Welcome to Dweeb Club

by Betsy Uhrig

I ACTUALLY PUNCHED THE AIR when I read that last sentence. This was the help screen I’d been waiting for. The personal, honest one. Give it a good S.A.P., a little S.L.O.P. and some G.L.O.P., maybe a few misapplied filters, and we were in business.

  I typed the obvious follow-up question: Why did you want me to join H.A.I.R. Club so bad? Were you trying to tell me something?

  The next thing I write here should be “There was a knock on the door.” Because that is how interruptions occur in the normal world. Politely, and with some warning. But not in mine. There was no knock on the door. There was just an Alice. In my room. Without warning and not politely.

  “It’s time for you to come down and watch my show,” she announced.

  “I can’t right now,” I said. “I’m doing my homework.”

  “That’s not your homework,” she said. “That’s not your computer either.”

  “It’s a school computer that I borrowed,” I said.

  She didn’t care. “My show is called The Adventures of Skunk Boy the Arsenic in Dork Land, Part One.”

  “Sounds terrible. Now, beat it. You’re being a pest.”

  “No, you’re being a pest,” came the usual retort.

  “Look, Alice. I don’t have time for your stupid show. Someone is trying to torment me from the future.” Great. Now my filters had been misapplied.

  “You’re tormenting you from the future,” Alice muttered as she stomped out of the room.

  At least she was gone. I got up and closed the door, then turned back to the computer, which had gone dark again. I moved the cursor, and the screen lit up, filled with single-spaced type. What had I even asked it?

  Oh, Jason, it read. What can I say? Okay, here goes. You’re never going to see this anyway, so why not? Maybe it will be good for me to get it off my chest.

  I know you live in a bubble. Your own little Jason bubble, where everything is about Jason. But please don’t label people and assume they’re only minor characters in your story. Never assume that about anyone. Take the time to really look at people and really listen to them. And learn their names. Please, please learn their names. Believe me, you are never going to look back on your life and wish you’d paid less attention to others.

  I wasn’t sure that this last part was all the way true, because didn’t being nosy factor in there somewhere? But okay, point taken. I kept going.

  In fact, Jason, since we’re being honest here, you are going to look back on your life and wish you’d paid a lot more attention to the shy girl sitting next to you in seventh-grade math. You’re going to wish with all your heart that you’d at least learned her actual name and not called her the wrong name—when you spoke to her at all—for two years.

  Yikes. This was way beyond help-screen material. And it wasn’t Alice speaking to me from the future—that much was clear, at least. This was someone way closer to the situation than Alice was or ever would be. There was really only one person it could have been.

  Lara. Lara had created H.A.I.R. Club and sent these files to show me what a mess I was going to be, all because I’d ignored her and called her Laura. For two years, though? Geez, other Jason. At least this time around it had only been a month.

  But the help screen wasn’t done with me. Far from it. I kept reading.

  There’s going to come a day, my friend, it told me, when you go to a ninth-grade dance and see that same shy girl walk onto the stage with a new haircut and a new attitude and a guitar slung low, and your jaw is going to drop when her band starts up and you understand what a colossal mistake you’ve made. You are going to fall and fall hard for her, and you are not going to get back up.

  So when you see the recordings of yourself mooning after a fabulous girl who thinks—correctly!—that you are a self-centered chucklehead, I really hope you will understand what I did way too late. Her name is Lara, you fool. Lara.

  And here is where the lengthy and lecturing answer to whatever question I’d asked finally ended.

  I’d ruled out Alice as my tormenter from the future, and now I could rule out Lara too. First, she wasn’t the type to call herself “fabulous,” in any timeline. And second, she wasn’t the type to call me a fool, either, no matter what she silently thought. Plus, how obsessive would you have to be to go to so much trouble to torment some kid who got your name wrong in junior high? Way more obsessive than Lara seemed to be.

  Only one person knew me well enough to have written this. Not even Vincent could have done it. Unlikely as it seemed, the author of this filterless rant from the future had to be me, Jason Sloan, H.A.I.R. Club historian.

