Cheat (2 page)

He threw up his arms and did a victory dance.

Sean shook his head in disgust.

“You got horseshoes up your butt, man.”

Jack laughed as he flopped on the couch. “It's skills, pal. Skills. Eat your heart out.”

Sean scratched his stomach. “Speaking of eating, whatcha got to chow on?” He headed for the fridge, messing my hair on the way by.

“Bug off,” I said, giving him a hip check.

He grinned. “Is that any way for a big reporter to talk?”

“Yeah, right,” I mumbled, trying not to smile.

“No, seriously. That was a good article,” he said. “I liked it.”

“Next stop,
The Globe and Mail
,” Jack teased. “I almost forgot—there's a message for you. Not
The Globe and
Mail
, but some guy from the
Islander
.”

“Nice try,” I retorted. I know my brother. There was no way I was going to let him suck me in.

“Really. I'm not kidding,” Jack insisted, picking up the phone and punching in the message code. He held it out to me. “Listen for yourself.”

I still didn't believe him, but I took the phone. I was all set to hear a dial tone, but there really was a message from someone at the
Islander
. The editor. He said his daughter was a Barton High student and had brought the paper home at lunch. He'd read my story and wanted to talk to me about it.

I quickly jotted down the phone number and took off to my room to return the call.

As I hung up the phone, I was numb. The
Islander
wanted to print my story about the squatter! It was going to run in Friday's paper. I was even going to get money for it. Just $25, but that still made me a paid reporter. Even better, the editor said he'd be interested in seeing future articles too.

I was so excited. I wanted to get writing that very second. The only problem was I had nothing to write about.

Chapter Three

By Monday morning, I was a celebrity. Everybody had seen the article in the
Islander
. Mr. Wiens even mentioned it during the morning announcements. It was embarrassing and thrilling at the same time. I didn't know how to look or what to say.

So I was actually grateful to have a math test after lunch. It took my mind off all the attention I was suddenly getting. I hadn't studied, so I should have been nervous. The way I look at it, though, you either know math or you don't. I was pretty sure I was okay with it.

My heart always speeds up before a test, but once I get started, I'm fine. I calm down and focus on what I'm doing. I just have to make it through those first few minutes of panic.

“Write your name on the answer sheet, and leave your test papers facedown until I tell you to begin,” said Mrs. Abernathy as she handed out the tests. “You may use your calculators and scrap paper to work out your answers. In
pencil,
completely fill in the bubble of the correct answer for each question. Do not—I repeat—do
not
write on the test paper itself. Are there any questions?”

Her gaze swept the room. No one raised their hand. We all knew the drill.

“Good,” Mrs. Abernathy said. “You will have the entire period to complete the test.”

Which was getting shorter all the time. I glanced up at the clock. Just thirty-five minutes left.

“You may begin.”

Twenty-five test papers flipped over. Right away I zipped to the last page. There were thirty questions, which meant just over a minute per question. Thank goodness the test was multiple guess. Teachers call it multiple choice, but let's be honest. For a lot of kids, it comes down to guessing. It seems to me tests would be more useful if students had to come up with answers from their brains. But that would mean teachers would actually have to mark them. With multiple-choice tests, they just scan the answer sheets, and the marking is done for them.

I have a system for tests. First I skim the whole thing to see what kind of questions there are. That helps me know how to use my time. Then I quickly do the questions I know I can answer. After all, a mark is a mark. Bottom line: get as many as you can. Some kids spend so long on one question that they don't finish. That's just plain dumb. I leave the hard questions for the end. And when in doubt—I guess.

There were about ten minutes left in the class. I was finished except for two problems. For some reason, my brain wasn't kicking in. I was doing gradeten math, but at that moment it might as well have been rocket science. I looked up from my paper and stared into space, trying to make sense of the questions.

My eyes were open, but I wasn't really seeing anything—at least not at first. But then I became aware of something fluttering in the bottom left-hand corner of my field of vision. I zoomed in on it.

