Off the Wall

by Laura Dower

  “I can’t believe I always get paired off with you.” Ivy groaned.

  “That makes two of us,” Madison said, glancing around. Across the gym, under the basketball net, she saw that Fiona and Aimee were happily joined at the hip. They gave Madison a little nod as if to say, “Sorry! Don’t hate us!”

  “I despise volleyball,” Ivy snarled.

  Madison rolled her eyes. “You just despise everything and everyone,” she blurted out.

  Ivy stared, stunned. “Excuse me? You are so rude!”

  Coach Hammond blew a whistle and asked the class to split up and practice their volleyball drills in pairs. Since Ivy didn’t even bother to grab any equipment, Madison took a new volleyball from the bin. She wondered if anyone would notice if she threw the ball hard at Ivy’s head.

  “This is gross. I just did my nails!” Ivy said, holding her hands out in front of her.

  Madison gazed up at the large, white clock on the wall and started counting the minutes until the gym class—and her gym partnership with Poison Ivy—would be over.

  It didn’t happen soon enough.

  Arriving home after school later that day, Madison found a note on the hall table.

  Maddie,

  Sorry! Another meeting called @ the last minute! There’s a can of soup on the counter and salad in a bowl in the fridge. Have some supper if you get hungry. Otherwise, I should be home after six-thirty and we can eat then.

  Don’t spend too much time online, okay?

  Love,

  Mom

  Madison crumpled up the note and yanked a fat, gray book, Math Made Easy, out of her bag.

  After a little practice in and out of school that week, she was finally getting the hang of positive and negative integers. For some reason, she got confused when she had to subtract a negative number to find the value of x. This particular day’s math work sheets still showed a bunch of scratch-outs and scribbles. At least, she finished it early.

  When she returned from taking Phin for a walk, Mom was still not home. Madison could think of only one other thing to do. She pulled out her laptop. Mom had warned Madison not to go online too much, but she couldn’t stop herself.

  The Wall was waiting.

  Each visit to the site was like being inside the world’s biggest vacuum cleaner. Madison selected the topic gossip and WHAM! She was sucked in.

  Fortunately, the first thing Madison noticed was that the post about “fat camp” had been removed. Lindsay’s campaign to the Webmaster obviously had been a success.

  Unfortunately, the message from MF13 was still there, glaring at Madison with its flashing yellow letters.

  But then Madison saw another message, which had been posted earlier that day.

  And it had the SAME stolen screen name.

  Posted by: MF13

  Date: 9 Nov

  Message: A.G. is such a geek she thinks she can dance who is she kidding? I know 4 a fact she wears ripped leotards and dance teacher is ready 2 KICK HER OUT of class for being a showoff she will NEVER get a lead even tho she thinks she is all that :)

  --------

  Madison sat back, staring at the monitor.

  A.G.?

  She wanted to cry. Those were Aimee’s initials. And the information about ripped leotards confused her. Who was writing these messages and signing Madison’s name? Madison wished she could pretend that MF13 didn’t exist. Her lucky number was ruined forever.

  At the very least, Madison hoped that there was a good chance Aimee wouldn’t even see the posting. Maybe Madison could campaign, as Lindsay had done, to have this message deleted, too.

  She quickly logged off the site and opened a new file.

  Off the Wall

  Rude Awakening: I thought posting on The Wall would be fun, but I can’t believe anything I hear by word of mouse.

  This website started out as something good, but it took a major left turn. Who’s sending messages and signing MY name?

  First I thought maybe it was one of the guys. Chet seemed like the candidate for Most Guilty. He bugs Fiona all the time. It made sense that he would write that message goofing on her big date.

  But then Dan told me that that didn’t seem like Chet and I agree. Even if Fiona drives him crazier than crazy, would Chet really resort to total, cruel sabotage to get back at her? Why would he pick my name to do it? He knows Fiona would never really believe I wrote those words.

  Nope, it’s not Chet. It’s not Egg, Hart or Drew and definitely not Dan either. Which leaves the nastiest person I can name.

  Poison Ivy, of course.