  Chapter 55

  SO. MY PATHETIC SENIOR-YEAR SELF had somehow grown up to be a pathetic “entrepreneur” who had managed to send his high school security files back in time to himself. He had probably worked hard on this for a long while. All because he had somehow never gotten over a crush he developed in ninth grade.

  Okay, he’d made some valid points about self-centeredness that I was going to have to consider seriously. But had he really not met any nice women since high school? Even with his high-powered career as an entrepreneur? Maybe future Jason needed to stop chewing on the past like it was an old wad of gum and get out more. Do some volunteer work. Take a walk, at the very least.

  This alone was enough to think about for the rest of the weekend. More than enough. The problem was, I knew that if I turned the computer off and it was able to reboot and take care of its slop and its glop and its filters, the help screen wouldn’t be this chatty when I turned it on again. My mind whirred as I considered what else we had wanted to ask. My mind isn’t at its best when whirring. Here’s what I typed:

  What is wrong with Steve’s hair?

  Ha! said the help screen / future Jason. There’s nothing wrong with Steve’s hair. It’s as glamorous as ever.

  But while we’re on the subject of others (and good for you for asking about someone besides yourself!), there are a few things I might as well say. None of this is going to appear on the T.W.E.R.P. screen anyway. Andrew has made it very clear that only the most essential information will be provided, even if you are alone with it. No clues about who sent the files. No hints about the future. No impassioned pleas like the one I’ve rewritten about a hundred times. He says we can’t mess with the timeline any more than absolutely necessary. He says he’s only doing this—against his way better judgment, he keeps reminding me—because we are business partners and mostly because I begged so much it got uncomfortable for him.

  Andrew. I stopped reading here to digest this new nugget of information. Andrew was part of this? Of course he was. I’m sure you have been wondering how I, a person with zero interest in or ability with computers, somehow managed to invent Prescient. I would have been wondering the same thing myself if I’d given the question more than half a second of thought. But future Andrew could do it. I’m pretty sure he was already thinking about it. Although he was only thinking about it because it had happened. Which really confused the situation.

  I went back to reading.

  Andrew’s filters will hide all this. He says you’d actually have to submerge the laptops in water for S.L.O.P. and/or G.L.O.P. to go into action. Then you’d have to ignore his apocalyptic warnings and not reboot. And what are the odds of that happening?

  So here goes.

  First, Steve. Poor Steve. He should not make bets he’s not sure he can win. Especially with Hoppy. Maybe if we hadn’t drifted apart when I got so hung up on Lara, I could have warned him. Okay, we didn’t drift apart. I drove him away with my moping and whining about how I wished I could go back in time and change the way I’d treated Lara. It was completely my fault. So be a better friend to Steve. It’s really not that hard.

  Second, and very important: Vincent. Vincent’s been a true and extremely patient best friend. He has stuck by me through thick and… well, thicker. Tell him that dare with Karen ended when she graduated. I’m pretty sure she forgot about it after seventh grade. Make him quit all those
clubs and get some rest. Except Crochet Club. He’s got a real gift for that. The vest he made me belongs in a museum.

  And now Lara. Tell Lara… Tell Lara that her eyes are the color of a glacial lake on a cloudless day.

  Needless to say, I was not going to do that. Nope. Never.

  As for anyone else who’s worried about what they see senior year, they can relax. It’s the ones who love what they see who should worry. Who wants to peak in high school?

  I wish I could send this advice back in time to you directly, Jason. But I’ve already asked Andrew to do too much. He had to spend a lot of his Warren carrots on this project, as well as his time. So I’m going to have to hope you figure out the important stuff from the recordings and make better choices than I did. All those glimpses of the future need to do is jostle you a tiny bit off the path you started out on. That should be enough. At least I hope so.

  Oh, and one last thing. Be nicer to Alice. It looks like her musical The Dork Ages is headed for Broadway.

