Black and White and Gray All Over

by Rachel Wise

  “What? Me?” I nearly choked on my Frappuccino. The last word I’d even use to describe myself would be “perfect.”

  “Yes, you, Sam Martone!” Kate said, smiling. “According to Michael Lawrence, anyway.”

  “Oh, stop. No way,” I said. “I drive him crazy.” But I was tingling inside.

  “You certainly do, but not in the way you mean.” She laughed. “He’s always scolding me. ‘That’s not the way Sam does this,’ or ‘Sam always gets the quotes right the first time,’ or ‘One time Sam said . . .’ and on and on. Oh, my word! If I didn’t feel secure in myself and my writing, I’d just about drop to the floor in a heap, listening to him natter on about you!” She laughed again, shaking her head.

  “Ha-ha,” I tittered nervously. Was this for real?

  “Yes, it’s been very difficult for me to step into the Martone shoes in the famous Martone/Lawrence team. Like being an understudy. An insufficient one at best. I can’t wait until it’s over. I wish Mr. Trigg had never asked me to do it. It’s just not playing to my strengths.”

  I was so overjoyed at the compliments she was passing along that I could hardly participate in the conversation, but I made a huge effort and asked, “What are your strengths?”

  “Oh, I love writing about fashion and pop culture. And my actual writing is pretty great, if I do say so myself.”

  I had to smile, thinking of what I’d said to Hailey about my own writing, just a week earlier. But I didn’t see this as a brag. When a reporter dissects her own skills like this, she’s probably giving herself a pretty fair evaluation.

  “Wow. So you should be writing the school uniforms piece and I should be writing the year-round-school article. Is that right?” I joked.

  But Kate was dead serious. “Yes. Though I would write the uniform article as a fashion piece with lots of photos of kids in uniforms and how they accessorize them to look great. We could have tons of photos from that guy . . . . What’s his name? The friend of Michael’s?”

  “Jeff Perry?” I said. It was funny she didn’t even know Michael’s best friend’s name. She and Michael couldn’t be spending much time together if she didn’t know that, at least.

  “Yes! He would make a fabulous fashion photographer.”

  I giggled, picturing Jeff Perry hanging out with a bunch of models, or even a gaggle of pretty girls. He’d eat it up! I was feeling better by the minute about all of this. But I didn’t want to get too relaxed in case she had her eye on Michael for the future.

  “So do you think Michael’s cute?” I asked.

  She paused, thoughtful. “Well, I wouldn’t even bother to think about it, seeing as how he’s so smitten with you. But since you ask, I do have a sort of boyfriend back home and—no offense—but he’s more my type. I really like blond guys. Athletic . . . not so much, you know? More the poet type.”

  I laughed out loud and Kate blushed. “Is that just gross to you?” she asked. “Am I totally off the American girl’s taste?”

  “Oh my gosh, sorry. No! Not at all. I just . . . Oh, I guess I’m relieved . . . .” I couldn’t believe I’d admitted it to her, but she’d been so honest, so open and forthright with me all along, I could see now that I owed her the same. Because suddenly I knew Kate Bigley and I were going to be very good friends for a very long time (even if I ended up having to join Buddybook to stay in touch with her). And since that was the case, it was time to come clean with her. “See, here’s the thing . . . ,” I said. And as we sat on our uncomfortable bar stools at the Starbucks in the mall, I told her the whole story about Michael.

  Chapter 10

  NUCLEAR WINTER THAWS AS TALKS CONTINUE

  Kate and I spent a really fun afternoon together, never running out of things to talk about. She loved the Michael Lawrence crush story, even the Pasty part, and she was mortified at her role in separating me from my one true love. She even offered to step down from the article so I could finish it with Michael, but there was no way I’d take her up on that. First of all, it would look bad for her, and second of all, there was no way I was taking on all that work at this late stage in the issue! She swore he only talked about me, and she wanted to talk about ways to get us together. I laughed because that’s what Hailey is always trying to do, too.

