Truth Game

by Anna Staniszewski

  “Um, actually,” I say slowly, “I think it’s a great idea.”

  Mom’s eyes widen. “You do?”

  “You’re right about Mr. Hammond’s house. There’s tons of room for all three of us.”

  “Really?” Mom practically squeals. “I’m so glad you’re okay with the idea. I’ll talk to Robert about a time frame and let you know, okay?” She reaches out and gives my arm a squeeze. “You really are growing up.”

  And even though the whole idea of packing up our house and moving in with my former vice principal is making my armpits slick with sweat, I can’t help smiling back at her.

  Chapter 16

  This time when I go into the Town Center Inn, I feel prepared. Not only did I practice what I was going to say to Chip, but I also have a note attached to my plate of pastries. I went ahead and made the religieuse (after I looked up how to pronounce it) which is basically a cream puff with some chocolate layered in. It came out perfect.

  I see the same guy with the twirled mustache at the front desk, and I start to wonder if anyone else works here.

  “Hello there!” he says. “How can I help you?”

  “Hi, I, um, dropped off some macaroons for Mr. Ackerson the other day, but I’m not sure he got them. And if he did, I don’t know if he knew they were from me, so I brought something else for him. Um, so is he here?”

  “Sorry! I can leave a message for him.”

  “Do you know if he liked the pastries I brought last time?”

  The man gives me a blank look. “I’m sorry. I don’t remember.”

  That makes me twice as nervous to leave the pastries. What if the man ate them? Or what if he forgot about them and never even gave them to Chip?

  “Can’t you tell me which room he’s in so I can leave them outside his door?”

  “No can do!” he says. “I’m happy to take them though.”

  Is it my imagination, or does he sound a little too eager to take them off my hands? “Never mind, I’ll come back later,” I say.

  The man looks a tiny bit disappointed. “Okay.”

  I head toward the door, my heart pounding. I can’t strike out again, but if I leave the pastries with this guy, there’s no telling if Chip will actually get them. I lurk in the lobby for a minute, trying to decide what to do. Somehow Marisol roped me into being a production assistant for Andrew’s documentary on school lunches, so I’m supposed to be at the school right now, but I feel like I can’t leave here unless I’ve done something to reach out to Chip.

  Then the phone at the front desk rings, and the man answers it. He listens for a minute, his face growing serious, and then he says, “I’ll be right there with a fresh towel!”

  He rushes over to a small office I hadn’t noticed before and asks someone to watch the front desk for a second before he disappears down the hall. A woman who looks like she’s definitely someone’s grandmother goes over to stand behind the front desk. Maybe I’ll have better luck with her.

  “Hi, dear,” she says when I go over. “How can I help you?”

  “I really need your help,” I say, trying a different approach this time. “I baked these pastries as a thank-you to one of your guests. He’s not here right now, but I really want to leave them in front of his door so he’ll be sure to get them.”

  “We can keep them up here at the desk for him,” she says.

  “I know, but I’d feel a lot better if they were delivered right to his room,” I say. “I’m afraid someone will eat them or something.”

  She laughs. “My son does have a soft spot for sweets,” she says. “If you leave them lying around, there’s a chance he won’t be able to help himself.”

  I knew it! The guy with the mustache must be her son, and he gobbled up my macaroons! “Please, can you put the pastries in his room for him? It’s really, really important that he gets them. Please?”

  I must sound as desperate as I feel because the woman finally nods and asks me for the last name. “Oh, he’s one of the convention guests,” she says as she looks up Chip’s room number. I don’t know what she’s talking about, but all I care about is that my plan is actually working. “Okay, come with me.”

  I expect her to lead us to some kind of huge suite away from the other rooms, but Room 22 is about halfway down a hallway of rooms that seem like they’re all the same. Chip must really be trying to fly under the radar so that people don’t try to stalk him.

  The woman knocks on the door, and when there’s no answer, she unlocks it and takes the pastries from me. “Did you leave a note so he knows who they’re from?”