  And then, right on cue, the door banged open, knocking one of my participation trophies off the bookcase.

  “Mom says to come see my show. She says you need to support my art.”

  Alice stalked over to my desk, and her stubby little forefinger poked the power button on the laptop. The screen winked out.

  Broadway, huh?

  “Okay,” I said. “Let’s see your show, Alice.”

  Chapter 56

  I WAS WALKING TO SCHOOL Monday morning when I sensed a car following slowly behind me. This is always creepy on TV, and it was also creepy in real life. I sped up, and so did the car. I slowed down, and so did the car. Then I stopped, getting ready to memorize some creep’s license plate and run.

  “Hey, Jason!” said Shannon from the open window of her car as she pulled over beside me. “How’s it going?”

  “What are you doing?” I asked. “Besides freaking me out.”

  “Sorry!” she said. “I didn’t want to startle you by honking. You appeared to be deep in thought. C’mere.”

  I went over to the car and peered in the window.

  “How did the laptop work?” she asked.

  “Fine, I guess,” I said.

  “Did you find out what you needed to know?”

  “Ah, yeah.”

  “Good. Do you have it with you?”

  I did. I wasn’t going to let it out of my sight until it was back at H.A.I.R. headquarters.

  I nodded, and Shannon put out a hand. “Give it,” she said.

  “But—”

  “I need to turn it over to the school,” said Shannon. “Don’t worry—no one will look at it. I’ll tell them it’s all ready to go.”

  I removed my backpack and took out the laptop. As I handed it over, I asked, “What about the other one?”

  “One step ahead of you,” she said, pointing to the passenger seat.

  There it was. She put mine next to it.

  “Thanks!” she said.

  Her tires actually squealed as she pulled away from the curb and down the street. If the top had been down, I probably would have heard her laughing maniacally as she sped off.

  * * *

  In answer to your obvious question: Yes, I had tried turning the laptop back on and asking the help screen more questions over the weekend. It did call me a dork one more time—I guess because I was alone with it—but it was definitely done spewing interesting information. Whatever filters had gone missing before were now back in place.

  In answer to a question you aren’t asking and don’t care about: No, Alice’s new show was not good. It was as terrible as the others, only longer. Except I do have to admit that her song “It’s Never Cool in Dork Land” was kind of stuck in my head. Our parents had been humming it all weekend too.

  Lara was hovering near the entrance to school when I got there.

  “Hey,” I said when I got within heying distance.

  “Hey,” she said. She tucked her hair behind an ear on one side. “How was your weekend?” she asked.

  “Oh, not bad. Kind of boring, I guess. Yours?”

  “Mine too, I guess. Compared to Friday, anyway.”

  “Yeah, that was wild, wasn’t it?”

  She nodded. “Fun too.” She tucked her hair behind the ear on the other side. I was seeing her whole face at once for possibly the first time. “So, I wanted to apologize for being kind of a jerk to you lately,” she said. “About my name and all. I overreacted.”

  “No, you didn’t. I’m sorry I got your name wrong in the first place. I need to learn to pay better attention to people. Or so I’ve been told.”

  “That’s okay,” she said. “I need to learn to speak up more. Or so I’ve been told.”

  A vision of that other laptop in Shannon’s passenger seat popped into my head. Then a cold trickle of something close to fear made its way down my spine like a raindrop on a windowpane.

  “Think the laptops are fixed?” I asked carefully.

  Lara’s eyes widened for an instant, like a cold drip had landed on the back of her neck. “I’m sure they are,” she said. “I mean, I’m guessing they are. Your uncle seemed to know what he was doing.”

  I nodded. “He does. At least I hope so.”

  And here the bell rang, and the two of us headed gratefully into school.

  We were silent as we walked down the main hall toward math class. It felt like we’d said everything we needed to say.

  I’m pretty sure Lara had the other laptop over the weekend.

  I’m pretty sure it said some personal stuff to her.

  And I’m very sure I will never, ever ask her about it.