  At the bookstore Kate introduced me to the work of John Green, which she said is amazing, and I told her about Lauren Myracle, whose books I really like. We both loved the Dork Diaries and had read all the books in the series, and we went over all the recent bestsellers and said what we thought of the ones we’d read. I could spend all day in the bookstore, the same way my mom could spend all day in the hardware store. I guess it’s all about being surrounded by what excites you and shows you the most possibility.

  Kate told me all about the dinner with her parents and their friends the night before. She also told me about a bestselling author of adult books who we both like to read when our parents aren’t looking, and how the woman has nine children and writes for a week straight sometimes, having her meals delivered and showering in her office bathroom.

  I told Kate how I really want to be a journalist when I grow up and travel to scary places to uncover the truth.

  “I have no doubt you will do that, Sam,” said Kate, and it felt great hearing it from her.

  When it was time to go meet our moms, we didn’t want to leave, but we both were tired and had a lot of work to do at home. We hugged before we got into our cars and made a plan to do the same thing next week, maybe meeting Jenna and Hailey for lunch or a movie too. I was so excited to have made a new friend who shares so many of my interests, and I told my mom all about her and our day as we drove home.

  “Did you know she’s moved three times in the last four years?” I said. “And all her friends are back at the original place! But she still is in touch with all of them almost every day. Wow. I can’t imagine how hard that is,” I said, shaking my head in wonder.

  My mother looked at me in the rearview mirror. “You know how much I hate to say ‘I told you so,’ right?” she said with a smile.

  “Right.” I nodded. “So I’ll say it for you: You told me so.”

  “Thanks,” said my mom. And she turned up the radio and started singing along.

  Sunday morning I got up early and began pulling together all my uniform pieces and facts and figures. Hailey called in a tally of 567 for uniforms and 129 against them. We were really shocked.

  I started writing at about ten o’clock, and by twelve I had a ten-page article that I really was starting to like. I stopped for lunch and then went back and edited it down to eight pages. I cut and pasted a few photos from the school uniform company’s Website—a couple of funny vintage ones and a few current ones. They might want to run them with the article, so I’d gotten permission from the marketing director at the company in advance. I tacked the permission on to the article so the managing editor would have it on file if it ever came up. I took one last read though and then I decided to e-mail it to Kate for a fresh pair of eyes. First I IM’d her to see if she was there and willing to read it, and she was, both.

  I sent it and then waited. I always hate that part, waiting for feedback. To distract myself, I did my homework (there wasn’t much this weekend, thank goodness), and then I pulled up the Dear Know-It-All response to smooth that out.

  But that just wasn’t coming. I couldn’t decide how to order the information and how to make it gender neutral. Like, should all the activity ideas be gender neutral (“Play Words with Pals”), which could get kind of boring, or should I separate the idea lists into one for girls and one for boys (like “Play paintball” and “Give each other mani-pedis”)? This was obviously pretty sticky business and I’d really need Trigger’s advice on it. I don’t like sending things to an editor when they’re not the very best I think they can be. But in this case, I really needed my editor’s help, and since no one else but my mom knows I write this column, it would have to be Trigger.

  I wrote up a little cov
er e-mail and attached my response. I was now ruining the surprise that I’d written a blockbuster, but at least he could start mentally mapping out the layout, now that he knew I’d be submitting a really long column for this issue.

  Meanwhile, I had heard back from Kate!

  Eagerly, I read her e-mail and looked for suggestions I could incorporate in any way, shape, or form. But I quickly saw she hadn’t given me any notes. She wrote that it was “divine” and she gave many specific examples of things she’d liked and even loved, so I knew for sure she’d read it. But there was no constructive criticism to be found.

  I wrote back. “Don’t be shy, Kate. Any mistakes? Anything you’d change? Hate any parts? What’s the most boring section, where your eyes truly glazed over?”

  And then the phone rang. It was Kate. “I had to call. Honestly, it’s flawless. I loved every inch of it, and I think you’re a genius. I’m not just saying it. I swear!” Hmm. Nuclear Winter Thaws as Talks Continue.