It was a hand—Dale Pearson's hand. He held it at seat level, up tight to his body. His thumb was tucked up and four fingers were extended. As I watched, he closed his hand into a fist and then opened it again. Now just one finger was showing. He held his hand like that for a few seconds before closing his fist again. When he opened it next, all five of his fingers were extended.

This clearly wasn't a case of writer's cramp. Dale was sending somebody a message.

I looked around. Two seats behind, Jarod Bailey had his eye on Dale's hand too. Every time Dale changed the position of his fingers, Jarod marked his answer sheet.

Ding! Ding! Ding!
Bells started ringing in my head. Jarod was a solid D student. Dale got Bs. They were best friends. They were obviously cheating. There was no doubt in my mind.

It didn't take a genius to figure out the code they were using. A single finger told Jarod to fill in A, two was for B, and so on. Five fingers would be E.

I couldn't believe it. I knew kids cheated, but I'd never actually seen it before.

“One minute, people,” Mrs. Abernathy announced in a robotic voice.

One minute! There was no time for me to finish the test now. All I could do was hope I was a good guesser. I wasn't too worried though. Two missed answers wasn't going to hurt me. I'd still pass.

Besides, the lost marks were worth it. Now I had a topic for my next article.

Chapter Four

The article on cheating almost wrote itself. That always happens when I'm fired up. My brain bubbles over, and the words spill out. I couldn't wait to see my story in print.

If kids were cheating in my math class, I had no doubt it was happening in other classes too. I'd stumbled on a real issue—one that a lot of kids probably didn't even know existed. If the editor at the
Islander
liked my last article, he was going to love this one.

I was at the dentist when the paper went on sale, and lunch hour was over when I got back to school. I snuck into the math room as quietly as I could and handed Mrs. Abernathy my late slip. Then I turned to take my seat and stopped. Everybody was glaring at me.

They weren't just frowning because I'd disturbed them. They were totally telling me off with their eyes.

I wanted to run. It took all my willpower to walk to my desk and pretend everything was normal. I sat down, opened my books and made a big production of getting to work. It didn't help. I still felt every pair of eyes in the room—except maybe Mrs. Abernathy's—shooting death rays at me.

But why?

Jarod Bailey got up to sharpen his pencil. As he walked past, he dropped something on my desk and muttered, “Traitor.”

I looked down. There was a copy of the school paper with a big black
X
through my story.

My mouth went dry, and my stomach did a flip. Apparently I'd gone from hero to villain.

“I don't get it,” I complained to Tara and Liz as we walked home after school. “Everybody in my math class hates me! You should've seen the looks on their faces. Except for Jarod, not a single person spoke to me—
nobody
. And when the bell rang, the whole class took off like I had the plague.”

Liz snorted and shifted the books she was carrying to the other arm. “What were you expecting? A ticker-tape parade?”

“What do you mean?”

Tara clucked her tongue. “Think about it, Laurel. You just ratted out your class.”

“I did not!” I protested. “I didn't say who the cheaters were. I just wrote what they did.”

Tara and Liz didn't look convinced.

“Okay, fine,” I said. “I can understand why Jarod and Dale would be mad at me. They won't be able to cheat anymore. From now on, Mrs. Abernathy is going to be watching everybody like a hawk.” My forehead buckled into a frown. “But why are the other kids mad?”

Tara rolled her eyes. “Because Mrs. Abernathy is going to be watching everybody like a hawk?”

“So?”

“So that means everyone is a suspect.

Everyone except you, that is.”

As Tara's words sank in, I said, “Oh. I never thought about it like that.”

It was true. Not for a second had I considered that I was putting my classmates under a microscope.

Liz shifted her books again. “Why did you write that article, anyway?”

I blinked in disbelief. “You're kidding, right?”

Liz shook her head.

“Liz!” I said. “Kids were cheating!”

All she did was shrug.

I couldn't believe it. “Liz!” I exclaimed again.