  Chapter 57

  THE WHOLE H.A.I.R. CLUB SAT together at lunch that day for the first time but not the last. We had a lot to discuss, and it couldn’t wait for tomorrow’s meeting.

  Vincent had told the story of our Escape from Woozle multiple times over the weekend in e-mails and on the phone, but he told it again for the whole group in person. He came across as the action hero in his exciting retelling, of course, but he made the rest of us look a lot bolder than we had been, so we let him have it.

  Those who had refused to go to Woozle with us—for the historical record: Sonia, Andrew, Nikhil, and Steve—regretted having missed out, which was highly satisfying.

  “So the laptops are fixed?” Andrew asked when Vincent was done.

  “Yes,” Lara and I said at the same time.

  “I mean, they should be,” I hedged.

  Lara took a tiny bite of her sandwich and chewed like she had an overwhelming fear of choking.

  “And it was your uncle who built the stuff?” Andrew said.

  I nodded.

  “But he’s not Prescient?”

  “Do you mean the company or the adjective?” I asked.

  Andrew’s expression warned me not to mess with him.

  “He’s not,” I said quickly. “He has no idea what Prescient is. Or about the future files. They contacted him through this online game with rabbits and sent the files somehow—”

  “Warren!” said Andrew. “They contacted him through Warren. That’s wild. Is that possible? It must be, since they did it. But did they… How did they…?”

  He was too polite to come right out and ask the obvious. “They paid him in Warren carrots,” I said.

  Andrew made a whistling sound through his teeth, but he didn’t say anything. Andrew had really good filters.

  “So we’re no closer to knowing who sent us the files or why,” said Nikhil.

  “Or whether we can change the future,” said Steve.

  “Nope,” said Hoppy. “But we can grill the help screen all we want tomorrow, right?”

  Everyone nodded except Lara and me. She was nibbling at an Oreo with great care. I was watching her nibble and staying quiet.

  * * *

  The next afternoon when I arrived at club headquarters, Lara was carrying her guitar case.

  “I thought you were giving that up,” I s
aid.

  “I am,” she said. “I’m giving it to Sonia. She wants to take lessons.”

  “What?” said Steve, who had just walked in. “You’re giving up guitar lessons? And Sonia’s starting? What does that do to the future?”

  “Changes it, I’m guessing,” said Sonia. She’d opened the case and was gazing adoringly at the gleaming guitar in its plush nest.

  “But Sonia,” I couldn’t help saying, “how are you going to manage matching guitar cases for your outfits? That’s a lot of cases.” Her backpack today was orange, as were her hairband, sweater, and sneakers.

  She raised her eyebrows at me, then smiled smugly. “Black goes with everything.”

  Steve sat down in front of a laptop and pulled up the most recent midnight file. The other H.A.I.R. Clubbers crowded around.

  “So will the posters for Lara’s band be gone now?” Steve asked, focusing on the cafeteria wall.

  “Nope,” said Andrew. “If the future files came as a download to Jason’s uncle, they aren’t going to change because we change our minds. These files are read-only, if you want to look at it that way.”

  “But doesn’t that mean we can’t change our minds—or if we do it won’t matter?” said Nikhil.

  “Nope,” said Andrew again. “Changing our minds matters a lot. But it mostly means these files are obsolete. In fact, the minute we saw the first one and recognized ourselves, these files became obsolete. What happens in them isn’t going to happen like this anymore, because we’re going to respond to what we see, and that will change the future. Cool, huh?”

  Maybe it was cool with Andrew, but it was incredibly complicated for me. Here’s the thing. In one timeline, I was obsessed with Lara the rocker starting in high school, lost Steve and any other friends I might have had except Vincent (and mostly lost Vincent), grew up to start Prescient with Andrew, basically forced him to send our senior-year security files back in time to our seventh-grade selves, and then what? Sat around and waited to see if life turned out differently? Which it now would, simply because we’d glimpsed our futures and made some decisions to do things differently.