  “Well . . . okay, I guess . . . ,” I said skeptically. There had to be at least one typo. The odds were about a billion to one that there wasn’t!

  After we hung up, I sat and stared at my screen for a while. I couldn’t swamp Trigger with my own insecurity, asking him to review everything I was working on. I had my reputation to maintain, after all. Hailey would be absolutely no help, and I felt too lazy to walk downstairs and ask my mom to read it.

  Let’s face it. There was only one person I wanted to hear from.

  I typed up an e-mail apologizing for bothering him, and then I attached the document and hit send. I drummed my fingers on the table for a full five minutes while I waited for any sort of a reply. Then I gave up and went downstairs for a snack.

  Since I was finished with my homework and in limbo on my articles, I settled in for an episode of Star Dancing with my mom and Allie and got totally sucked in. It was the perfect Sunday late-afternoon distraction.

  When it was over, my mom stood up and stretched and went to get dinner going, while I hoped against hope that Michael had replied. I made myself climb the stairs slowly, cross my room slowly, lifted my screen slowly . . . and he had replied!

  I sat on the edge of my seat and opened his e-mail. Which was long. Very long.

  I began to read his comments and realized he had gone line by line to edit my article. Besides finding a bunch of typos and wrong word choices, as well as punctuation errors, Michael found an inconsistency I’d have to re-fact-check with the marketing company, a discrepancy in the wording of the Bill Clinton quote (having checked it against another source), and I’d carelessly said, “So we can see why Mr. Pfeiffer is for uniforms . . .” when I meant to say “against.”

  After I’d finished what Michael had written, I felt whipped. He had torn me apart and I hadn’t been expecting it, especially after the lovefest with Kate earlier. Slowly, I began to get mad. I shut my computer and went down to dinner, where I barked at my mom, froze out Allie, and generally behaved badly (according to my mother). But when I explained what had made me so cranky, they took Michael’s side!

  “Sammy, you asked the guy for a critique! You solicited the criticism!” said Allie.

  “Well, so? He didn’t have to be so . . . thorough!” I said, knowing it sounded dumb and spoiled even as the words left my mouth.

  Allie rolled her eyes. “What, you want him to skip over errors just so you don’t get mad at him?”

  “No,” I said, cutting my chicken. “But he didn’t have to be so nitpicky.”

  “Oh, please!”

  My mother watched us, amused.

  “I’m glad you think it’s funny!” I said finally.

  “I do!” she said. “Here you have some really constructive help from a very close friend and writing partner, whom you greatly respect, who has taken a large chunk out of his own work time to slave over every word you’ve written to make it absolutely as perfect as can be. And you’re mad at him! You two are really too much!” she said, shaking her head and laughing.

  “Well,” I huffed. “If you put it that way.” And I finished my dinner, cleared my plate, and went upstairs to call Michael.

  My fingers shook as I dialed the number (I know it by heart, of course), and luckily it was Michael himself who picked up on the second ring.

  “Pasty!” he said happily.

  “Michael,” I said.

  “Uh-oh,” said Michael. “No Mikey? What have I done?”

  “First of all, thank you for reading and . . . uh . . . fixing my article. I’m sure it will be greatly improved now that it has been under your eagle eye.”

  “Oh, so I was too aggressive, was I?” he asked, catching right on.

  “Well, you certainly left no stone unturned,” I agreed.

  He sighed. “Listen, Paste. It’s a great article. If no one had looked at it and you’d sent it in, I’m sure it would have been just fine. I just can’t bear to see you, of all people, submit something that’s less than perfect. It’s just not right.”

  “Well, Kate read it and she thought it was perfect. She even used that word. Perfect!” I said indignantly.

  Michael sighed loudly. “I’m not surprised,” he said.

  “What is that supposed to mean?” I asked haughtily.

  Michael sighed again and then said, “Sam, Kate is not a journalist. I’m not quite sure what she is, but she is definitely not a journalist. She doesn’t like research. She doesn’t like . . .”

