by Susie Salom
Well, freeze my farts ’n’ call me Elsa. I actually sound like I know what I’m talking about.
“Right. I’ll head to the gym,” Reed volunteers. “See if Coach might have some. We’ll be back.”
Reed, Brooke and me go into the hall that leads to the gym and the school theatre.
“I’m glad your mom changed her mind about letting you do NAVS,” Brooke says as soon as we’re out the door.
I swallow. “Well, she hasn’t exactly changed her mind.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that, well, for now, I’ll just be helping you guys while I figure out a plan.”
“She got an idea in gym class yesterday,” Reed tells Brooke. “And after the meeting at Donna’s, I’d say the team needs all the good ideas it can get.”
Reed takes a separate hall to go to the gym while Brooke and me pay a visit to the Drama teacher. No dice. Thankfully, though, when we get back to the library, Reed is already there with a couple of jump ropes.
“That should work,” I say.
I hope.
“I don’t think we have time to try anything out now,” Cameron says. “We have”—he looks at his watch—“two minutes and forty-three seconds before first bell.”
“Forty-one seconds,” Brooke says.
(I love Brooke humor.)
“Okay, so why don’t we meet in the gym at lunch?” Donna suggests. “That way we can have as many jump ropes as we need.”
I nod. Though inside, I’m beginning to realize what all this means.
I, Kyle Constantini, am gonna go to a bunch of meetings, help my team solve a maze and go compete at the Civic Center (the Civic Center!) all without telling Mom and Dad.
“Looking forward to your idea,” Reed tells me as Brooke and I swing on our backpacks and get ready to go to homeroom. “The team needs a mind like yours, Fedora.” Then he steps out of the library before us and heads down the hall to his locker.
Brooke looks at me, then at Reed walking away, then back at me.
“What?” I say.
She shrugs one shoulder. “Nothing.”
Soon as lunch is over, me and Brooke head to the gym. Coach has left a pile of jump ropes on a fold out table and Mrs. A. is in the bleachers, grading papers and crunching on a pear.
“Kyle, you take charge,” she tells me. “If you need me, I’ll be right here.”
Here goes nothin’.
“Okay, so do I tie the jump rope on?” Cameron asks.
“Give her a second to explain,” Reed tells him.
“Go ahead and tie the rope to your waist,” I tell Cameron. “And, Reed”—I look at him—“you tie the other end around yours.”
By the time they finish, there’s no room for anyone else to stand between them. They look awkwardly close together and like they’re trying really hard not to think my idea is mouse poop.
“Why don’t we use three jump ropes?” Brooke suggests. “Tie one around Cameron like a belt, one around Reed and then hook the third one between them to make room for the person standing in the middle?”
“Yes.” I point at her. “That.”
“All right, what now?” Cameron says once they’ve rigged the ropes.
“We’re going to send a message to you,” I tell him. He nods. “Now pretend you can’t hear or see. Brooke, can you stand by the middle of the jump rope between them? Reed, stretch it out as tight as can be.”
Reed pulls as far away from Cameron as he can.
“Okay, Brooke,” I say. “Give it a good chop right in the center.”
I swallow. Please work.
Brooke hits the rope and everyone looks at me as I look at Cameron.
“What did you feel?” I ask him.
He doesn’t answer.
I clear my throat. “Cameron?”
“I thought I wasn’t supposed to hear.”
“Okay, fine,” I say. “Pretend like you couldn’t see Brooke hitting the rope but pretend like you can hear me inside your head asking the question.”
He takes a breath. “Okay, I felt a tickle.”
“That’s good!” I say. “A tickle is good!”
“It is?”
“Yes, because that tickle you feel is what we are going to use to send you messages.”
“That could get confusing,” Donna says.
“Yes, but that’s why it’s a challenge,” I tell her, feeling just a little more confident. I may not be the smartest scholar in seven counties, but I know a good idea when it kicks me in the bahamas. “Picture like this,” I go on. “We use the rope between Cameron and Reed to shoot different messages. One to tell Cam when he needs to turn a corner, one for when to stop, one for how many steps to take in a straight line, et cetera.”
