Twenty years later, I went alone to the house that was no longer Amy’s. The bag was gone. No doubt some unknowing landscaper had swept it away.
Wendy Mass
THE STORY
STORIES UNDER STONES
Refresh . . . refresh . . . refresh . . . refresh . . .
Mom stands behind me as I hit the Enter key repeatedly. I’ve been hitting it pretty much nonstop since nine this morning, and it’s almost noon.
“Abby, you’re going to break the keyboard if you keep beating up on it like that,” Mom says gently. She knows I’m nervous. I’ve waited all summer to find out which of my friends I’ll be in class with this year. The lists are supposed to be posted on the school’s website today. I don’t have a big group of friends like some kids. I’ve heard Mom tell other moms that I’m still “coming into myself,” whatever that means. I don’t even care which teacher I get. There are only four fifth-grade classes, so I’m bound to have at least a few friends in my class; the question is who. I’m hoping it’s Suzy and Samantha, but I’ll be happy if it’s Maya or Kimmy. Or even any of the girls from last year’s Girl Scout troop or my dance class.
Refresh . . . refresh . . . refresh . . . hurrah!
It’s up! The list is up! My heart is already thumping fast and now it starts to pound against my chest. Mom leans over as I scroll down the page. Ms. Smithy’s class is first. I scan the alphabetical list of names. Since my last name starts with a B, I quickly see that mine isn’t there. Samantha’s is, though. And Kimmy’s. Next is Mr. Parlo’s class. Maya, Janie from Girl Scouts, and Brin from tap lessons. Not me. Next is Mrs. Kaine. Four girls from Girl Scouts, and Suzy. Plus Alexis and Becca from my class last year, who I was just starting to know! I’m beginning to panic. I can’t think of any more friends! Mom puts her hand on my shoulder as I scroll down to the last class. Ms. Lions. There I am. My eyes dart through the rest of the list, but they soon get too clouded with tears to see straight. I push the chair away from the computer and stand up. Mom moves to hug me, but I just stand there.
“It can’t be that bad,” Mom says. “I’m sure you know some nice kids in there. And Ms. Lions is supposed to be wonderful.”
“I know their names,” I tell her through my tears. “But they’re not my friends. Who am I even going to sit with at lunch? Can you call the school and ask them to change my class?”
She frowns. “You know I can’t do that. They only let you request a change for a really good reason. Like your teacher is your aunt. Or you need to be kept away from a particular child in the class. You’ve never had any problems with any of the kids, have you?”
I search my brain to come up with something. “Jimmy Henkins broke my crayon in first grade and lied about it, and I got in trouble. Is that good enough?”
She sighs and strokes my hair. “I’m afraid not, honey. I’m sure there’s someone in the class that you’ll click with. Let’s look at the list.”
I sulk my way back over to the computer. “Here,” Mom says, pointing to the name right below me on the list. “Madeline Bennett. She lives right around the corner, can’t be more than ten houses away. She must be on your bus, right?”
I shake my head. “One of her brothers drives her. He’s in high school.” How can I explain to my mom that Madeline Bennett isn’t an appropriate friend? She hangs around with high school kids, and we’re not even in middle school yet. And I heard one of her brothers paid her fifty cents to curse in front of this little first grader. I can’t tell Mom any of this, so I run upstairs instead. I don’t even bother to grab my phone, which my parents finally agreed to give me this summer. I don’t want to read my friends’ texts telling me how excited they are to be with so-and-so and what an awesome year it’s gonna be.
I have two more weeks before school starts, and I plan to spend it moping around and feeling sorry for myself. I make it two days doing exactly that before my mom knocks on the door and announces that we’re going to the Bennetts’ house so Madeline and I can “get to know each other.”
I stare at her. “But I don’t want to be friends with her. I told you that.”
“No, you didn’t,” she argues. “You only said she’s not on your bus.”
Well, I guess technically that’s true. “Please don’t make me do this. It’s going to be really weird. We’ve never even spoken to each other.”
