Samantha Sanderson Off the Record

by Robin Caroll

  Where had she seen it before?

  Ms. Martha stood and opened the group with a prayer. Then she lifted her head and welcomed the visitors. Sam smiled as she noticed the little bulge of Ms. Martha’s belly. Not too long ago, the youth director had shared that she and her husband were going to have their first baby in May.

  “Instead of going over a specific Scripture today, I thought I’d ask if any of you took my suggestion to find a Scripture and to base one of your new year’s resolutions on it. If you did, I would love for some of you to share which one and how you’re doing so far.”

  Daniel, the high school guy who was always so nice to everyone, spoke up. “I selected Proverbs 3:27: ‘Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to act.’ ”

  “That’s a good one.” Ms. Martha nodded. “How’re you doing with it so far?”

  “Pretty good. I’m looking for reasons to compliment someone or give them kudos, instead of not saying anything. Like, last week, we went to a restaurant and the waiter was really, really good. Instead of only leaving him a nice tip, I asked to see the manager on our way out. I told the manager how the waiter had given us such great service and I just wanted him to know. The manager thanked me and even told me that he was going to make a note in the waiter’s file so it would be there for his next employee evaluation.”

  “Very good, Daniel. Thank you for sharing.” Ms. Martha looked around. “Anybody else?”

  Ava Kate, a fellow seventh grader, raised her hand. “I chose Matthew 5:4: ‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.’ ”

  Ms. Martha sat back in her chair. “Interesting. How are you doing with it?”

  “Well, I talked with my mother about it after you suggested it, and she’s helping me. We make little lap afghans together and then we pray over them. We donate them to the local funeral homes so they can be given to grieving families when they make funeral arrangements.”

  “That’s a beautiful thing, Ava Kate. I like that. Thanks for sharing.” Ms. Martha checked her watch. “Anybody else?”

  Sam raised her hand before she changed her mind.

  “Sam?” Ms. Martha smiled.

  “I chose Matthew 22:39: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’ because it made me think of my next door neighbor who’s a widow. I chose the resolution so that I’d be more conscientious about thinking of her and being a friend to her.”

  “That’s good, Sam,” Ms. Martha said. “How’s it going so far?”

  “Well, it’s really easy. I make it a point to visit her and make sure she isn’t as lonely, and she appreciates it. But . . .” Sam paused. Sharing this was a little harder than she’d imagined.

  “But what?” Ms. Martha asked.

  “Well, once I took that Scripture as my resolution, I realized it wasn’t just about my actual neighbor, but also neighbors in the whole community. Even some of the kids at school who I don’t exactly get along with.”

  “Oh. So how are you doing with that part?”

  “I’m not going to say it hasn’t been difficult. It has. Sometimes really difficult. But just yesterday, I ran into a girl at the store. We used to be friends, but two years ago, she started acting like she didn’t even like me but I’ve never known what changed, so I felt that I needed to love her by apologizing. So I told her I was sorry for whatever it was I had done to hurt or offend her.”

  Ms. Martha smiled wide. “How did she respond?”

  Sam grinned. “Well, she was a little shocked and seemed like she was going to resist. So I just told her she could either accept my apology or not, but either way, my conscience was clear and I felt good.”

  “What did she say?” Ms. Martha asked.

  Sam grinned wider. “Nothing. I didn’t give her a chance. I just told her to have a nice day and I walked off.”

  The church bells chimed.

  Ms. Martha shook her head, but was smiling. “Let’s close in prayer, shall we?”

  After prayer, Makayla grabbed Sam as she and David headed to the sanctuary. “Were you talking about Aubrey?”

  Sam nodded. “I saw her yesterday at Kroger.”

  “I can’t believe you didn’t trip over your apology. I would have paid to see her face.”

  “She put the smirk on, so that’s why I had to leave. Figured I shouldn’t undo the good start I was going with.”

  David, clearly bored with their girl-talk, swung his backpack to his other shoulder.

  Sam pointed at the USB drive. “Where’d you get that jump drive? I’ve seen one like it before, but I can’t remember where.”

  David looked at his pack and touched the key-shaped drive. “This one?”

  She nodded.

  “They’re the ones custom designed for our group.” He tilted his head toward Makayla. “She should have some.”

  Maybe that’s where she’d seen it before.

  “Sam,” Dad whispered from behind her.

  She turned.

  “Mom’s got a bit of a headache and needs to lie down. We need to go on home.”

  “Is she okay?”

  “Yes. She says her sinuses feel clogged with the weather changes.”

  “I’ll call you later,” Sam told Makayla. She smiled at David. “It was very nice to meet you. I hope you come visit again.”

