Double Dare (From the Files of Madison Finn, 14) (3 page)

And after all, it was a double dare.

When Fiona logged off, Madison headed into her e-mailbox. She had five spam messages, so she quickly deleted them. Bigwheels hadn’t written back yet, so she popped off another quick e-mail to her. She needed the advice now more than ever.

From: MadFinn


To: Bigwheels


Subject: Fw: Need Your HELP!


Date: Thurs 14 Sept 5:02
PM


Did u get my last e-msg from yesterday? I attached it again below just in case.


Hey, I found a partner for the contest but now I am stuck figuring out what 2 do for it. My BFF Fiona is my partner. She is so nice but 4 this we’re up against her brother so she is mad crazy to win, saying all this competitive stuff. It makes me a little nervous, like extra pressure to win. I think we do have a chance even though Egg is hands down the smartest guy in the contest. I would only admit that to you, BTW. If he knew I thought that he’d never let me forget it. So do u have any brilliant ideas for us? Ur wicked good @ computers, I can tell. Once again, I need ur help.


SO … HELP!!!!!


Yours till the web pages,


MadFinn


THE CONTEST


What a week! Fiona and I have been going bananas trying to figure out what to do for our webpage. We’ve had all these ideas, but it seems like everything we come up with is waaaaay too complicated. Like, I wanted to have a chat room, so people could discuss their homework. Good idea, right?


Wrong.


It’s impossible to build, plus we’d need a 24-hour moderator … so that’s out.


Fiona said we should have some funky graphics; maybe design our own stuff. But the software we’d need is seriously expensive. More than $300—on sale! I still think we can find something online for free, but what if we download something that has a virus?


It feels like our list of a billion ideas = a big zero. I wonder what Chet and Egg are doing? Fiona has been trying to pull some 007 on them, but she hasn’t had much luck. Which is fine by me. Part of me doesn’t even WANT to know what they’re up to.


Rude Awakening:
It’s all fun and games until someone loses an eye—or a contest. I know winning isn’t everything … it’s just the only thing you can think about when you’re losing!


I hope Bigwheels writes back soon. I need MORE inspiration! We have to win! I can’t take Egg’s bragging for the rest of junior high.


HELP!


“I don’t know, Maddie,” Madison’s father’s voice cut into her thoughts. “I think that this dinner might be a big
mis
-steak.”

Madison sighed and placed her elbows on the kitchen table, cradling her chin in her hands.

“Not even a courtesy chuckle?” Dad asked from his place by the stove.

Madison gave him a lopsided smile. “Maybe if you didn’t crack the same joke every time you made steak for dinner—”

“Hey,” Dad protested, “I’m like glue, Maddie. When I get a good joke, I stick with it.”

Madison didn’t laugh even though she
was
happy to be hanging with Dad right now. He’d just gotten back from a business trip, so Madison and Phin were staying with him instead of Aimee tonight. Whenever Madison stayed over, Dad acted like it was a special occasion. He was even making her favorite dinner—steak and french fries.

Best of all, Madison had her father all to herself. Lately, Dad always wanted to hang out as a threesome with his girlfriend, Stephanie. Madison liked Stephanie—a lot. But, sometimes she wanted to be a Dad hog. Tonight was one of those times.

Dad flipped the steak, which let out an angry hiss. The delicious smell of grilled meat filled the kitchen and Madison’s stomach let out a growl. “Will it be ready soon?” she asked eagerly.

“Yep,” Dad replied. “Better clear the table.”

Madison powered down her laptop and stuck it into her bag. Then she got out the place mats and set the small table that sat in the corner of the kitchen.

“Dinner is served,” Dad said as he placed the plates on the table.

Madison took a fry and popped it into her mouth. “Mmm.” Dad’s fries always came out perfect—extra-salty, just the way Madison liked them.

“Hey!” Dad protested, “Wait for me to—ketch up!” He held out a bottle of Heinz ketchup as Madison rolled her eyes and shook her head.

“Hmm,” Dad said as he settled into his seat. “That makes a few no-laughs in a row. Is everything okay, sweetie?”

Madison sighed. Dad was so good at knowing how she was feeling. “It’s just that Fiona and I entered this contest. We’re supposed to design a webpage … and it’s a little harder than we thought it would be.”

“Bit off more than you could chew, eh?” Dad asked as Madison bit into a piece of steak. That actually made Madison laugh a little, and for a minute she was so busy trying to chew and laugh at the same time that she nearly choked.

“Dad—I’m being serious!” Madison protested as she took a drink and gulped down the piece of steak.

“I know, sweetie, I’m sorry.” Dad looked sheepish. “But, hey—maybe I could help you with your project. I know a thing or two about websites, you know.”

Madison grinned. “Of course! That would be great!” she said happily. Dad had already created a few start-up websites. He knew pretty much everything about setting up webpages and making them work. Why hadn’t she thought of this sooner?

“So—” Dad said. “What kind of webpage are you building?”

“It’s a homework-helper site,” Madison explained. “It has to be something educational. Fiona and I want to make something that looks really cool—but the graphics we like best take forever to download. Some of them even crashed my computer.”

“Hmm,” Dad said, obviously thinking hard. “It seems to me that the most important thing is to have a webpage that works,” he said finally. “If it’s a homework helper, it’s important for it to be
helpful.
”

“Right,” Madison agreed. “That’s one of the things they said specifically in the rules. The winning entries have to be functional. Design and style are graded in separate categories. They don’t count for as many points.”

At her feet, Phin let out a low whine and looked up, sniffing the air. Madison cut off a tiny sliver of steak and slipped it to him.

“What you need is useful content, and lots of it,” Dad went on. “If you want to have special effects—like graphics and sound—just be sure that there’s a point to them.”

