Suddenly Andie scooted up onto the porch railing, balancing herself there. “There’s only one problem. How will I do it? How can I possibly bribe the seniors?”
“Somehow you have to get them to waive initiation this year,” I replied. “It’s not fair in the first place because we’re supposed to be in junior high. You could start out by reminding them of that.”
Andie’s eyes dropped. “I just don’t know how we could talk them out of it. Maybe it isn’t such a good idea, after all.”
“We could suggest that they initiate the sophomores—they’d be getting it now if we hadn’t been moved up,” I said, thinking of Stan.
“Hey, you’re right. Maybe I’ll talk to Marcia Greene. Doesn’t she have a brother who’s a senior?”
“What about Shauna and Joy?” I said. “Don’t they have older sisters—seniors, too?”
“And there’s a bunch of seniors in the church youth group”— Andie was getting excited again—“maybe they’d help us.”
We dashed inside for some ice cream. Time for celebration.
Mom was sorting through the kitchen pantry when we slid up to the barstools. She turned and smiled. “You two certainly look happy.”
Andie and I grinned at each other. “I think we’ve stumbled onto something to help get Andie elected,” I said.
Mom simply had to hear what we were up to. “Sounds like a big undertaking to me,” she said after we filled her in. “I’d hate to be the one to approach those haughty seniors at Dressel Hills High. Especially that Zye Greene.”
“Zye?” Andie and I said in unison. “You mean Marcia Greene’s brother?”
Mom nodded, her eyes squinting a little. “Zye Greene the second. He pretty much runs the show over there.”
I wasn’t sure how Mom knew so much. “How do you know this guy . . . Zye?”
Andie burst into laughter.
Mom chuckled a little. “Well, Zye Sr. is a highly respected member of the Dressel Hills school board. In fact, he’s the one who got the ball rolling for the ninth graders to move up to high school.”
“Freshmen,” Andie and I said together.
“Yes, you are definitely freshmen,” Mom acknowledged. “It’s just a little difficult for a mother to adjust to these sophisticated labels.” She went back to organizing the pantry.
“Wow.” I headed for the freezer. “What do you think? Could we get Marcia’s brother to help us call off initiation?”
“We’ll give it our best shot.” Andie reached for the phone book.
“Who’re you going to call?” I asked, dishing up some strawberry ice cream for two.
“Zye, the guy—our main man.”
“Good thinking.”
Andie scooped up a spoonful of ice cream while she looked in the phone book under the Gs. “There aren’t any Zye Greenes listed,” she said, looking up.
“The number might be unlisted,” Mom explained. “Maybe you should talk to Marcia on Monday.”
“Aw, Mom!” I wailed. “We have to get things rolling now, or we’ll never get Andie’s campaign speech ready.”
Andie was smiling like a chimp, showing all her teeth. “Hey, this is good news, Holly-Heart. You’re worried about my speech. Does this mean you’ll help me write it after all?”
“I’m speechless, er . . . you know.” Oops, wrong choice of words.
Andie stared at me. “C’mon, Holly, I need you. Please?” Our eyes met. And all at once we were very close. Like little kids. I felt that I had a best friend forever. Andie needed my writing to make her speech fly. And I was the writer, like she said.
“Okay, Andie, you win,” I said at last. “I’ll write your speech.”
“Yes!” She raised her hands high over her head.
I grabbed a tablet off the desk in the corner of the kitchen. “Now all I need is a sharpened pencil.”
Andie hopped off the stool and found a pencil in a can on the desk. “This is so cool,” she announced, hugging me.
Not for one second did I wish I were running against her. Not anymore. I actually wanted to do this—write my best friend’s speech, be Andie’s campaign manager. With all my heart I wanted to.
Nothing else mattered.
FRESHMAN FRENZY
Chapter 12
Monday morning. Bad news.
Andie stopped at my locker first thing. She looked depressed. “We’ve got a problem,” she said. “I talked to Zye Greene this morning. Man, what a jerk. How can his sister be so sweet? Anyway, this guy . . . he’s got a major case of senioritis.”