  “I did!” I say. I agonized over what to write for hours, but I finally settled on: “I hope these pastries give you a taste of what I’d bring to your show. Please give me another chance!” Then I’d left my name and contact info.

  I watch the woman leave the plate on the nightstand and then I try to get a peek into the rest of the room, but she quickly closes the door again. “There,” she says. “He’s guaranteed to get them.”

  “Thank you!” I say, tempted to hug her. Instead, I hurry down the hallway and get to the lobby just as the man at the front desk resumes his spot.

  “Can I help you?” he asks, as if he’s never met me before.

  “Nope! I was just leaving!” I chirp. Then I hurry out the door, my body pulsing with excitement. I did it! Now all I have to do is wait.

  • • •

  “You kissed Evan more than twenty-four hours ago, and you’re only telling me about this now?” Marisol screeches.

  “Sorry!” I say. “It’s practically the first time I’ve seen you since it happened.”

  “Quiet on the set!” Andrew calls from the other side of the hedges. It turns out “making a documentary” means Andrew spending all afternoon lurking outside the school trying to ask the lunch ladies “hard-hitting” questions about meat loaf and filming them through the windows cooking tomorrow’s lunch, while Marisol and I hide out behind bushes in case he needs us to help him.

  “Plastic bag!” Andrew calls.

  I shoot Marisol a look. “I think it’s your turn this time,” I say.

  She sighs and trots over to remove the offensive plastic bag from the shot. Then she comes to hide next me again so as not to disturb Andrew’s view of the side door to the cafeteria. So far, only two lunch ladies have agreed to talk to him, and it was clear the last thing they wanted to talk about was the school’s food. “Why did you pick such a boring topic?” one of them even asked. “We’ve been making the same recipes for twenty years!” Andrew, however, doesn’t seem discouraged. He’s convinced there’s an interesting story here. I hope he’s right or else Marisol and I will have to sit through one seriously blah movie.

  “Okay. Your first kiss,” Marisol whispers. “Tell me everything.” For the first time since school started, I feel like I have her undivided attention.

  But as I tell her the story, her eyebrows draw closer and closer together. “Wait,” she says finally. “You kissed him during gym class? While you were both sweaty from dodgeball? And then you apologized?”

  It doesn’t sound all that great when she puts it like that. “But he said it was nice,” I say, and suddenly the doubts I had yesterday at his house start to creep in again.

  Marisol frowns. “He hasn’t tried kissing you since?”

  “Um, no. We haven’t had a chance.” But that’s not really true. We had plenty of chances at his house last night.

  “Maybe I did it wrong,” I say.

  Marisol gives me a sympathetic smile. “I’m sure it’s fine. He might have gotten a little spooked, that’s all. But if you kiss him again, then—”

  “Wait. I have to do it again? I thought it was his turn!”

  “It’s not like tag!” She laughs. “There aren’t turns or anything. You do it when it feels right.”

 
I hate how she makes it sound so easy. Seriously, did everyone get a manual on dating except me?

  Marisol goes back to scowling at her phone, probably filling out more stuff for Ms. Emerald. I guess that means our conversation is over.

  “How long are we supposed to crouch here?” I call over to Andrew. “My butt’s falling asleep.” Not to mention that the foul odors wafting out of the kitchen are making my stomach turn. It smells more like a chemistry lab than a kitchen. Pierre from the Cooking Club would be happy.

  “Only another hour or two!” Andrew calls from behind his camera as he perches outside one of the windows, straining to get a shot of something or other.

  I sigh and pull out my phone, thumbing through the Truth Game. I’d been so excited to enter in my bonus points for kissing Evan, but now they feel a little hollow. Still, I go ahead and put in my points for doing something to show my parents how I feel about them. Really I should get double the points since I’m going along with this whole moving idea and I’m going rock climbing with Dad. Sometimes I don’t even recognize myself anymore!