  Who else has a reason for making me look bad and getting revenge on my friends? Who is always lurking around me when my BFFs are telling me their secrets? She must be listening in on my conversations. That’s where she gets the information about Fiona’s date and Aimee’s leotards ripping. How else could anyone know those things?

  This gives me just one more reason to hate the enemy.

  So, now what do I do?

  Dingdong.

  Madison craned her neck to be able to see in the direction of the front door. She expected Mom, but Mom had a key. She wouldn’t have rung the doorbell.

  Who else could it be?

  “Maddie! Are you in there?” a voice called out.

  Madison groaned.

  Aimee.

  That’s who was outside again, just like the other morning. Since Aimee had only just returned from dance class, maybe she hadn’t seen the posting. Madison hoped she hadn’t.

  “Hey, Aim,” Madison said as she opened the front door slowly.

  Aimee faced her from the front step, bouncing on her toes like a boxer. Aimee’s lips were pursed.

  “I thought you could keep a secret!” Aimee said.

  Madison frowned. She knew that tone of voice. “I can,” she replied.

  “Been on The Wall lately?” Aimee asked.

  “Well—” Madison stammered. “Not really … ”

  “So how did my confession to you today turn into public news?”

  Madison gulped. “What are you talking about?”

  “Are you still mad about the puppies, or what?” Aimee cried.

  “No, I—” Madison didn’t know how to answer. “It’s just that—”

  Aimee simply continued talking. “I really think that is just so ridiculous, and you shouldn’t have to make stuff up online or create dumb lies. I don’t understand you at all, Maddie. Why do you have to keep going on The Wall anyway? It’s just not nice. I thought we were best friends.”

  “We are!” Madison said.

  Aimee made a face. “You’re different,” she said bluntly.

  Madison crinkled up her nose, confused. “What do you mean?”

  “Ever since you’ve been going online on that bulletin board, you’ve been different. I can’t explain it—” Aimee said.

  “I swear, Aim,” Madison said. “I didn’t make anything up. I didn’t post any message. … ”

  Aimee’s jaw dropped. “Are you joking? Someone else posted all that stuff about me being a bad dancer and a faker? No one—and I mean no one else—knew about my leotard being ripped, Maddie. Only you. And we were totally alone in that locker room talking.”

  “You don’t know that for sure,” Madison said. She remembered seeing Ivy right after they’d spoken. “I think someone else was there.”

  “Well, I think that you’ve flipped out or something,” Aimee said. She was letting her temper flare. Her arms were waving wildly as she talked.

  “Aim, why would I say that stuff?” Madison asked. “I don’t lie. And why would I want to be mean to you?”

  “Oh, come on, you have lied before. What about that time in second grade when you told me that you hadn’t gotten invited to Miranda Day’s birthday party, when you really had?” Aimee said, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

  “But I only told a teeny lie then, so you wouldn’t feel bad,” Madison responded. “I can’t believe you even remembe
r that. … ”

  “All I know is that, first, there were those messages about Fiona … with secret information that only you knew. …”Aimee said.

  “It was one message,” Madison corrected her.

  “And now there’s a message for me! That’s TWO!” Aimee said. “And they’re from the same sender—who just happens to pick your screen name! How can you explain that, Maddie?”

  “I don’t know,” Madison said. “I can’t explain it.”

  “Well, I think you were goofing around, and you wrote that stuff, but you just forgot what you wrote, and you didn’t think that maybe it would actually get posted forever and ever into infinity. …” Aimee’s face looked all puffy now, as though she were about to start crying. Madison had never seen Aimee look so upset.

  “Aimee?” Madison pleaded. She wanted to cry, too. “How can you think I would do this? You said you believed me when we talked before.”

  “Yeah, I did believe you. Before this,” Aimee said. She spun around and grunted all the way down the steps.

  Madison wanted to run after her, but her feet froze in place.

  Aimee turned around again when she reached the last step. “This changes EVERYTHING!” she cried.

  With that, Aimee disappeared around the hedges.