  “Notes,” I offered.

  “Right. Or, frankly, even facts. She doesn’t like doing any of the hard work. She really just likes to write!” he said.

  I giggled. “I know. She was really hoping for a fashion column. And instead she got the lead article with the meanest taskmaster in the school as her writing partner!”

  “What?” Now Michael was the indignant one. “That’s not fair! And it’s not true! I’m not mean.”

  “No, I’m just teasing. She didn’t say you were mean. But she did say it’s hard work and very different from her paper back home.”

  “I know. I know. She tells me that all the time.”

  We were silent for a moment.

  “So it needed that much work, huh? My little uniform article?”

  “Little? That sucker was eight pages long!” cried Michael.

  I grinned. “I know. I wrote it.”

  “Well, it wasn’t up to your usual quality. That’s all. And I hate to see your byline on something inferior to what you’re capable of. You don’t have to fix anything I said if you don’t want to, obviously. It’s a free country.”

  “Nah, I’ll fix it. It’s just annoying. You’re right as usual.”

  “No, you’re the one who’s usually right around here,” he teased.

  “Oh, good thing I just got that on tape. I’ve been recording this whole conversation, in fact. I might just play it for one Kate Bigley . . . ,” I joked.

  “You’d better not, Pasty! I’ll get you!” Michael said, laughing.

  “Well, I’d better go. I’ve got tons of work to do on my article,” I said.

  “Hey, Paste? Thanks for asking me. Seriously. I was glad.”

  “Yeah. Anytime,” I said. And we hung up, smiling. Both of us, I’m sure of it.

  Chapter 11

  JOURNALIST STRUCK BY CUPID’S ARROW DIES OF LOVE IN HALL

  Mr. Trigg got back to me late Sunday night. He’d been at a World War II conference (his favorite topic) in Normandy, Michigan (for real), and he’d had no Wi-Fi on his flight to reply sooner.

  But the gist of what he said was, This is way too long of a reply to this lame letter.

  Why was everyone suddenly so down on my writing? I wondered. Defeated Journalist Gets Kicked While Down.

  It didn’t seem fair. But I made a mental note to stop by his office and catch him that day. It would be more efficient than a lot of e-mailing back and forth this close to deadline.

  At school I ran into Kate and almost told her how Michael had ripped apart the articl
e she had thought was “perfect,” but I couldn’t think of how to phrase it without making both of them look like jerks, so I just kept it to myself. I had lunch with Hailey, who had so loved her outdoor watercolor class on Saturday that she was planning another for this weekend, all with an eye toward doing an art show or even making a series of gift cards that she could sell to make money.

  It was Michael whom I was most pleased to see, on my way to the news office. He walked me there, asking why I was going, and I made up some story about running something by Trigger before I sent the uniform article in to Susannah for editing.

  We stopped just outside the newsroom, since Michael was on his way somewhere else. It felt good to be with him again, and I was glad the air was cleared about Kate, even though he’d never known it wasn’t clear. But there was one nagging detail that was still bugging me. I had to know.

  “So, Mikey, one question: Why didn’t you tell me that you were having a hard time working with Kate?” I asked, shocked at my own nerve for asking and semidreading the answer.

  Michael bit his lip, and his eyebrows knit together as he searched for the right words. “I guess . . . At first it was because I was giving her the benefit of the doubt. I just thought, you know, I couldn’t presume to judge her, and if the shoe were on the other foot, I’d want to be given a fair chance to prove myself. Then, after a bit, I decided maybe there were cultural differences in the way we report things in our two countries. And finally I just decided she had no interest in doing the hard work. Which is fine, but I would have rather known sooner, so I could do it myself before the eleventh hour.” He looked at me. “I guess I’ve gotten spoiled working with you, Pasty. You carry more than your fair share of the load.”

  “Whatever,” I said, embarrassed again.

  He was quiet for an extra second. “And really, most of all, I just didn’t want you to think I couldn’t do it without you, that I couldn’t handle it.”