“Oh, Laurel, take a pill,” Tara said. “It's not like somebody robbed a bank.”

“Yeah, it is,” I argued. “Dishonesty is dishonesty. People who cheat on a test are the same kind of people who'd rob a bank.”

“Oh, please,” said Tara. “You've never copied an answer off someone else's paper?”

I shook my head. “No.”

“Like I believe you,” Tara snorted. “Everybody cheats.”

I shook my head again. “Not everybody. I don't.” I gestured toward Liz. “Liz doesn't.”

I didn't know that for sure, but it was a pretty safe guess. Liz is the smartest kid I know. If teachers don't give her homework, she makes up her own. In all the years I've known her—and we go back to fifth grade—I have never seen her leave school without a stack of books.

I was shocked when she said, “Well, no, I've never copied someone else's answers—luckily, I've never had to. But I have let kids copy mine. Not very often,” she said, “but when I know somebody needs a little help.”

“That's not help!” I protested. “It's cheating!”

To my surprise, she grinned. “Oh, come on, Laurel. Lighten up. It's not a big deal. So somebody gets a couple of extra marks on a test. So what? It isn't going to stop the world from spinning. It might save a kid from getting grounded or cut from a team though.”

“I can't believe what you're saying.”

“Why?” asked Liz.

“Because you're smart. You're going to be a doctor or a lawyer or the prime minister or something. Why would you help kids cheat?”

Liz just sighed. “Because it doesn't matter. What happens at school only matters at school. The real world doesn't care.”

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't surprised by my friends' attitudes. I thought I was doing a good deed by writing that article. But nobody else saw it that way.

When I asked Jack what he thought, he said I was overreacting too. Was I the only person at Barton High who knew the difference between right and wrong? Or were Liz and Tara and Jack right? Was I getting all bent out of shape over nothing?

I had to find out. And I knew just how to do it.

It took a bit of pleading to convince the editor of the school paper, but finally he agreed to let me run a survey on cheating in the next issue.

Monday morning I headed straight for the newspaper office. Through the window of the door I saw strips of paper strewn on the floor below the mail slot.
Yes!
Kids had filled out the survey. I let myself in. I didn't bother to move the survey slips to a table. I just flopped down on the floor in the middle of the mess.

I organized them into piles. The results were pretty discouraging. The box most often checked was
Not Concerned
. A few students selected
Slightly
Concerned.
There were several
Unaware
of Cheating
responses too. Only a couple of people checked off
Very Concerned
.

A lot of kids wrote comments. Most of them were less than friendly.
Get a
life! Who cares? Don't be a troublemaker
were some of the kinder ones.

I sighed. This was not going the way I'd hoped. Then I saw it. It was a strip just like the others, except no box had been ticked. Instead, scrawled across it in red felt marker were the words
DRAPER'S
SCANTRON TESTS. BIG-TIME SCAM.

Chapter Five

I'd heard of Mr. Draper, but I didn't know anything about him. It's funny how that works. Unless teachers are standing in a classroom, you don't notice them. I'd probably passed the guy in the hall a hundred times, but I couldn't even tell you what he looked like. All I knew was that he taught grade-twelve math and biology. And the only reason I knew that much was because I asked around.

My informant had said a major cheating scam was going on in Draper's classes. Probably a lot of people were involved. The scam had something to do with the Scantron tests—those fill-in-the-bubble sheets. Scantron tests were marked by machine, so there had to be answer keys around somewhere. My guess was that someone had found them and made copies.

But I was only guessing. I had no evidence, and I couldn't write a news story based on an accusation scribbled on a scrap of paper. The
Islander
would never print it. I needed to prove the kids in Draper's classes were cheating.

Then
BAM!
It came to me. Their grades, of course. The cheaters should have better marks than the kids in the other classes.

It was a good theory, but once again I needed proof. Getting it was going to be a challenge. I couldn't go around asking kids to tell me their grades, and there was no way teachers would let me snoop through their mark books.