  She rushed off with her father toward the car.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  So that’s how it uninstalled.” Makayla finished and licked her lips, her nervousness evident on her face.

  Mrs. Trees stared at her from across her desk.

  Sam pushed her leg against Makayla’s in silent support. Makayla’s mom sat straight in the chair next to Makayla, looking as uncomfortable as Chewy did when Baby Kitty curled up and went to sleep in the dog’s bed.

  “The copy is currently being analyzed by the department’s cyber unit,” Sam’s dad said, standing against the wall.

  “I’m very impressed,” Mr. Alexander replied. “I didn’t realize we had such advanced computer science students here at Joe T. Robinson Middle School.”

  Makayla’s mother squared her shoulders. “My daughter is part of a government funded computer research demographic group. They work on very difficult and complex computer programming issues.”

  Yeah! Go, Mrs. Ansley. Sam sent silent kudos in her mind. She winked at Makayla.

  “Well. I’m relieved the issue has been resolved.” Mrs. Trees glared at Makayla. “And very relieved that any further damage wasn’t done.”

  Sam bit her tongue to stop herself from telling the principal that they should all be extremely grateful to Makayla. If it hadn’t been for her, the system would still be infected and report cards would still be held hostage.

  But she thought better about saying that. Dad would probably kill her.

  “You girls can go back to class now.”

  Sam and Makayla stood. Sam kept her gaze down. No telling what she might be tempted to say if she looked Mrs. Trees in the eye —

  That’s why it looked so familiar.

  “Mrs. Trees, where did you get this jump drive?” Sam reached over and grabbed the key shaped drive with the zebra head sitting on the principal’s desk.

  “Excuse me, young lady?” Mrs Trees said, holding out her hand to receive the jump drive back.

  “Sam,” her dad said, his tone telling her to drop the question immediately.

  But she had to press on.

  Sam turned to her best friend. “Mac, you said some of the people in your group create viruses so y’all can learn how to break them down and delete them, right?”

  Makayla nodded.

  “Do y’all ever put those on drives? Like that one?”

  Makayla’s eyes widened. “Yes. Those are the only drives we’re allowed to put them on so we don’t accidently put them on a PC and infect them.” She covered her mouth with her hand. Her eyes went wide.

  Sam turned to her father. “Dad.”

  He held up his hand. “I got it.” Dad
faced Mrs. Trees. “I need to see that drive, please.”

  She only hesitated it a moment before she handed it to him. He handed it to Makayla. “Where’s the closest computer we can use?”

  “EAST lab,” Sam replied.

  “Let’s go,” he said, opening the door. Everyone followed.

  “Mr. Sanderson, I’m not sure I follow,” Mrs. Trees began.

  Dad glanced at her over his shoulder. “Let us check this out first, and then I will brief you.”

  They headed into the EAST lab. Mrs. Shine looked up as they entered. “Hello there.”

  “Hi, Mrs. Shine. We need to use the MacBook for a second,” Sam said.

  “Certainly.” She waved at the one at the end of the row.

  Makayla sat down and gently inserted the drive. Sam, Mrs. Ansley, Mrs. Trees, Mr. Alexander, and Sam’s dad all hovered around her.

  “Do you remember enough of the code to recognize it?” Sam’s dad asked.

  Makayla looked at Sam, excitement burning in her expression.

  Sam sighed. “She doesn’t have to, Dad. She has a copy. I made it for her.” She nodded at Makayla. “Go ahead and compare them.”

  Makayla pulled Sam’s jump drive out of her backpack and stuck it in another USB port.

  Dad narrowed his eyes at Sam. “We’ll discuss that later.”

  Great. She was grounded for life.

  “It’s the same one, Mr. Sanderson,” Makayla said as she split screen to look at the files on both of the jump drives. “Exactly the same.”

  “What’s going on?” Mrs. Trees asked. “Officer Bill found that drive on the ground before we broke for Christmas vacation. He gave it to Mrs. Darrington, who gave it to me. I plugged it into my computer to see if there was any student’s name on it, but there was only gibberish. Now please tell me why it’s so important.”

  Sam swallowed. This was priceless. “Mrs. Trees, you unknowingly installed the virus on the system.”

  “What? I did no such thing.” She cocked her hip out.

  “Only students in my group have those specific drives, Mrs. Trees. And there aren’t any other Robinson students in my group. The drive must have fallen out of my backpack when I was running to catch the bus or something,” Makayla said. “That’s why the virus wasn’t set up to cause permanent damage. None of the viruses we create are that destructive.” She shook her head. “I didn’t even realize my drive was missing. I was busy over break and then with getting back to school and the weather . . .” Makayla’s voice wavered, then trailed off.