“Eat your cereal and then I’ll walk you over. If it’s awful after two hours, text me and I’ll come get you.”
“Fine,” I grumble. “I guess I don’t have anything better to do.”
“That’s the spirit!” she says, hitting me playfully on the arm.
As soon as we arrive, Madeline grabs me by the arm and takes me to her room. We play a bunch of games, and she has a whole stash of candy hidden inside a toy cash register. When I ask her where all the candy came from, she says she stole it. Then she winks at me. My eyes widen.
I’m hooked.
Two hours come and go, and I don’t even think about texting Mom. I’m having too much fun. Madeline’s house is totally different from mine. Mine is quiet—it’s just Mom, Dad, me, and our cat, Hector. Dad’s the come-home-from-the-office-and-settle-in-to-read-and-relax type, and Hector is so old that he doesn’t move much from his little cat bed. Madeline’s house has different music blasting out of each room, along with two boys and two dogs running everywhere. Bright, colorful paintings and black-and-white photographs cover the walls; soft rugs dot the floors in every room. And everyone laughs a lot. Sure, we laugh at my house, but here everyone has these big booming laughs, even Madeline.
“I should probably go,” I finally say. We’d been exploring the brook behind her house for hours, pretending to be pirates hiding treasure. The slope was pretty steep, and the water was kind of high, but she said she was allowed to go down there. I’m not so sure I believed her, and her parents weren’t home to ask. I didn’t push it, though, because I really wanted to do it.
“I’ll walk you back,” she says, pulling two thorns out of the palm of her hand and sucking on the blood. This girl is fearless. Maybe some of it will rub off on me.
I discover that Madeline’s family always goes away to the beach the week before school, so I don’t see her again until I step into Ms. Lions’s class. On the whiteboard is a giant image of a lion in the jungle. Coming out of its mouth is a big speech bubble that says “Sit anywhere you like.”
I freeze. No teacher has let us choose our own seats before! Kids begin pouring into the room, and I start feeling that same dread I’d felt when I first saw the class list on the computer. I really, really, don’t know anyone. Kids are choosing seats left and right, and I’m still just standing, frozen.
Then Madeline flies in right as the bell rings, and I can breathe again. She grabs me and leads me to the last two desks in the back row, the only ones still empty. She tosses me a little Baggie filled with Every Flavor Jelly Beans, which we’re definitely not supposed to have in class. She has a matching bag. “To nosh on during the day,” she whispers and sticks hers deep into her empty desk. I quickly do the same.
Ms. Lions takes attendance, and when she reads our two names and we say, “Here,” and start giggling, she says, “Guess I’m going to have to keep an eye on you two,” which only makes us giggle more. An hour later I crack up when Madeline scrunches up her whole face and says, “Earwax flavor! Watch out for that one!” I’ve never known anyone like her.
One morning when Ms. Lions is busy writing on the board, Madeline passes me a note, folded up and taped around the edges. I stick my hands inside the desk to unwrap it. When I get it open, a long skinny key falls out! I glance up to make sure Ms. Lions didn’t hear it clatter, then I quickly read the note.
The music teacher lent me this key so I could use the music room during lunch to practice for the performance next week. After you finish eating today, get a bathroom pass and come join me.
<
br /> I have a plan. PS: When you’re finished reading this note, rip it up and eat it!
I slip the key back to her then rip up the note. Hopefully she was kidding about the eating-it part.
It takes longer than I’d hoped to get the bathroom pass at lunchtime, because only one girl and one boy can be gone at a time. When I finally make it down to the music room, Madeline is the only person there. I stand at the door and watch her play what looks like a giant violin turned upside down. She’s really getting into it, pushing the big bow back and forth across the strings with her whole body. I can’t say that it makes the world’s most pleasant noise, though, and I’m not exactly sorry when she sees me and lifts the bow off the strings.
“Yo!” she says. She closes the music book and stashes the bow in a narrow box on the floor. “So here’s the scoop. That key is, like, a skeleton key, which means it should work in any lock in the building. Haven’t you always wondered what was actually in the janitor’s closet?”