  Then, just for fun, I write in a part that describes Evan’s and my first kiss in the bonus section at the end. When I write it all out, I realize Marisol was right to be horrified. The part about my sweat dripping onto his lip is pretty gross. And I certainly never thought I’d have my first kiss while wearing my too-small sports bra! Okay, so it wasn’t perfect, but it counts. Still, I write “Not the kiss first I’d always imagined, but hopefully next time will be better” at the end and hit Submit.

  A little while later, Andrew finally releases us from our duties. He heads home to review his footage while I go back to Marisol’s house to wait for my mom to pick me up.

  Once we settle in on the porch, Marisol is on her phone again.

  “Do you want to help me come up with a list of club goals?” she asks.

  I groan. “I’m having a hard enough time coming up with one Cooking Club goal for myself. I don’t think you really want my help.”

  She shrugs and goes back to squinting at her phone. I finally tell her she can go on inside and work on her laptop instead of sitting out here with me. “Are you sure?” she says. “It is hard to do all this stuff on a small screen.”

  “It’s fine. Go.”

  She gives me a little wave and disappears inside. I’m not even annoyed that Marisol is practically ignoring me, just sad that we seem to be on totally different planets these days. Hopefully that will change once the Fashion Club is a done deal.

  Since I’m expecting my mom to pick me up, I’m surprised when Mr. Hammond pulls into Marisol’s driveway.

  “Your mom got held up at work,” he says. “Some kind of clogged drain emergency. I hope you don’t mind getting a ride with me instead.”

  “No, that’s okay,” I say as I climb into the front seat of his little hatchback, although honestly I’m a little weirded out. I’ve never had to spend an entire car ride alone with Mr. Hammond. If things get really awkward, there’s nowhere to hide.

  “So how’s the bakery job going so far?” he asks, almost like he practiced what to say on the ride over.

  “Good. Um, I’m working on some fun ideas for a birthday cake. I’ve never used edible glitter before.” I don’t tell him that other than that detail, I still have no idea what to do for Angela’s cake, or that my kitchen is currently covered with a light sprinkling of glitter that even my mom’s crazy vacuuming skills haven’t been able to defeat, or that I’m not even technically supposed to be working on the cake at all.

  He makes a face. “In my day, you only ate glitter by accident!” He gives me a warm smile, and I can’t help smiling back. I like Mr. Hammond. If my mom had to choose someone else to be with other than my dad, I really couldn’t have picked a nicer guy for her. I only wish this whole situation wasn’t so awkward.

  “So have you started packing?” he asks.

  “Um, no. I didn’t realize we were in a rush.” My mom told me that she and Mr. Hammond hadn’t even talked about a time line for the move yet.

  “No, no rush! But if we are going to do it anyway, there’s no sense in dragging our feet.” Mr. Hammond clears his throat again. “Has your father found a place to live yet?”

  “He’s still in a hotel, but he has a good job now, so I’m sure he’ll be able to find a place soon.”

  I can almost hear what he’s thinking, that my dad is notorious for quitting perfectly good jobs when he gets tired of them.

  “He really wants to stay this time,” I say. “He’ll find a way to make it work.”

  “Well, good,” Mr. Hammond says. “Then I hope it all turns out the way you’re imagining.”

  I bite back a sigh. That makes two of us.

  Chapter 17

  Instead of spending my afternoon off hanging out with friends or doing homework like a normal person, I’m in an indoor climbing gym at the foot of a giant wall with about ten pounds of ropes strapped around my body. Meanwhile, my dad is in heaven. He’s halfway up the beginner wall already, navigating the fake rocks so effortlessly that I start to wonder if he’s part monkey or something while our overly perky instructor, Sheila, cheers him on with each step. “Keep it up, Ted!”

  He keeps going and going until he gets to the top. He flashes me a thumbs-up, like being up there is the most natural thing in the world. Then he lets Sheila lower him down, even though it means trusting that his harness will hold him and that he won’t fall to the floor like a sack of potatoes.