  From behind Madison, Phinnie barked at his chew toy in the corner of the foyer. It was wedged between the desk cabinet and the wall. Madison gently closed the front door and tottered over to retrieve the toy for him. She was in a fog.

  “Rooooooooooowf!” Phin barked, as he bit into the toy once again. Madison followed him into the kitchen and collapsed into a kitchen chair.

  Why were her hands clammy?

  Was there any way to prove that Poison Ivy Daly was MF13?

  She was beginning to believe what she’d feared: The Wall was trouble.

  And she was knee-deep in it.

  Chapter 10

  WHEN SHE WALKED OVER to Aimee and Fiona at the lockers on Friday morning, Madison’s BFFs barely said hello.

  Egg and the other boys were shocked by Aimee and Fiona’s icy reception of Madison. They’d never seen their girl friends act that way around one another.

  “Whoa!” Egg said to Madison as soon as the other girls walked away. “Fiona says she isn’t talking to you. What’s the deal?”

  Madison frowned. “Oh, Egg, it’s too awful to explain.”

  “Does it have to do with The Wall?” Egg asked. “Because Fiona showed me those stupid postings. You obviously didn’t write them, Maddie. I don’t know what her problem is. She’s just upset because it said all that stuff about me asking her out.”

  Madison’s face brightened a little bit.

  “Would you tell Fiona that, please? She thinks that for some strange reason I’ve turned into Dr. Jekyll and Miss Hyde overnight. She thinks that I’ve decided to write bad gossip about my best friends. Why would I ever do that?” Madison asked.

  “She’s angry,” Egg said, lowering his voice. “Wicked angry.”

  Dan and Drew came over and stood next to Egg and Madison.

  “What are you two whispering about?” Dan asked.

  “The Wall,” Madison grumbled. “And my life being over.”

  “Life is not over,” Egg said. “It’s all good.”

  Madison sighed. “That’s what you think.”

  She felt bad, standing there. Days before, she had tried to blame the boys for the bad postings. She’d even tried to get Fiona to believe that it had been Chet who had done the dirty work. Now here she was, and those same guys turned out to be her only supporters.

  “Maybe it’s all some coincidence,” Drew suggested. “And someone else, in a school miles away, has people with the same exact initials doing the same exact stuff.”

  Madison rolled her eyes. “Oh, yeah, like that’s a possibility.”

  Her stomach flip-flopped again. Again. It had been doing a lot more of that lately than usual.

  “Well, I have to go to class,” Egg said. “Catch you later.”

  Madison waved as the boys raced off. She coasted along in their downdraft, heading toward science class.

  After everything that had happened the day before Madison decided once and for all that she would stop her visits to The Wall. She would stick to websites with careful monitors and grown-up moderators that Mom and Dad would approve of. She’d go for gossip-free pages only.

  Yeah, right.

  Madison was hooked. How could she stop now?

  Plus, when she walked into Mr. Danehy’s classroom and saw Ivy sitting up on a stool by the lab tables, Madison knew she’d be visiting The Wall again soon. She had to find out the real identity of MF13.

  In fact, was she looking at MF13 right now?

  Ivy was shameless. Madison watched as her archenemy preened and gazed into a small compact right there in the middle of the classroom, puckering her lips, checking for smudged gloss. She fussed with her red bangs a little, too. Poison Ivy had a new haircut. She always had new shoes, new clothes, new something.

  The boys in class, including Hart, were goofing off and double checking their science homework. They scarcely noticed Ivy’s obvious routine. But Madison couldn’t take her eyes off the enemy.

  Brrrrrrring.

  When the start-of-class bell rang, Ivy’s pink mini-compact disappeared back into her pink backpack, and she sat at attention. Mr. Danehy was super-strict about starting class on time. Even Ivy had to obey his rules.

  Madison copied down the week’s assignment from the board. Mr. Danehy asked the class to write a short, “team” profile about a physical scientist, with ten key ideas and facts.

  The whole time she wrote in her notebook, Madison was careful to keep one eye closely on Ivy. If she were going to prove Ivy guilty of the Wall postings, she needed to watch Ivy’s every move. Plus, Madison figured Ivy would be copying stuff out of her own notebook as usual. Madison was determined to catch Ivy in that act, too.

