled. “Maddie and I were just talking, and I’m entering that computer contest too. SO THERE!”

Chet squinted back with disbelief. “What are you talking about, Fiona?”

“Since you and Egg went ahead and signed on together, Maddie and I are doing the same. And we’re going to win.”

Egg piped up. “You guys … uh, excuse me …
girls
don’t have a chance.”

“I can’t believe you’d say that!” Madison gasped. She knew he was showing off in front of his friends.

“I dare you to enter,” Egg teased. The other boys at the table laughed.

“You’re so conceited, Egg,” Madison said.

“I double-dare you!” Chet said, still laughing.

Aimee leaned over to Madison. “Why are you guys getting so worked up about this? It’s just a dumb computer contest,” she whispered.

Madison thought for a moment.

This was way more than just one contest. This was some kind of junior high ritual. It was a test of friendships. It was her chance to show Egg that he’d made a major mistake in not asking his oldest friend—her—to do the contest
first.

“Aimee, a computer contest may sound dumb to you, but it really isn’t dumb,” Madison explained. “Not to me, anyway.”

“So, Maddie, is it a dare or what?” Egg asked again.

Madison nodded. “Absolutely,” she said, crossing her fingers under the table. Fiona and Chet were still screaming at each other, even though they could barely be heard above the sound of other voices, silverware, trays, and backpack zippers in the lunchroom.

For the remainder of the school day, Madison replayed the lunchroom exchange over and over in her mind. When she arrived at Aimee’s house later that night, Madison immediately turned on her laptop. She wanted to continue working on her file marked, “The Contest.” Her mind swirled with thoughts. As always, Madison had to overthink everything. Had she done the right thing? Did she and Fiona
really
have a chance to win? Would this mean the end of her friendship with Egg?

An Insta-Message from TweenBlurt.com interrupted all the questions.

: You were soooo excellent in school! Meet me in private room COMPGIRL


Fiona was online. She wanted to talk—now. Madison scooted into the chat room.

: Chet is freaking


: ?


: locked himself in his rm LOL


: 1-)


: so what’s the plan


: plan?


: what do u wanna do for the webpage


: IHNI


: I thought you had some big plan that’s y I said I’d do it


: LOL


: seriously


: well I don’t have a plan I only just found out about the contest


: what do the rules say??


: the webpg has to be like a homework helper


: what’s that?


: we nd to put lots of information and links


: IDGI


: it’s like a place to go for answers and cool information I think like a web search function


: can we put a poll online? I always wanted to do that


: I think you can download that from somewhere, what would the poll be about?


: something like what is ur fave subject


: I saw a poll site once where kids put up notices on a bulletin board to vote for the hottest kid in their class


: weird


: yeah and it got really nasty too people writing mean stuff about girls and guys in their class


: I could never do that


: so what would OUR poll be?


Madison and Fiona chatted back and forth about different webpage ideas, but neither of them could agree on a direction for the contest. They decided to meet over the weekend to finalize their plan. Fiona suggested that she spy on her brother so she could get information about what he was planning to do on the webpage with Egg. Madison wasn’t sure that was fair, but then decided that
anything
seemed fair in this game.