“Well, then I think we’d need more than one rope between them,” Donna says. “Three ropes would make better sense. We can not only use different messages but send them through different ropes. One to send the message to turn right, one to send a message to turn left and one to send a message to walk forward.”
“Donzie, you’re a genius,” I tell her.
“And we could have one person be in charge of the right rope and another person be in charge of the left,” Brooke says.
“Wizard,” I say. “So not kidding. You all could form a brain tank.”
Brooke grins.
“You mean a think tank?” Cameron asks.
“Bings. Seriously, we could be the generation to save the universe from the stupocalypse.”
Cameron lifts one side of his mouth in the kind of smile where you can see someone getting the joke a little bit at a time and then deciding they like it, so I smile back at him. Because the way I’m seeing it now, this is just as kick as giving him his own star chart to memorize. Except it’s we who are Cameron’s stars, and he’s gonna learn to put his trust in us.
We’re finding the right way to get under his skin.
September starts to melt away like a gooey marshmallow on top of a hot chocolate. The weather turns coldish and I’m happy to be spending the time after lunch in Mrs. A.’s classroom or the gym instead of outside where Reed says soon it’ll be brass monkeys. (That’s British for freezing.)
It turns out, of course, that it would be easier to just lug Cam around with the rope—and I can feel sometimes that the team wouldn’t mind taking that route when figuring out our message system starts to get a little hairy. But I think that the way to make it through a maze is not just to have something or someone do all the work for you. It’s important to be able to get a message, munch on it a little and then make a choice based on what you decide. Otherwise, it would just be a bunch of commands that you have to do no matter what. And I don’t see where that would be the glory of solving a puzzle, so I try my best to encourage the team to keep thinking about how to work the ropes to send a clean signal—from one problem-solving mind to another.
Speaking of problems, Mom doesn’t have a clue I’ve been going to the meetings. But that’s under control because I’ve been planning to tell her at almost every dinner time. It’s just that the right moment hasn’t exactly shown up because she never went back to Braca Khan about the detentions and any talk of NAVS just sort of went away.
That night at the dinner table, though, I’m pretty much seven seconds from blowing my own cover. If I don’t find a way to talk about everything that’s been going on, Dad and Meowsie will end up having to peel bits of me off the cabinets while Mom calls Exploded Daughter Control.
“Michael, remind me of the date of your choir performance at the bank downtown,” Mom tells Meowsie.
Everyone has been super into Meowsie’s voice stuff while no one has the smallest idea about my team’s amazing system of vibrating cables.
“You know there’s an app for that,” Dad tells Mom. “You can sign up for a lot of the activities the kids are involved in at all three schools and get updates sent directly.”
“Kyle, pass the tomatoes.”
Mom made fried
green tomatoes as part of dinner tonight and they are 100% revolting. Tomatoes are always leaving bits of themselves like slug trails wherever they’ve been. Frying them green doesn’t change the fact that they’re the most barftastic food in captivity. But since tonight I’m frying my brains trying to think of a way to finally tell Mom and Dad my big surprise about NAVS, I think maybe I’ll try the tomatoes.
“Nicki, for the love of my final taste bud.” Dad clanks a fork to his plate. “Would it absolutely kill you to crush a handful of sea salt on these?”
He’s taken a bite of the enemy. Maybe now is the time for a compliment?
“I like your hair today, Mom.”
“Eat your food, Kyle.”
Mom’s distracted. She ignores Dad and pulls out her tablet.
“Michael, the concert.”
“November seventh,” he says, not looking up from his book.
“Time?”
Meowsie chews his bite and swallows. “Six.”
“Thank you for not talking with your mouth full.”
“Hey, Mom.” Roger walks in and kisses Mom on the cheek. “You’re looking swell.” He smirks. “Have I told you that is the perfect color for you?”