Madison sighed. “The only problem is, I don’t know where to start!”

“Have you checked out any other homework-helper websites?” Dad asked.

Madison’s eyes grew wide. “Umm—no,” she admitted, slightly embarrassed that she hadn’t thought of something so obvious.

Dad grinned. “Maybe we should start there. Why don’t you pull out the laptop while I take care of the dishes?”

Madison snatched the last two fries off her plate as Dad cleared the table, popping one fry into her mouth and tossing the other one to Phin. Then she pulled out her laptop.

Dad had made the webpage project sound like fun again.

After the dishes were done, Dad pulled his chair next to Madison. She typed “homework” into a search engine and waited for the number of searches to come up onscreen.

Search: HOMEWORK.

Total items found: 11,321,395.

“See?” Dad said. “There’s plenty of stuff to look at.”

“Eleven million entries? I think I’ll start with the top three,” Madison said, clicking through to a site called hellohomework. It had a list of school subjects and a complex database, including an online atlas and encyclopedia.

“This page is outta site!” Dad said, winking.

Madison clicked through to look at the atlas. “They’ve got a ton of great stuff,” she agreed, ignoring Dad’s bad pun. “But we could never make anything this complicated.”

“No,” Dad said, sitting back in his chair. “But you could provide a link to this page.”

“Oh—” Madison said. “Right!” She clicked back to the search engine and tried another site. This one was mostly science centered, and had detailed information on plants and animals. Madison added the link to
FAVORITES
and kept surfing while Dad scooped out dessert.

“Dad?” Madison called out. “I’m trying to use the search feature, but it doesn’t work.”

“Too much stuff on that page,” Dad said, slurping a spoonful of ice cream. “It’s real slow. That’s a good example of what
not
to do.”

“Oh,” Madison said. She nodded and clicked to a different page with a scrolling list of books by different authors.

“I just can’t wait to tell Fiona about all these sites!” Madison said.

“Why don’t you give her a call?” Dad suggested.

“Yeah!” Madison snatched the cordless phone off the wall and punched in Fiona’s number, grinning.

“Hello?” said a male voice on the other end of the phone line.

Madison’s grin evaporated.

Chet!

Just say hi, Madison told herself. She opened her mouth, but she couldn’t make any sound come out. She didn’t want to speak to Fiona’s brother under any circumstances. Before she realized what she was doing, Madison hung up with a slam.

Oh my gosh! Madison thought, the minute she’d clicked off the phone. Why did I just do that? She hoped the Waters family didn’t have caller ID. Even though she was at Dad’s, Chet still could figure out who had hung up on him!

“Wrong number?” Dad asked as he put their dessert bowls into the dishwasher.

“Um … yeah,” Madison lied. “I guess I’ll just call Fiona later.” She bit her lip, wondering why she’d hung up the phone like that. She felt a little more competitive about this contest than she thought she would feel when it began.

“It’s getting late, Maddie,” Dad said. “And you have school tomorrow. You should probably start getting ready for bed.”

“Can’t I just stay on for a little while longer?” Madison pleaded.

“Hmmmm. I don’t want you to get surf bored,” Dad said, wiggling his eyebrows.

Madison gave a half-laugh, half-groan. “Oh, Dad, I just want to check my e-mail,” she pleaded. “Really, really quickly.”

“Okay.” Dad relented. “Fifteen more minutes.”

Madison liked bargaining with Dad for more bedtime. Mom never sent her to sleep on the clock at home, so why should she have to do that here?

Madison decided to send Fiona a message rather than risk calling and getting Chet again. She logged into TweenBlurt.com and checked her buddy list.

Fiona wasn’t online. But Chet
was.

“Grrrrrr!” Madison fumed to herself. Why did Chet have to be such a phone and computer hog? Didn’t he know Fiona and Madison had work to do?

Since everyone appeared to have gone offline, Madison decided to send Fiona e-mail. When she opened her e-mailbox, she discovered a bunch of unread messages.

From: Bigwheels


To: MadFinn


Subject: Fw: Need Your HELP!


Date: Thurs 21 Sept 7:21
PM


Sorry I haven’t written—u’ll never believe what happened. My computer totally died! I was surfing the web for info for an English project, and the screen went blank. Can you believe it? My mom was on the phone with the tech people for an hour, but nothing worked. They said we should send the computer to them and they could get it back to me in a month (!), but my dad said that the computer was way old anyway. It was going to cost too much to fix it, so we decided I should get a new one (!!!!!)


So I’m writing you from my (drumroll PLEASE) cool new laptop. And it’s orange, which makes me think of u. We’re practically twins now! The laptop is superfast, too, so I’m sure I’ll be spending even MORE time online.


I don’t have any brilliant ideas about ur webpage, but if I come across anything that looks interesting, I’ll totally share. But don’t worry! Ur so good with computers—I know u and Fiona will do great.


Yours till the cyber spaces,


Bigwheels a/k/a Victoria


Madison smiled and reached down to pet Phin. He was lying on his back, wiggling, making happy snuffling noises as Madison rubbed his belly. “Are you going to help me, Phinnie?” Madison asked.

“Rowrroooo!” Phin howled. He scooted around on his back, legs pumping the air. He looked so silly.

Madison felt the same way. But she remembered what her Gramma Helen always said: “The best way to get help is to ask for it.” She had Fiona, Dad, and Bigwheels to ask. Madison could get all the help she needed—and make sure that her webpage would rate A+++ … right?

Bah-ling!

Madison’s computer chirped and flashed.

Another new e-mail?

The newest message downloaded, and Madison read the address: [email protected]. Her heart skipped a beat. Was this from Chet—telling her that he knew she was the one who hung up on him? Madison clicked the message icon to find out.