  “Okay, everyone, I’m rushing a bit today,” Mr. Danehy announced to the class. He looked down at his watch. “I have to leave the room for about ten minutes. While I’m gone, I want you to work on two things. First, look over your homework questions from the last class. We’ll be collecting and discussing those today. Then I want you to start working on the assignment with your lab partners.”

  He pointed to the board.

  “Follow my directions and feel free to use the science library at the back of the room. I’ll be right back.”

  Mr. Danehy grabbed a pile of folders and disappeared through the door.

  Madison glanced back over at her partner. Ivy smiled a fake smile. The most annoying of the dozens of annoying things about Poison Ivy, Madison thought, was her unique ability to turn on the charm when she needed something—and then be spiteful a mere five minutes later.

  “So, what do we do now?” Ivy asked, acting coy. “I mean, we are partners, right?”

  Madison wanted to scream, “NO! I HATE BEING YOUR PARTNER! GET AWAY FROM ME!” but instead, she just shrugged. She needed to play it cool.

  “We need to think of ideas,” Madison said.

  “What will we write about?” Ivy asked. She had no original ideas. In Ivy’s plan, Madison would do all the work, starting with their topic.

  “I don’t know what to write about,” Madison said. “Relativity?”

  “Oh, that?” Ivy asked. “Is that when some guy dropped apples?”

  Madison sighed. “No, that’s gravity.”

  “You decide on our topic, okay?” Ivy said, examining her fingernail polish instead of doing any more thinking. She looked over at her drones.

  Madison turned to a new notebook page and wrote “Relativity” at the top. “Why don’t we look first in the science textbook for some information?” Madison suggested to Ivy.

  “But I don’t have my textbook,” Ivy said, distracted.

  “Okay,” Madison said, feeling flustered. “Then I’ll look.”

  She flipped to the index and f
ound a chapter on Einstein. While she was reading, Madison had another idea—a better way to test Ivy’s sneakiness.

  “Why don’t you read this and look for other scientists we could write about? I’ll go check in the science library at the back of the room,” Madison suggested.

  She left her notebook in plain view—a tempting trap, she hoped, as she stood up and walked to the back of the classroom. She kept one eye on her nemesis, desperate to catch Ivy red-handed, copying Madison’s homework. Once Madison had managed that, she felt, she would be able to confront Ivy about the nasty postings on The Wall. Everything else would fall into place from there!

  “Hey, Finnster!” Hart said. He was looking for a book at the back of the room, too.

  “Oh!” Madison said, surprised. “I didn’t see you standing there.” She twisted her body so she could keep watching Ivy, but Hart stood in the way. Madison couldn’t see much at all besides his shirt.

  “What are you and Ivy writing about?” Hart asked.

  “Um …”Madison leaned sideways, still trying to see. “I think we’re picking Albert Einstein. Although everyone might pick him, so I was going to look around for other subjects. It’s good to have a backup.”

  “I like science when Mr. Danehy’s not here, don’t you?” Hart said.

  Madison nodded. “Yeah … um … could you move over to your left just a little?”

  “Huh?” Hart said, oblivious. As soon as he moved, Ivy came back into view.

  But she wasn’t looking at Madison’s notebook. She wasn’t cheating, as Madison had hoped she would be. She wasn’t even alone. Her drones had joined her there. They were probably talking about lip gloss, not science.

  “By the way, Maddie, Egg told me about what happened on The Wall,” Hart said. “That’s a huge bummer.”

  Madison glanced back. “Aimee and Fiona won’t even talk to me.”

  “They’ll come around,” Hart said. “They’re your best friends.”

  “The truth is, I think someone is deliberately trying to get me into trouble,” Madison said, wishing she could name names.

  Hart often hung out with Ivy, so Madison couldn’t come right out and blame Ivy directly for being MF13. She didn’t want to risk getting him mad at her, too. And secretly she wondered if maybe Hart knew more about her dilemma than he was admitting.