Rules for Secret Keeping (16 page)

Anyway, I had to tell her I was going as a cowgirl and
now she's freaking out.

“You're going as some kind of wild cowgirl?”

“Not
wild,”
I say. “Who said anything about
wild
?”

I read over what I've written.

Dear
You Girl
finalists,

Hi! How are you? My name is Samantha Carmichael, and I am one of the
You Girl
Young Entrepreneur of the Year finalists. I met some of you at the photo shoot. Anyway, I cannot believe that the banquet is in a couple of weeks! We are getting so close to finding out who the winner of the
You Girl
Young Entrepreneur of the Year award is! So very exciting!

As I'm sure all of you are aware, we are allowed two tickets to the banquet. Unfortunately, I have a stepfather and a father, and I'm sure they would both just love to attend. I was wondering if perhaps you or your family has an extra ticket you would be willing to give to me? I am not saying that it is more important for my family to go than yours, of course, but it would help me out greatly.

It was so amazing meeting some of you at the photo shoot, and I hope we can all keep in touch!

Good luck to all!

Best wishes,

Samantha Carmichael

I tried to sound like I wasn't just getting in touch now because I needed something, even though that's obviously the reason. I feel bad about it, but I would feel even worse if I have to break poor Tom's heart. I read the email through one more time, spell-check it, hope for the best, and hit send.

“Well, it
sounds
wild,” Taylor's saying. “Cowgirls are
known
for being wild. They ride bulls and, like, lasso people.”

“It's not definite that I'm going as a cowgirl.” Which isn't a lie. “And I'm definitely not going to
lasso
people, that's ridiculous. Anyway, I told you—I'm probably going to try to find another outfit with Daphne.”

“If you say so,” Taylor says, not sounding like she believes it.

“Gotta go,” I tell her, hopping off her computer chair and heading for the door. “I'm supposed to be at Jake's. Thanks for letting me use your computer.”

“You've been spending a lot of time with Jake lately,” she says lightly. I turn around. She's on her bed, painting her toenails a color called Pumpkin Spice.

“No, I haven't,” I say. I sound defensive. Very defensive. I try it again. “No, I haven't.” Yikes. Still defensive.

“Didn't you just have breakfast with him this morning?”

“Not really,” I say. “I mean, yeah, we did meet up, but we weren't having breakfast. I mean, yes, I did have a lemonade, but we were mostly getting together to talk about something else. Something having to do with business stuff.” Taylor looks at me skeptically, then caps the nail polish she's using and opens her mouth to say something else. But I don't wait for her to catch me in a lie. I slide my feet into my shoes and hop out the door to go to Jake's house.

“Oh, hi, Samantha!” Mrs. Giacandi says when she opens Jake's front door. “So nice to see you!”

“Hi,” I squeak. This is the first time I've been over to Jake's house since he came back from camp. The first time I've stood on his mat since I started liking him. The first time I've rung his doorbell. The first time—

“Are you okay?” Mrs. Giacandi asks. “You look a little . . . ah, pale.”

“I'm fine,” I say. Oh my God! Jake's mom can tell! She KNOWS THAT I LIKE HIM. Moms are very good about picking up on that stuff. And now maybe she's going to tell him. Maybe they'll sit down to breakfast tomorrow and she'll be all,
“Wow, that Samantha was acting very flustered last night; she really has a crush on you, Jake.”
And Jake will
be all,
“Yeah, I kind of noticed that, it's weird. I want to be friends with her, but not if she's going to get crazy.”
And then Mrs. Giacandi will be all,
“Jake, you know girls at that age are very vulnerable; I don't think you should be friends with her if it's going to mess with her mind.”

“Jake's upstairs,” Mrs. Giacandi says, closing the door behind me. On second thought, maybe she doesn't know, if she's willing to let me go up to Jake's room without worrying about us. What is with everyone? Is it so strange to think that Jake and I could like each other as more than friends? Or do people just think it's weird that Jake could like
me
as more than a friend?

I bound up the stairs, which doesn't really help the fact that my heart is racing. Jake's bedroom door is open, and he's at his desk, his back to me, playing a video game on his computer. He has his headphones on.