Craptain Kirk. He must have something he wants to ask her for, too.
“No, you cannot go to Curt’s house on Friday,” Mom says.
“What? Why?” Roger says.
“Because we are all going to the cabin this weekend. It’s the last weekend before it’ll get too cold to be agreeable.”
“But why this weekend?” Roger wails. “We’ve been planning this party for weeks!”
Mom raises an eyebrow at him.
“Well”—my brother gets a sheepish look—“not, like, a party party. Just”—he lifts a hand—“a little get-together. For a couple of old friends.”
“Is your old friend Sondrine going to be there?”
Roger scrunches his brow. “Sondrine?”
Mom smiles.
That’s good. A smile is good.
“In any event, no,” Mom says. “Not this weekend. I’m sorry.”
Roger’s arms hang at his sides as he slumps into his chair.
“Sit up straight, Roger,” Dad tells him.
Roger sits up for like a second then folds his body over the top of his plate.
“Roger.”
“Mom, I’m really looking forward to some nice family time at the cabin,” I say.
“Yes, you may invite a friend.” She looks at me and smiles again. “I’ve appreciated how well you’ve endured your discipline this month, Kyle. You didn’t go behind Dad’s back or mine and you stuck to your guns. I think that deserves a small reward. If you’d like to bring along Brooke or Sheroo, that would be fine by me.”
I smile back at her but it’s like someone has jammed toothpicks inside my lips to prop them open. Mom slides her warm hand over mine.
“You’ve been a good girl,” she tells me. “And you’re well on your way to earning back my trust.”
She takes a bite of the fried green tomatoes and scratches the space between her eyes.
“Roger, pass the pepper.”
I am a fly. I am a fly in a maximum-security spider web with a wing on the fritz.
Meowsie’s been firing a jillion messages on Instant pushing me to pick Marcy to come with us to the cabin so he can talk to her about wayfinders. But I don’t want to hear any more about wayfinders! Maybe some time away from all of this will clear my head. That’s what stressed-out grown-ups do, right? Go away for the weekend so they can sit around in hot tubs while all the answers come to them?
Come to think of it, there actually is a Jacuzzi at the cabin. It’s in the room with the windows where you can see all the pine trees. There’s even actual bears. I can already picture one coming up to a window and resting his poor, tired paws on it. He’s blind and can’t hear and everyone’s afraid of him but I just tap on the glass to communicate that we are his friends. There’s a moment and a breakthrough with bears in all the forests of the world because of my new message system—which it turns out all animals understand because the only language you need to know is good vibrations.
I stare at the ceiling as another bubble pops on my screen. I’m about to message Meowsie not to ask me about inviting Marcy anymore but it’s not even him. When I go to my screen to look, I see that it’s Brooke!
(Hey, that rhymes.)
I yank out my chair and flop into it, scooting in close.
analog_girl: Bet you thought you’d never see me on here again.
the_amazing_kyle: Brooke what is going on??? Why haven’t you been doing NAVS chats? You haven’t sent even one message on Instant. You’ve been all mr mysterioso for like a month. Ever since the tests.
analog_girl: Have you found a way to let your mom know you’ve still been doing NAVS?
the_amazing_kyle: Negative. Plus Sheroo still isn’t talking to me. I think she thinks I stole YOU KNOW WHO away from her.
analog_girl: Nobody steals anybody. People aren’t passwords.
the_amazing_kyle: Tell her that. Brooke my parents are taking us to the cabins this weekend and they said I could invite a friend. I want to ask Sheroo to try to make up with her but I want to ask you too.
Logan: this doesn’t sound like official NAVS business
My heart does this gigantic floop against the tops of my ribs, like someone just launched it in the air like uncooked pizza. Man, he has a way of appearing out of nowhere. He’s like the Cheshire cat of the Internet.
analog_girl: I’m at my Dad’s so I won’t be on the bus tomorrow. See you at lunch.
the_amazing_kyle: Wait Brooke don’t log off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Brooke’s little record player avatar goes into sleep mode.