I groaned.
Andie continued. “He made it so obvious that he did not want some puny peon freshman asking him dumb questions. Zye said no senior alive—at least not in Dressel Hills—would agree to dump initiation. In fact, he let me in on a little secret.”
I closed my locker door. “What’s that?”
“He said this year’s initiation was going to be tougher than ever.” Andie’s eyes bugged out. “Because, as he put it, ‘freshmen have never darkened the doors of this high school.’ Are we in for it or what?”
I didn’t know what to say. It looked like my plan had fallen flat. And to make things worse, I’d spent most of the weekend writing Andie’s speech, focusing on the promise of no initiation. “So . . . now what do we do?”
Paula and Kayla were headed our way. “Have you discussed this with anyone else?” I asked Andie, nodding in the twins’ direction.
“Being sophomores, Paula and Kayla loved your idea,” Andie said. “They think none of us—not even tenth-grade students—should get initiated this year. It’s degrading to the human spirit.”
Sounded like something the Miller girls would say.
“Well, they’d be going through it if we weren’t here,” I whispered.
“It’s either us or them,” Andie said, meaning our sophomore friends.
Now the Miller twins were standing on either side of us. “Good morning,” Paula said, sporting a new pair of jeans and a pink shirt. Kayla had opted for a slim-fitting outfit in more neutral colors.
“Hey,” I said.
Andie smiled. “We’ve run into a slight snag.”
The twins leaned in for the details, and while Andie explained things, I pushed my baseball cap down hard on my head. Wearing a hat worked quite well these days; it smashed down the kinks in my hair.
Kayla must have noticed. “How goes the war?” she asked, eyeing my head.
I ignored the lame comment.
Paula, however, was a bit more sympathetic. “The tomboy look is very in, you know.”
“Perfect,” I cooed back.
But Andie had the jitters. She wanted to discuss our next move, so I paved the way for her to talk. “What about the seniors at our church . . . remember? Shouldn’t we talk to them about initiation?”
“Haven’t decided yet,” Andie said. “Maybe if enough of us got together it would help. How many churchgoing freshmen do we know in this school, anyway?”
We listed the Christian kids from our church—Jared, Amy-Liz, Billy, Shauna, Joy, Andie, and me. Seven of us.
“Well, that’s a good start,” Andie said. “But we have to get going on this, because tomorrow’s our class meeting.”
“You’re right,” Kayla said, blinking her made-up eyes. “I’ve been hearing that Jeff Kinney’s making some pretty impressive promises.”
“Yeah, we heard,” I said glumly.
“So what’ll we do?” Andie asked.
“Let’s try and have lunch with some seniors today,” I suggested. “You know, just casually—get to know them.”
“Cool,” Andie said.
“We’ll help spread the word,” Paula said.
Spreading the word would be a relatively easy chore since the high school was reflective of our ski village. Small. There were only about three hundred students total—counting freshmen.
The bell rang. Andie, Paula, and Kayla sped off to their individual homerooms. I hurried to Room 202, hoping
my newly attained bond with Andie would not dissolve in a brush with senioritis.
In homeroom I sat through announcements. My ears perked up when Mr. Irving began talking about freshman initiation. He called it Freshman Frenzy.
I groaned.
“Several students have already been caught—upperclassmen, of course—for stealing clothes during PE.” He smiled with kind, sympathetic eyes. “I thought it was wise to warn all of you—not to alarm anyone. Just be on the lookout.”
I raised my hand. “What sort of initiation stunts should we watch for?”
He held his finger near his mouth. “Every year there are cases of books missing, kids being locked inside lockers, salt replaced for sugar in the cafeteria—things like that. Last year, however, someone nearly drowned when a dunking stunt got out of hand. We certainly don’t want any of our freshmen to feel endangered.” He paused, looking more serious now. “However, this sort of thing is usually done by mid-September, so be especially on the lookout during the next two weeks.”