“Um . . . not really?”
She frowns. “Okay, bad example. What if it opened our own classroom door and we could steal next week’s math test! I know Ms. Lions copies them a week early and puts them in her bottom desk drawer.”
“Um, sure,” I say, my stomach twisting up a bit. I’m hoping she’s just talking but doesn’t really mean it. But then she says, “Cool, let’s go now!”
“Now?” I ask, my stomach twisting further. “Shouldn’t we plan it out a little more? Like, you know, watch the hallway for a while to make sure the coast is clear?”
“We can do that when we get up there.” Without waiting for an answer, she heads out of the room. I have no choice but to follow. We hurry up the stairs and peek around the corner. No one is in our wing of the hallway. “The coast is clear,” she whispers, sounding like a spy in a movie.
“There’s only five minutes till recess is over,” I whisper.
“Plenty of time,” Madeline says, pulling at the doorknob. It’s locked, as we knew it would be. The last person out of the room at lunchtime has the job of closing the door behind them, and it locks automatically. The teacher is the only one with the key. Glancing both ways again to make sure no one’s around, Madeline slips the key into the lock and twists. Nothing happens. She pulls the key out, pushes it back in, and turns again. Still nothing.
I let out the breath I didn’t realize I was holding. I’m relieved, but say only, “Oh well.”
Madeline gives one more good yank on the doorknob. “Okay. Plan B,” she says.
“There’s a Plan B?” I ask warily.
She nods. “Janitor’s closet.”
Plan B worked. I have a carton of industrial-size green sponges hidden under my bed to prove it.
I’d hoped Madeline’s dreams of breaking into our classroom had faded, but a week later she slips me another note:
When it’s time to leave for lunch, we need to be last in line. PS: Rip and eat.
This time I just crumple up the note. Then I think better of it and rip it into pieces. I may not be a master spy, but I know better than to leave written evidence.
When the bell rings for lunch, Madeline and I exchange a glance and take our time gathering our lunch bags. Soon it’s only the two of us left. Madeline waves me ahead, and then just before the door swings closed behind her, her hand darts out and wedges something in the doorjamb. The door still shuts.
“What is that?” I ask.
“A ruler,” she says. “It keeps the little lock thingy from going into the wall.”
I have to admit this is very clever. The door really looks fully closed. When we get to the cafeteria, Madeline gets her usual pass to the music room and I take the bathroom one. It’s a good thing the lunchroom aides change all the time or they’d start to think I have a bladder problem!
The door opens just like Madeline said it would. We slip inside, taking the ruler with us. Madeline runs over to the teacher’s desk and opens the bottom drawer. “It’s not here!” she says, frowning.
“Oh, well,” I say, trying to make my face look disappointed.
She shuts the drawer. “We can’t just leave without doing anything.”
I look around the room. “We can move people’s desks around,” I suggest. That seems pretty harmless.
“Nice!” Madeline says, and we get to work. I decide to move my own desk, too, since it would look obvious if everyone else’s was moved but ours. Madeline suddenly stops and grabs her notebook from her own desk. “I have an even better idea,” she says. “Who do you think is the cutest boy in our class?”
At the same time we both answer, “Ashton!”
She rips out a blank page and writes:
Dear Ashton,
I think you’re really cute. Will you go out with me?
Your true love,
Emily
I put my hand over my mouth. Emily is the shyest girl in our class. I don’t think I’ve ever heard her speak unless Ms. Lions called on her. Madeline grabs a piece of tape off the teacher’s desk and tapes the note right on the back of Ashton’s chair!
We hurry out of the room, trying not to laugh. It’s a good thing there’s only fifteen more minutes of lunch left, because I’m too nervous and excited to eat. As we file into the classroom I prepare to look surprised. Turns out I don’t have to prepare anything! My jaw falls open when I step inside and see all of the desks are back exactly where they were! Before either of us can accuse the other of doing it, Ms. Lions says, “Madeline and Abby, you’re wanted in the principal’s office.” The class turns to look at us, and a few kids say, “Ooooo” and “You’re in trouble!”
