“And that’s when we got you, and lived happily ever after until hackers threatened to post all our private stuff on the Internet,” I told Scruffles, who wagged his tail and licked my face, looking like he was grinning, with his tongue hanging out the side of his mouth.
I ripped that page out and tore it into little pieces because it reminded me how upset I was when it turned out Dad had to go give a Really Important Speech in Paris on my birthday and Mom was invited. She wasn’t about to give up an all-expenses-paid trip to Paris for tea at the American Girl store. Sure, I still got to go have tea with my doll, but it was with Grandma Sally and Grandpa Marty, not my parents. Maybe I shouldn’t be so upset—I mean, there are kids who would kill for the chance to take their doll for tea at the American Girl store, no matter who took them. But at the time, I felt totally betrayed that it wasn’t my parents. They’d promised me we’d go together. It felt like they didn’t love me as much as they loved work and expenses-paid travel.
Guess I should have learned the lesson when I was seven. “Life’s not fair, Sammy.” People break promises, even the ones you trust to tell you the truth. Stuff happens.
Seeing my ill-formed seven-year-old handwritten hope made me mad and hurt all over again, but that disappointment seems lame now.
What if the hackers put my diary online? How will I ever be able to show my face at school again? I mean, all those long ramblings about Jamie Moss. I could DIE. And the probability calculations about if he’ll ask me to prom? What about the things I wrote about Rose and Margo. UGH! My life is over. Seriously, it’s ruined before I’ve even got my driver’s license. How sad is that?
I might throw up.
It’s one thing to be a weird geek in private, when you think no one’s going to see it. Then it’s just part of what makes you awesome—a secret identity and all. It’s another to have your innermost thoughts posted for everyone in your high school—or even the world—to see. Literally, THE WORLD.
And what about my parents? Dad said we can’t read the stuff the hackers post, but does the same go for them? Because if they read my texts and my diary, I’m done for. They’ll know that I went to the concert. They’ll know that I lied. I’ll be grounded for life before I can say: “You’ve been hacked.”
“Sammy!” Rosa shouts as soon as I get off the bus. “What’s up with you? I’ve been texting you all morning and you haven’t answered!”
I don’t want to shout why where everyone can hear. “Hold on, I’m coming over.”
I make my way through the knots of kids hanging out, till I get over to where Rosa is standing with Margo. Margo gives me a warning look, but I’m not going to say anything. I’ve got enough stress without stirring things up between my friends.
“Are you pretending to be dead again?” Rosa says. “Because it’s getting really old.”
She sounds mad at me. Great. Margo’s the one she should be mad at, not me.
“No! It’s not my fault, Rosa. Really. Dick quarantined my phone and my laptop.”
“Oh crap. Did your parents find out you went to the Einstein’s Encounter concert?” Margo asks.
“Not yet,” I say. “At least not that I know of.”
“So how come you’ve got a complete device ban, then?” Rosa asks.
I look around to make sure no one is listening.
“It’s the hackers,” I explain, so quietly that they have to lean in to hear me. “They managed to hack onto our family cloud. And they’re threatening to post that stuff, too. I might die waiting for the impending Sammypocalypse.”
“But why? You don’t work for the bank!” Rosa exclaims. “That’s crazy!”
“Keep it down,” I hiss. “I don’t want everyone to know. It’s bad enough having to worry that my deepest private thoughts might be posted online at any minute.”
“What do you mean your ‘deepest private thoughts’?” Margo asks.
“Oh, Sammy …” Rosa groans. “You kept an online journal?”
“It wasn’t online. It was one hundred percent offline,” I insist. “It’s quicker to type than write.”
“That’s true,” Margo agrees.
“Plus, that way I didn’t have to worry about my parents or RJ finding a diary in my room and reading it,” I continue. “What I didn’t count on was Dick and the Geekitude guy and their ‘seamless backup to the cloud.’ ”
“What’s the potential damage?” Rosa asks, getting straight to the bottom line. “I mean, on a scale of one to ten, how bad is it if they do post it?”