Once announcements were over, I was torn between answering Sean’s letter and rewriting Andie’s campaign speech. I sighed and stared out the window, feeling concern for Andie. The odds were stacked against her. I couldn’t imagine any senior jumping on board with our idea. Shoot, if I were a senior, would I let initiation slip through my fingers?
It was impossible to jump ahead three years into the future and know for sure what I’d be thinking. Three years from now . . . let’s see. I’d be starting my senior year, still getting top grades, hopefully, and being a person who would be willing to listen to a lowly freshman. And Sean? Would he still be in my life— writing great letters, maybe arranging to fly out and ski some weekends?
“Holly Meredith.” Mr. Irving was calling my name. I jerked to attention. “Uh . . . yes?”
“The principal would like to see you.” He came down the row to my desk. “You’re not in trouble,” he assured me.
I knew that. People know when they’re in trouble. I hoped no one was sick at home or anything. Quickly, I grabbed my backpack.
The office was not as crowded as I expected. Instead, it was populated by two secretaries and a couple of kids waiting to see the counselor.
I was talking to one of the secretaries when Mr. Crane came out of his private office. “You must be Holly Meredith.” He extended his hand.
“Yes . . . hello.” I shook his hand, feeling a little strange about this formality.
He led me into his office and pulled out a chair. I sat down, wondering what this was all about. Mr. Crane, my new principal, sat behind his wide desk. Then he leaned forward and folded his hands. “One of our student editors, Marcia Greene, has been telling me about you and your terrific writing,” he began. “And it occurred to me that perhaps you’d be interested in befriending another writer—a new student. We’ve taken her under our collective wing, so to speak, mainly because she happens to be handicapped . . . blind.”
I couldn’t get a handle on any of this. Why was he talking to me?
Finally he made himself clear. “Marcia thinks you are a good choice for a part-time student aide for Tina Frazer.” I listened intently.
“Tina has a high academic rating and is being mainstreamed into regular classes as a four-week experiment. Are you interested in an assigned friendship?” He chuckled somewhat nervously.
A high academic rating . . . an assigned friendship. The whole thing sounded too impersonal. I remembered the pixie-haired girl I’d seen in the cafeteria. She’d seemed lonely; no one had talked to her that first day. “Does Tina know about the experiment?’ I asked.
“As a matter of fact, she volunteered for it.”
Now I was more interested, knowing that she wasn’t an unknowing guinea pig. “Did she attend the School for the Deaf and the Blind?” I asked.
“She’s always been one of their top students,” he explained. “But the school is becoming overcrowded as more handicapped students move here from Denver. Parents are concerned about big-city crime; they want to live in a quieter, less hectic place.”
Dressel Hills was the ticket—an ideal place for families. I could see why parents would choose to live here.
I was definitely interested in volunteering to be Tina’s aide, but I wondered how tending to a blind student’s needs would fit into my campaign plans with Andie.
Mr. Crane sensed my hesitation. “Think about it for a couple of days. In the meantime, Marcia will be assisting Tina.”
I wondered why Marcia couldn’t continue; then I remembered. She had more responsibility than ever, being on the student staff of the school paper.
I thanked the principal for thinking of me and headed back down the hall. That’s when I spotted Tina Frazer and her wonderful dog. The two of them were waiting outside the nurse’s office. Alone. Marcia Greene was nowhere in sight.
Not wanting to startle the girl, I scuffed my shoes across the floor as I approached her. “You’re Tina, aren’t you?”
She smiled. “That’s right.”
“My name is Holly Meredith. I’m glad to meet you.”
Tina held out her hand and I shook it. “Thanks, it’s nice to talk with someone who’s not afraid to strike up a conversation.”
I gazed at her beautiful guide dog. “What a gorgeous dog you have.”
She nodded. “Everyone thinks so. Her name is Taffy and she adores people.”
“I can see that.” Then I realized what I’d said—about seeing— and instantly felt stupid.
The nurse opened the door and Tina turned to me. “I hope I’ll see you again, Holly.”
“Same here,” I said, trying to deal with her usage of “see.”