“Hey,” I say. But he doesn't hear me. He's moving his hands and arms all around, trying to kill something on the screen. Or outrun something. It's hard to tell. Whatever it is, it looks very violent and loud. Also maybe a little bloody. I think it's one of those video games parents are always protesting against.

“Hey!” I say again. Still, he doesn't hear me.

I take a few steps toward him. I wonder if I should, like, touch his shoulder? Or maybe just scream his name really
loud. “JAKE!” I yell. He doesn't turn around. Finally, I reach out and touch his shoulder.

He screams and throws his controller up in the air. “Ahhh!”

“Ahh!” I scream back. On the screen, a dragon starts to beat Jake's character into a bloody pulp. Gross.

Jake laughs and pulls his headphones off. “Sorry,” he says. “You scared me.”

“No,
I'm
sorry,” I say. “I was calling your name but I guess you didn't hear me. Since, you know, you had your headphones on.” I'm babbling, so I take a deep breath and then grab a chair that's leaning against the wall. I pull it over toward the computer but not, you know, too close. No need to tip him off.

“What are you doing way over there?” Jake asks. “Can you even see the screen?”

“Uh, no,” I say. I scoot the chair closer and throw my bag over the back. I hope he won't be able to notice my drawn-on eyebrows when we're this close. Jake, of course, looks fabulous. He's wearing a Tony Hawk T-shirt and a pair of baggy cargo pants.

“Now,” he says, pulling up Olivia's website. “If you look at what Olivia has set up, basically her website form gets filtered into a normal email account.” He taps around on the screen and shows me. “So if we can somehow prove
that her email account is corrupt, then we can break into her emails and prove that the whole system isn't secure.”

“But
is
it corrupt?” I ask, trying out the word. Corrupt. It sounds so . . . sinister.

“Well, it's not corrupt per se,” he says. “She just doesn't have any security measures in place.” He types around some more, opening up a program that asks him for the email password. “So if we can figure out her email password, then we can probably get into her account.”

“Try ‘IhateSamantha,'” I say.

Jake laughs. I love making him laugh! I reach over and pretend to type “IhateSamantha” into the computer, and at the same time Jake reaches over to type something, and our hands brush against each other and he doesn't pull away right away and neither do I and my face gets all hot and electricity runs all the way from the tips of my fingers down to my toes, making me all tingly.

I yank my hand back, and Jake looks over at me and smiles, and then just keeps typing like nothing happened.

“So, uh, what are you doing now?” I ask. I slide my hands into my lap and will myself to keep them there so that there are no more mishaps.

“Well, I tried all the normal passwords she might use, like ‘Olivia' or the name of her dog, or ‘ZacEfron.'”

“How did you know the name of her dog?” I ask.

“I found it on her Facebook page.”

“Oh, right. And Zac Efron?”

“She has Photoshopped pics of herself with him in her photo gallery.”

“Right.” I giggle.

“So now I'm just running a simple hacking program that's going to try and find out the password.”

“Do you think it will work?”

“I don't know,” he says.

I watch as the program runs on the screen, and suddenly, out of nowhere, I feel like I want to cry. It seems so pointless. Trying to bring down Olivia's Secrets, when really all she did was figure out a way to do what I was doing, only better. What am I going to do when Barb comes to my school next week? I have no clue if things will even be back to normal by then. How am I going to figure out a way to mask the fact that I am basically getting no secrets anymore? And to top it all off, what the heck am I going to tell my dad?

“What's wrong?” Jake asks, noticing the look on my face.

“Nothing.” I try to make my voice sound bright. “Just tired, probably from getting up so early.” I give him a tentative smile.

“Right,” he says, rolling his eyes. “Seriously, what's
wrong?”

“Nothing!”

“Samantha,” he says. “We've been friends since we were eight, you can't tell me nothing's wrong when something definitely is.”

“Well,” I say, taking a deep breath. “It's just that Barb is coming to school next week to follow me around for
You Girl
. And I haven't really been getting any secrets anymore.” An image of Barb standing in front of my locker while I open the door to see nothing there flashes through my brain. “And she's going to think I'm a total loser.” My throat is catching on itself, and I'm trying not to start crying.