“I’m thinking … ELEVEN?” I say. “I feel sick just thinking about it.”
“That’s bad,” Margo says. “Really bad.”
Like I hadn’t figured that out already.
“What kind of things are we talking about?” Rosa asks.
“Well, let’s see … a probability tree involving prom, Jamie Moss, and yours truly. That alone is enough to sign my social death warrant.”
“You made a probability chart about a guy asking you to the prom?” Margo says, starting to crack up. “Really? Sammy, you’re an even bigger nerd than everyone says you are!”
I am not amused. “People say I’m a nerd? Like who exactly?”
“It doesn’t matter what a few idiots think, Sammy,” Rosa says. “You’ve got bigger problems to deal with.” She glares at Margo. “We’re supposed to be supportive right now,” she reminds her.
“My student government friends aren’t idiots, Rosa,” Margo says, lifting her chin. “But whatever. Sorry, Sammy.”
Rosa ignores her.
There’s an undercurrent between them and they haven’t even read my journal. I feel a burst of panic when I think about how much worse it will be when they do.
“So what else?” Rosa asks. “Did you write about the concert? Could your parents find out?”
“Of course I wrote about the concert. It’s my journal!” I say. “And I wrote about the sweater and the puke and it shrinking and Helene blaming Maria.”
“This isn’t an eleven,” Rosa groans. “It’s a twelve.”
“More like a twenty,” Margo says in a funereal tone. “If your parents read that, you’re going to be grounded until you go to college. Maybe even in college.”
If my friends are trying to make me feel better, they’re failing. Epically.
“Well, now that we’ve ascertained that I’m a Dead Girl Walking, I might as well walk to class for a final day before the crap really hits the fan.”
“When will that happen?” Rosa asks as we start heading into the building.
I shrug. “Your guess is as good as mine,” I tell her. “That’s if it happens. Maybe my dad will pay them off. Maybe the FBI will catch the hackers before they can post anything. Maybe the earth will be hit by an asteroid and posting the innermost thoughts of a teenage girl, as awesome as she is, will seem pointless compared to survival. I can live in hope.”
“I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for the asteroid,” Margo says. “Neil deGrasse Tyson says that the next time there’s a possibility of that is in 2029. And even then, it’s supposed to miss.”
I stare at her. “And you’re calling me a nerd?”
“Knowing when the earth could be potentially annihilated qualifies as self-preservation, not nerdiness,” Margo says matter-of-factly.
I look to Rosa for a ruling as a neutral party.
“I’m pleading the Fifth,” she says. “But it’s definitely walking a fine line.”
We head in different directions for first period. I’m so busy contemplating my potential doom that I’m halfway to my class before I realize I’m behind Jamie Moss and his friends Pete O’Doule and Daryl Williams and that they’re talking about prom. Specifically, Daryl just asked Jamie: “When are you going to ask her?”
To my frustration, he doesn’t reveal the identity of “her.”
I slow down so I’m far enough behind to still hear them, but not close enough that my presence is obvious. If I have to drop out of high
school due to Sammygeddon, maybe these talents will come in useful in my backup career as a spy.
“I’m thinking Thursday before school starts,” Jamie says. “My older brother said I should get on it because girls need time to pick out dresses and stuff. I was going to do it tomorrow, but we’ve got a game tonight and I’ve got to get the goods for the ask.”
“You’re assuming she’ll say yes,” Peter says.
Jamie punches his arm. “Of course she’s going to say yes. She totally wants me.”
I stop, pretending to tie a shoelace on my shoes—which don’t have laces—and let them continue down the hall.
She totally wants me.
Is it me he’s talking about? I mean, yeah, I totally DO want him to ask me to prom, but … wanting to go to a dance with him and wanting him are two different things. At least in the way I think he means.