  When he’s on solid ground again, Dad starts unhooking his gear. “All right, your turn, Roo!”

  “Are you sure you don’t want to go again?” I ask, but Sheila is already clipping me in.

  “You’re all ready to go!” she says a minute later.

  “What if I fall?” I say as Dad shoos me toward the foot of the wall.

  “Don’t worry,” Sheila assures me. “We’ll catch you.”

  “But what if I land weird and bang my head against one of the rocks? You weren’t there when I almost got a concussion during dodgeball the other day!”

  Sheila and my dad both laugh like they think I’m joking. It doesn’t look like there’s any way I’m getting out of this. And I didn’t come all this way and spend all that time strapping myself into harnesses and letting some overly cheerful lady loop about a million ropes around me to turn back now. So I close my eyes, take a deep breath, and take a step forward.

  “Way to go, Roo!” Dad says with a hoot.

  After I wipe my sweaty hands on my pants, I dust some chalk on my fingers to keep them from slipping. Then I gingerly reach up and grab the first handhold and pull myself up until I can put my other hand a little above my head. Oddly, my foot seems to follow suit so I don’t even have to think about where to put it. It simply finds a spot. Huh. Maybe this isn’t so bad.

  I focus on finding the next handhold, and miraculously there’s one right next to me. I transfer my weight so that I can grab it and move my leg up at the same time. I work steadily like that for another couple minutes until I realize that I’m no longer near the ground. In fact, my feet are over my dad’s head.

  “Great job, Roo!” he says, clearly impressed. That makes two of us. I can’t believe that instead of freaking out, I’m actually excited to keep going.

  Encouraged, I start going faster. And before I know it, I’m at the top. I can’t believe I did it! I almost wish someone had been filming the whole thing so I could show it to Mrs. Da Silva. There’s no way she’ll believe me without proof.

  When I get back on solid ground again, I turn to Sheila and say, “Is there a harder one I can try?”

  She looks surprised. “Usually we encourage newbies to stick with this wall for the first couple of climbs.”

  “But this one was easy. I want to see if I can do a harder one.”

  “I wouldn’t mind trying out a toug
her one myself,” Dad says.

  Sheila finally agrees and leads us over to a wall that slants backward a little. I stare up at it, wondering if I’m really crazy enough to go up, but before I can change my mind, she’s already sending me up.

  At first, I have no trouble. My arms and legs seem to know exactly what to do again. But after a few minutes, I reach out to grab the next handhold—and miss. Oof! I just manage to avoid falling by grabbing the spot I’d been holding before. I look around, trying to find somewhere else to go, but there isn’t anywhere. I’m stuck all the way on the far right of the wall with nowhere to go. There are no handholds that I can reach above my head, and the ones to the left of me seem about a mile away.

  “What do I do now?” I call down.

  “Try to find another place to put your left foot!” Sheila says.

  I try to do what she says, but my limbs suddenly feel shaky, and I can’t reach my foot out far enough to get over.

  “I’m stuck!” I call.

  I glance over at the foothold to my left again. It feels so far away that the only way I’ll be able to make it is to jump. I look down at my harness. That’s what it’s for, isn’t it? To catch me in case I don’t make it?

  I don’t let myself look down at the ground. Instead, I take a deep breath and leap to the left. For a second, I feel the rock under my hands, and I think I’ve done it. Then it slips out of my grasp, and I plummet through the air. I jerk to a stop as the harness catches me and sends me flailing into the wall.

  “Ouch!” I yelp as my elbow scrapes against the fake rock.

  “You okay?” Sheila asks as she lowers me to the ground.

  I nod, cradling my arm. It stings, but it’s not broken or anything. My pride, however, has seen better days.

  “Nice job, Roo!” Dad says. “You were so close to the top!”

  “But I fell.”

  Dad looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. “It was your first time. Did you expect to be perfect right away? Anyway, you were having fun, weren’t you?”