“You'll be fine,” Jake says. “You'll think of something, you'll fix it.”

“Maybe I will, “ I say. “But not in time for when Barb comes. And then there's the whole mess with the
You Girl
dinner. Do I bring Tom or do I bring my dad? Now that I've realized there's probably, like, no chance I'm going to win, I know I should probably bring Tom. My dad will freak out if I don't bring him, but if I
do
bring him and I don't win, then, then . . . and . . . and . . .” That's when I lose it. I start to cry, the tears sliding down my face.

“Oh,” Jake says. “Umm . . .” He shifts in his chair and looks uncomfortable.

“Sorry,” I say, wiping my tears with the back of my hand. “I don't know why I'm crying, it's so silly.”

“It's not silly,” Jake says. He reaches over to the box of tissues on the top of his desk and hands me one. I blow my nose. Great. Totally what I want to be doing in front of the guy that I like. Getting all sniffly and gross.

“I mean, I know it's just a dumb secret-passing website. It's not a matter of national security or anything. It's not even something that makes a difference in people's lives. Did I tell you there was a girl at the photo shoot who was making bracelets to save the children in Darfur?”

“Well, that's awesome that she's doing that,” Jake says. “But that doesn't mean that what you're doing is any less special. You put in just as much work as she did.”

“Not really.” I sniff. “I haven't even tried to research the way the digital revolution is sweeping the nation. Or work on my branding. Or come up with a name for my business. And now I'm paying the price.”

“The digital revolution?” Jake looks confused. “Samantha, Olivia didn't research the digital revolution, she just happens to have a dad who knows about computers and set her up with a website so that she wouldn't have to do any real work.”

“Maybe.” I sniff.

“And you watch, once we prove that she's telling
people's secrets, or once we can get into her website, she'll lose interest in this whole project and move on.”

“You think?”

“I know.” And then something crazy and wonderful and horrible and exciting and terrifying happens. Jake reaches over and wipes one of my tears away with his thumb. My heart starts up again. And then, before I even have time to think about what's happening, Jake is leaning in toward me. His lips are, like,
two inches
away from mine, and he's looking right into my eyes. Jake is going to kiss me! This is the moment I've been waiting for! The moment where Jake will tell me that he likes me only, not Emma, that he's been wanting to kiss me ever since that day with his skateboard.

“Samantha,” he says softly, and I wonder if his heart is beating as fast as mine.

But then, just as he's about to lean in for the kiss, out of nowhere, a rap song starts playing. Which is kind of weird, seeing as how I always figured my first kiss would be set to something a little more romantic. And then I realize it's Jake's phone. His ringtone is a rap song.

He picks up his cell from the desk, and I catch a glance at the caller ID before he sends the call to voicemail. But it's too late. I saw who it was. Emma.

“Who was that?” I ask, trying to keep my voice even.

“No one,” he says. Which is a complete
lie,
since I saw
the caller ID and I know it was definitely not a no one, it was definitely a
someone.
But I don't say this. I just look at him and still kind of hope that maybe he might try to kiss me.

But there's a knock on his open door, and it's his mom, and she wants Jake to know that dinner is ready, and then she asks me if I'm going to stay. But I say no, because, hello, how embarrassing is it to think that I maybe almost kissed Jake and now his mom is asking me to stay for dinner?

“So, um, I guess I'll get going,” I say once Jake's mom is back downstairs. “So that you can have dinner.”

“Yeah,” Jake says.

I grab my bag off the back of my chair. “Um, so, I'll see you in school tomorrow.”

“See you in school tomorrow,” Jake says. He grins and gives me a little wave. He's kind of acting like nothing happened. Is it possible that maybe I
imagined
the whole thing? That maybe Jake wasn't trying to kiss me, that maybe he was just reaching over me for something and his lips kind of came close to me by accident or something? How will I know? What if he thinks I didn't want to kiss him and so now he's never going to try again? Boys have very fragile self-esteem. That's one thing I've learned from watching Taylor and all the boys who flock around her.