Except I don’t even know if it’s me he’s talking about because I don’t know if I’m the one he’s planning on asking.
Then I realize that if the hackers include my diary in their data dump, Jamie’s going to know exactly how desperate I’ve been for him to ask me.
On the upside, at least I’ll finally know if I’ll be Jamie’s prom date. On the downside, I think I might vomit.
When I see Margo and Rosa in the hallway between classes, I tell them what I overheard.
“What do you think?” I ask.
Margo is suddenly deeply fascinated by something on the ceiling over my right shoulder. But Rosa looks me in the eye. “Sammy, I don’t think he’s going to ask you. He hasn’t shown any signs of being interested.”
“Yes, he has,” I protest. “He talks to me in class and he’s asked me to come to his games. You think Eddy Lau is going to ask you because you talk in class.”
“I know, but Eddy also … He … Well, he’s shown he likes me that way,” Rosa says. “Not at first. Gradually. And Jamie … he’s … I just don’t see it.”
“But you’re not in class with us! Of course you don’t see it.”
Why are my friends being like this, when I always support them about everything?
Margo finally stops dissecting the ceiling tiles with her eyes, but it’s to join Rosa in raining on my parade.
“I might not see him with you, Sammy, but I see him flirting with everyone else,” she says. “I don’t even get why you like him. Okay, so he’s totally hot, but he’s a jerk. Does that remind you of your dad or something?”
Some things, once uttered, cannot be unheard or unsaid. Also, EW.
Even though Rosa tells Margo she’s out of line, I turn and walk away without a word, knowing that she just fired a massive torpedo into the hull of our friendship.
I don’t know if the damage can be repaired.
I curl my feelings up into a tight ball and hide it away so I can walk through the hall with outer shell intact, like nothing is wrong. Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, even if you feel like an extra in George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead. Just shuffle your zombie body from one class to the next, trying not to think—except academically of course, because you still have to get good grades for college and that prize job at which some guy like your dad will probably end up making sexist jokes about you and paying you less than a man for doing the same job.
I slump into my chair in AP English, without even saying hi to Noah, who’s already sitting at the desk behind me. Looking adorkable in a T-shirt that says “Physics is Phun,” I can’t help but notice despite my impending doom.
“Who died?” Noah asks.
“My social life,” I utter in a monotone.
“Look at the bright side,” he says. “At least you had one to begin with.”
“I’m having a hard time seeing the bright side of anything right now.”
“What happened?” he asks. “Is it the stuff in the papers about your dad?”
“That’s just the tip of the misery iceberg. Ninety percent of it is still underwater,” I confess. “At least until the hackers decide to post it.”
“There’s more to come out about your dad?”
“Not just about him,” I reveal, before realizing I shouldn’t have.
But Noah’s going to find out soon enough. Chances are, everyone will. How am I going to face school when that happens?
Noah looks confused, but he can’t ask me any more questions, because class starts. Except I feel a warm, gentle tap on my shoulder, and he passes me a note.
What do you mean, “not just about him”? What’s going on? Are you okay? You seem really bummed.
My pen hesitates over the scrap of paper. The feeling ball is threatening to come unraveled, and I can’t let that happen. But I have to talk to someone, and so far my best friends are failing miserably.
They hacked our family cloud backup. Targeting my dad, but the rest of us are collateral damage. So pretty soon, my entire life might go viral for the entire school’s viewing pleasure.
I refold the note and then, as soon as Ms. Brown’s back is turned, pass it to Noah. He returns it pretty quickly.
Wow, no wonder you look so bummed. I wish I knew what I could do to help, but even Alfred Pennyworth is at a loss on this one.
I swallow the lump rising in my throat as I write quickly. I know it’s an unfair thing to ask, but I pass the note back to him.
Can you promise not to hate me?
I wait for an answer, but there’s no tap on my shoulder.
I can’t blame him. Who in their right mind would make a promise like that when they don’t even know what truths might come out about me?