Zoinks.
Logan: sorry
I let out a noisy breath.
Logan: but if you want my opinion Fedora you should ask your mum and dad if you can bring along both your mates
the_amazing_kyle: y?
Logan: just think you should
I scratch my arm and stare out the window, trying to think of what else I should say.
the_amazing_kyle: Reed do you even remember my real name?
I know he does, because he yelled it that one day in gym when we were stealing the bacon. But my breath still gets stuck in my throat as I wait for whatever he’s gonna type next.
Logan: it’s right there on the screen kyle
My heart goes unzipped as I imagine his voice saying my name again.
Logan: btw who’s YOU KNOW WHO
Crap’n Crunch. Now, my heart is a bongo at a luau! Feel like I just chugged two packets of Fun Dip and washed it back with Orange Fanta.
the_amazing_kyle: Sorry Reed I gotta go. Im so SORRY!!!!
I log off and shut down the computer before doing a flying jump onto my bed. I fling the covers over my head and do a little running in place before flopping down on the mattress with a thunk. Then I jam my face into one of my pillows and scream.
Enough is enough.
The next morning, I’m standing by Sheroo’s locker when she comes up to it by herself.
“Hey,” I say.
“Hey.”
We look at each other for a few seconds before something else to say pops into my head.
“Can I leave my math book in your locker?” I ask. “It’s closer to my class so I don’t have to walk as far and I won’t have to carry it around.”
When we were in fourth, me and Sheroo shared a cubby hole. Supposedly you weren’t allowed to share cubbies, but we did it behind our teacher Mr. Menchaca’s back and he never knew the difference. Or if he did, he didn’t care. Anyway, I’m hoping that sharing a locker—even if it is just a math book—might jog Sheroo’s memories about the good ol’ days.
“Whatevs,” she says now. “Guess you need my combo.”
I lift a shoulder. “If you don’t mind.”
“Whatevs,” she says again.
She teaches me her combo
and pops open the lock.
“So,” she starts with her back to me, “is Reed, like, your boyfriend now?”
I rub my nose.
“Well, is he?”
“No,” I say. “Why would you even ask?”
She turns to face me. “So, then why do I always see you guys together before school and at lunch?”
I give an exaggerated shrug. “That’s just for NAVS.”
“Thought you were grounded from NAVS.”
Guess she and Brooke are still talking. I take a breath and let it out.
“Listen, Sheroo, do you want to come with my parents and brothers and me to the cabins this weekend?”
She’s quiet. But then she asks, “Is it the one with the Jacuzzi in the window room?”
I smile. “Yeah.”
“And the bears?” She smiles, too.
“Uh-huh.” I laugh. “So, do you think you can come?”
She sighs and her smile disappears like a puff of mist.
“It sounds like fun, but … ”
“But what?”
“Sasha’s having a party.”
“Another one?”
Sheroo shrugs. “She throws them all the time. It’s, like, every weekend, practically.”
“Oh,” I say, and then don’t know what else to add.
“I already told Mercedes my stepmom would give her a ride.”
“Right,” I say. Though I have no idea who Mercedes is.
All I know is that my heart is a pancake. I never thought the day would come when Sheroo would be so booked up with other plans that there’d be no room left for us.
“So.” She hugs her books. “You’re not crushing on Reed, then?” And I can see all over her face what she wants my answer to be. What she needs my answer to be.
My hands start to sweat. I can’t see a single way where I could be totally truthful in the middle of a hallway packed with a ton of people without risking a scene because, fine. Maybe she is a tiny bit right. Maybe I do like Reed in that way, after all. And o-kay. Maybe it’s even possible I have for a while now. But it’s not like I stole him from her. It’s not like she walked into the Reed store, bought a Reed and then I went and snuck into her house and took him while she was fixing a snack.