So it turns out the hallways have cameras in them. We were spotted breaking into the classroom and the janitor’s closet. We both have to do chores around the school for the next month. I’m also grounded.
My mom says that Madeline is a bad influence, and maybe she’s right. Maybe (probably) I should have told her that sneaking around school wasn’t a good idea and that I didn’t really want to do it. But Madeline is the first best friend I’ve ever had. And even after the embarrassment of getting caught, I have to admit I miss the freedom and power that the key and the ruler gave us. What if I never have another partner in crime who needs me as much as I need her?
As soon as our punishments are lifted, I go over to her house again. Since our lives as mischief-makers are over, we decide to write a short story instead about two girls who become superfamous spies and live lives of romance and excitement as they travel the globe. We print it out and then burn it. We put the ashes in a sandwich Baggie and bury it under a flat stone in front of Madeline’s house. We promise each other we’ll come back as grown-ups and dig it up and remember the crazy things we did together in fifth grade. Maybe by that time there will be a burned-up story hidden under each stone on the path.
I hope so.
Jacqueline West
WHAT REALLY HAPPENED
THE EDIBLE LIE DETECTOR
There’s a line between pretending and lying.
Growing up, I wasn’t always sure where that line was. It seemed to be a pretty blurry, wavery line, anyway. I drifted over it several times a day. Usually I drifted inside my own head, where the things I pretended most intently had turned into things I truly believed—like that I was due to unearth a triceratops skeleton in our backyard sandbox any day now, or that our laundry chute was a passage to Wonderland, or that the food in our fridge came to life every time we closed the door.
I was happy in my pretend world. But because I also lived in the real world, surrounded by real family and real classmates and real teachers, the line between pretending and lying eventually drifted out of my head into reality.
One morning in third grade, as Miss Miller wrote on the blackboard, I decided to pretend I was falling asleep.
I’d practiced this often—sometimes I was Sleeping Be
auty with the spindle; sometimes I was in the field of poppies in The Wizard of Oz—so I knew just what to do. I let my eyelids slide shut and my head droop onto my arms, and made my breathing slow. In a few seconds, I almost believed I was asleep.
“Jacqui?” I heard Miss Miller say. “Jacqui?”
I didn’t move. The classroom grew quiet.
Miss Miller’s footsteps tapped closer to my desk. “Jacqui, it’s time to wake up.”
I waited until Miss Miller gave my shoulder a gentle shake. Then I raised my head, blinking groggily, pretending—or maybe believing—I’d just remembered where I was. There were giggles all around.
“Well, that’s the first time a student has fallen asleep on me!” said Miss Miller, laughing too. “Now, back to state capitals . . .”
As class resumed, I sat at my desk, a sparkling thrill racing through me. It had worked. I’d made Miss Miller stop teaching. I’d made the room go silent. I’d made believe I was asleep, and I’d made everyone else believe it, too.
The power! The possibilities!
A few weeks later, I raised the stakes.
It was the chilly midwinter. We bundled up for recess, keeping warm by playing tag on the hard-packed playground snow. Conditions were perfect for my next act.
I’d never broken a bone, but I thought it looked extremely exciting. People in books were always using crutches—Clara from Heidi, Tiny Tim, Pollyanna—and I’d spent hours hobbling around with two croquet mallets under my arms, wishing for crutches of my own. So, the next time someone yelled “Go!” I took off, let my boots skid, and flopped over into the snow.
“My ankle . . . ,” I whimpered from the icy drifts. “. . . I can’t move it.”
My classmates rushed off to get the playground monitors, and I lay there, watching puffs of breath freeze on my hair. I should have been freezing, too, but it was surprisingly easy to keep still. In fact, the longer I waited, the more certain I was that a throbbing pain had settled in my right ankle. Soon I couldn’t have climbed out of the snow if a herd of velociraptors was barreling toward me.
Been There, Done That Page 5