Still, it hurts. Just like everything else.
#Irony
When the bell rings, I grab my books and try to escape class without facing Noah. But just outside the classroom door, I hear “Sammy, wait!” and feel a hand on my shoulder.
Stiffening, I turn.
“Why would you think I’d hate you?” Noah asks, looking so genuinely confused it’s almost comical. “Am I going to read that Batman steals candy from kindergartners for kicks or something?”
No, but you are going to read that I’ve been calculating the probability of Jamie Moss asking me to the prom, and wonder why you were ever nice to me.
“Who, me?” I pause and then continue with gallows humor: “No, this Caped Crusader is too worried about getting cavities. Now, ice cream, on the other hand … that’s fair game.”
“Oh, that’s okay,” Noah says, totally deadpan. “Ice cream is nectar from the gods. Especially the stuff from that new place, Lickety Splits.”
A spark of life flickers in my zombie heart, and a giggle escapes my lips, met by Noah’s answering smile.
“It’s good to know that we see eye to eye on this,” I say.
“You can always count on me to back you up,” Noah says.
“Well, thanks,” I tell him, and I’m not talking about stealing ice cream from kindergartners, because I really never would, and I know Noah wouldn’t, either.
“I mean it, Sammy,” he says, and he’s serious now, too. He flashes me a wide grin and I feel a small burst of happiness.
But it can’t possibly last.
Because of my computer lockdown at home, I stay in the library after school to study, which really does make me feel like a nerd. At least at home I’m studying in private, but here there’s no hiding it. And it turns out I’m not the only one.
“I can’t believe there are so many people here after school,” I say to Ms. Stephens, the media specialist. “I thought the media center would be dead.”
“We’re busy most days after school,” she tells me. “Not all our students have their own laptops. A lot of our kids don’t have any computer at home at all.”
And here I was feeling sorry for myself because I can’t use my laptop for a few days. I can’t even imagine not having one at all. Dad always tells us that NTBC pays for the privileges we enjoy. But what if the protesters have a point?
I’m sitting here in the school
library trying to cram all these facts into my head for the AP Government exam, but I feel like all this information I’ve been working so hard to learn isn’t telling me what I really need to know.
Because what I really need to know is not on a standardized test.
How do I figure out what the truth is and what’s lies? I’m starting to wonder if the people I’ve always trusted to tell me the truth have only been telling me part of it. Maybe the people who are breaking the law could help me to discover the rest.
I start to google “New Territories Bank Corp hack,” but then close the browser window. What if I find out more things that freak me out? What if what I read just ends up shattering the foundations of my world even more?
You’re here to study for APs. Remember: College. Your Future. Study, Sammy, study.
I spend the rest of the time, till my mom picks me up, taking practice tests. Even though the rest of my life is a mess, I do well on these.
April 9
Mom is late to pick me up. Figures. I can’t wait to get my license.
Today’s Headline: Jamie Moss is going to ask someone to the prom on Thursday. The Million Dollar Question is: Will he ask me?
There are several new factors to consider when assessing the probability of this occurring.
The biggest one, of course, is whether the hackers post my ENTIRE LIFE ONLINE in the next 48 hours, which is a pretty big wild card. If they don’t, then my old probability charts might still stand.
But on the other hand, maybe not. Going with AN Other would be a lot more appealing at this point if that AN Other happened to be named Noah Woods.
So I guess there are two new probabilities to figure out: if the hackers don’t post my diary before Jamie asks, and if they do. In both scenarios, I’m going to assume that AN Other is Noah. Not that I know he would ask me. But … I think I’d like it if he did. I guess I could always ask someone myself. #GirlPower, right?
I’ve changed my preferences for Jamie because … well, I’m not as sure he’s as highly preferred as an option, especially if AN Other is Noah. I’m making him 60% vs. 40% for Noah, rather than 80% vs. 20% for unnamed other.
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