  “Mrs. Trees,” Sam’s father said, “the virus was created as part of the special group Makayla’s in. The drive must have accidently fallen out of her backpack. When you put it in your computer to see if you could identify who it belonged to, it installed the virus.”

  “But I did that before we left for Christmas break.”

  Makayla nodded. “The virus was set to go only into a numeric based program. It probably sorted through the programs on your system and the grading system best matched what it needed. When the program was activated, it would shut itself down, then when restarted, the virus would run and infect just that program.”

  “Very clever,” Mr. Alexander said.

  “Well,” Mrs. Trees said, blinking rapidly. “I had no idea. I never would have put —” she shook her head and frowned at Makayla. “The school board will have to investigate the violations of such an infection —”

  “So there was never any intent to tamper with grades. There’s been no crime. No one is to blame,” Sam’s dad interrupted. “And everything has been resolved.”

  Sam blew out a slow breath. “I guess it’s like that old saying, huh: no harm, no foul.” She smiled at her best friend, who snuck a smile back.

  “For the most part, that’s right, pumpkin,” Dad said, then leaned over and whispered in Sam’s ear, “Except for a certain somebody who deliberately disobeyed me and will be grounded for two weeks.”

  . . . The entire school owes a huge debt of gratitude to Makayla Ansley for removing the virus from our computer system and assisting in solving the mystery. And a most sincere apology to the transfer student who was incorrectly associated with the virus.

  ~ Sam Sanderson and Aubrey Damas, reporting

  DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

  1. Do you make New Year’s resolutions? Do you sometimes find them hard to stick to like Sam does? Why?

  2. Sam chose to “love her neighbor” (Matthew 22:39), but realized this doesn’t mean just her actual neighbor, Mrs. Willis. Do you think Sam does a good job of loving her neighbors, family, and friends in the book?

  3. When Felicia tells Sam why she was expelled, Sam decides not to write about it. Would you protect a friend’s secret, even if that meant missing out on a big opportunity?

  4. At one point, Sam worries her stories might hurt innocent people. Have you ever accidently hurt someone when you thought you were doing something good? What happened?

  5. Sam apologizes to Aubrey although she has no idea why Aubrey is upset with her. Would you apologize to someone who was mean to you, even if you hadn’t done anything wrong?

  6. For a moment, Sam believes that Luke’s dad might have gotten angry and hurt him. If you were Sam, what would you do? Would you talk to your friend? Your parents? Someone at school?

  7. In the end, it turns out the virus was put on the computer system accidentally. Who did you think was tampering with the grades? Why?

  8. When Sam’s mom is in the airplane accident, Sam is very scared and prays with Makayla. When you’re afraid, does praying make you feel better? How do you pray in times like those?

  9. Some of the other kids in Sam’s youth group based their New Year’s resolutions off the Bible. If you were to choose a Scripture for your resolution, what would it be?

  10. We don’t learn why Aubrey is upset with Sam, but we do learn she is holding a grudge. What is a grudge? Have you ever been angry with a person for a long time? Did you tell them that you were angry? Why or why not?

  11. During the winter storm, Sam rescues a kitten. Have you ever rescued a pet or an animal? What did you do to save them?

  12. Sam’s mom tells Sam that she should be brave even when she’s afraid or things aren’t going her way. Do you remember a time when it was really hard to be brave? What happened?

  13. At one point, Sam has to look through the comments on her article to “profile” people who may be involved with the grade tampering. What do you think about profiling? What are some good and bad things about it?

  14. When Makayla is looking for the virus, she doubts herself and isn’t sure she’s the right person for the job. But Sam believes in her all along. Have you ever had someone believe in you when you didn’t believe in yourself?

  15. Luke tells Sam a big secret about his science project — that he didn’t do it all on his own. If you were Sam, what would you do? Would you tell Luke to confess? Would you talk to a teacher? Or would you keep Luke’s secret like Sam does?

  16. Have you ever gotten a bad grade when you knew you’d done better? What did you do about it?

  17. When the false report cards come out, a lot of students are worried their parents will be upset or won’t believe the grades are wrong. How would your parents or guardians react if that happened to you?

  18. Sam and Makayla are best friends but have very different interests: Sam loves reporting and cheerleading while Makayla is into computers and karate. Do you have a friend who is different from you? What are the similarities that bring you together?

  19. In the end, how do you think Mrs. Trees felt when she learned she was the one who let the virus loose? What would you do if you were her?

  20. If you were Felicia and you thought Sam had spilled your secret, how would you react? Would you give your friend the benefit of the doubt?