My walk back to homeroom was more leisurely than my wild pace had been minutes before—prior to meeting Tina. What a delightful person. I couldn’t get over how outgoing she was. I guess I’d mistakenly pegged blind people as being shy and withdrawn. But Tina was very friendly. And that guide dog of hers—Taffy—what an amazing animal.
By the time I set foot in Mr. Irving’s homeroom, I’d almost forgotten the problems Andie faced with her election campaign. Almost, but not entirely.
Lunch hour held the key.
FRESHMAN FRENZY
Chapter 13
The weather had turned warm by noon. As warm as any Indian summer I’d experienced this close to the Rocky Mountains. I suggested to Andie that we have our meeting with the seniors outside, but she had other ideas.
“We need to meet them on their own turf,” she insisted.
“Are you sure?” I pleaded. “It feels like summer again.”
“Relax, Holly. Let’s do it my way for a change.” There was an icy edge to her words.
Jared and Amy-Liz showed up. Together, naturally. But it was still weird adjusting to them as a couple.
Billy, Shauna, and Joy came into the cafeteria a few seconds later. Paula and Kayla seemed to want to hang around and be involved, too. Even though they had nothing at stake in this, Andie decided they should stay. “For moral support,” she said. That was the first blow to my ego, and I should’ve seen what was coming.
Andie worked her charm with two senior boys from our church. They didn’t care either way about curbing initiation. They just seemed jazzed to be seniors. Who wouldn’t?
After they left, Andie and the rest of us headed across the cafeteria—to the back, where the windows offered a panoramic view. Zye Greene and a whole group of seniors sat waiting, most of them drinking soda from cans. Guess it wasn’t cool for seniors to eat lunch—at least not in the presence of freshmen. Anyway, the upbeat aspect of things quickly dissolved.
Zye sat there like King Tut. His lips curled into a disdainful sneer. “Look . . . uh, Andrea, is it?”
Andie’s face reddened but not from embarrassment. She was mad. “C’mon, you know who I am.”
Hang in there, Andie, I thought.
Zye leaned back in his chair and cracked his knuckles. “I think I’m beginning to see who y
ou are.” His fingers drummed the table impatiently.
Andie stood firm. “As you know, we were supposed to be in junior high this year.” She glanced at all of us. “So if you really want to be cool about things, you’d realize that fairness is in order here. And you seniors are the ones to get the ball rolling.”
Wow, was she bold!
I thought by the way Zye was unbuttoning his top shirt button that maybe he was getting hot under the collar. Andie, after all, was coming across like a pro.
“Fairness has never been a consideration in the past.” Zye stood up. He reminded me of an Elvis impersonator with his black pants and boots and that leather bomber jacket.
“So are you saying there’s no room to negotiate?” I heard Andie say.
“You’re hearing it right, girl.” Zye cracked his knuckles again.
“Well, that’s really a shame,” Andie said. “I can see we’re not dealing with typical seniors here—seniors with class.”
I thought she was pushing it and tugged on the back of her shirt. “Forget it,” I whispered.
Another guy stood up. “Hey, you’ve got a lot of gall, talking that way. Don’tcha have no respect?”
Zye clicked his fingers and the other kid sat down. “This conversation’s done. We’re outta here,” he said.
Good riddance, I thought. Not only was the guy an arrogant jerk, his friend needed grammar lessons.
“We tried,” Andie said when it was over. And there we sat, a bunch of whipped freshmen, too baffled to move. Zye and his entourage had exited loudly to the sitting area outside.
I stared out the huge cafeteria window at the students outside. Some of the senior girls were sunning themselves on the flagstone walkway. Others stood around talking and laughing with guys.
Zye sauntered around while sharing his soda with a blond cheerleader. Then I noticed a familiar figure approach him. Medium height, mousy brown hair . . .
I studied him. Then I called to Andie. “Hey, look who’s hanging out with Zye.” I pulled her over to the window.
“You’re kidding,” she whispered. “I thought Ryan Davis was history.”
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