Rules for Secret Keeping

  ALSO BY LAUREN BARNHOLDT

  The Secret Identity of Devon Delaney

  Devon Delaney Should Totally Know Better

  Four Truths and a Lie

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ALADDIN

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  First Aladdin hardcover edition October 2010

  Copyright © 2010 by Lauren Barnholdt

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  ALADDIN is a trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc., and related logo is a registered trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact

  Simon & Schuster Special Sales at 1-866-506-1949 or business@simonandschuster.com.

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  Designed by Jessica Handelman

  The text of this book was set in Lomba Book.

  Manufactured in the United States of America 0810 FFG

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Full CIP data for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

  ISBN 978-1-4169-8020-9

  ISBN 978-1-4424-0954-5 (eBook)

  For my dad

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thanks to my editor, Kate Angelella, for always knowing what’s best for the book and being so absolutely amazing to work with.

  Alyssa Henkin, for being the best agent a girl could ask for—“thank you” doesn’t even begin to cover it!

  My husband, Aaron, for everything—I love you.

  My mom, for constantly sending me emails about what to blog about—thanks for always being there for me.

  My sisters, Krissi and Kelsey, for being my best friends.

  Jodi Yanarella, Scott Neumyer, Kevin Cregg, and the Govine family for their support.

  Jessica Burkhart—TEAM BARNHART FTW!

  Mandy Hubbard for Text in the City, and answering all my crazy emails.

  And, of course, all the girls who read the Devon books or Four Truths and a Lie and emailed me to tell me how much you liked them—it means more than you know.

  ON THE FIRST DAY OF SEVENTH GRADE, I open my locker before homeroom to find a note from Eric Niles, which says the following:

  Dear Samantha,

  You look really pretty today.

  Love,

  Your Secret Admirer

  In kindergarten, Eric and I got seated next to each other by accident when the teacher thought I was a boy, since they’d mistakenly printed “Sam” on the class list instead of my full name, “Samantha.” Eric didn’t want to sit next to a girl, so he burst into tears, and then I burst into tears, and Eric felt so bad that at recess he picked me a dandelion flower and asked me to marry him. Ever since then, he’s been kind of like my stalker. But not the really crazy kind you have to get a restraining order against or anything. More like the slightly obsessive, slightly annoying kind you roll your eyes at and try to tolerate.

  “Is that from Eric?” my best friend, Daphne, says, coming up behind me. She peers over my shoulder at the paper. “How does he know you look really pretty today? Has he even seen you yet?” She takes a good look at my first-day-of-school outfit—jean skirt, leggings, black-and-white-striped top, and huge earrings. “Although you do look pretty cute.”

  “Daphne, this is Eric we’re talking about.” I place the note back in my locker and slam it shut. “Since when has sanity ever been his thing?”

  “True.”

  “And why does he always sign them ‘Your Secret Admirer’?” I ask. “I know it’s him. I recognize his handwriting.”

  “I think you’re too hard on him,” Daphne says. “He’s not that bad. Last year in math, I was constantly asking him if I could borrow some paper, and he never even once got mad.”

  “Daphne, he eats paste.”

  “He hasn’t done that since third grade,” Daphne says. And then her green eyes crinkle up at the edges and she gives me a look. One of those looks people give you when they’ve figured something out that you don’t necessarily want them to know, and now they’re going to tease you about it. “Oohh,” she says. “I know what this is about. This is about Jake.”

  I try to look haughty. “No, it isn’t!” I bend down and pretend to be tying my shoe so she doesn’t see the look that’s running across my face, which basically means that, yes, it is about Jake. “Have you seen him yet?” I straighten up and shrug my shoulders. “Just, you know, out of curiosity.”

  “Nope,” Daphne says. “Guess he’s not here yet.”

  Jake’s our best friend. Well, he was our best friend, until the end of last year when suddenly I decided that he and I should be more than best friends. (This was spurred on by what I like to call The Scandalous Skateboard Incident, or TSSI for short. Daphne doesn’t like referring to it as TSSI since she thinks it sounds kind of like a disease. Ever since Daphne’s orthodontist told her she might have TMJ, which is some kind of teeth-grinding affliction, she doesn’t like referring to things by their initials. Medical conditions make her nervous.)

  The Scandalous Skateboard Incident (or TSSI for those who aren’t freaked out by anagrams that may or may not remind them of diseases) happened at the beginning of the summer, right before Jake left for camp. One night, he invited me and Daphne over to his house to skateboard. This wasn’t the scandalous part—Jake was always inviting Daphne and me over to skateboard, although none of us actually skateboarded except him. Usually we’d sit on his porch and read magazines while Jake constructed some sort of ramp or obstacle course in his garage. Then Jake would emerge and try to do stunts on whatever sort of contraption he’d built.

  Anyway, on the day of TSSI, Jake was in his garage building a ramp out of some drywall and a traffic cone that he said he’d ordered off the internet, but that I think he stole when he got his driveway paved in the spring, and Daphne and I said we were leaving, because we were bored of reading magazines. And then Jake said, no, no, the ramp was done, and we should all go out into the road and watch him try it out. Daphne and I agreed, since we actually do like to watch Jake skateboard (he always does lots of tricks and flips and then we get to give him a score on a scale of one to ten, kind of like Olympic judges), we just don’t like waiting around while he builds things.

  So we all traipsed out to the road, and Jake set up the ramp, and after a few times of having to move it since cars were coming, we had it all set and ready to go. And Jake started off down the street so he could build up speed, and he came racing toward the ramp, and then he went up, up, up, and jumped a little bit in the air to grab the bottom of his board, and then floated down to the ground and skated to a stop right in front of us. It was amazing, exactly like something you’d see on one of those crazy extreme sports shows on TV.

  So then I said that I wanted to try it, and Jake and Daphne both gave me a look, because I am very uncoordinated and also because I had never once shown any interest in skateboarding. But Jake also looked impressed, and so I got on the board, but when I went over the ramp, I got thrown off somehow and ended up on the pavement with a scraped elbow and a slightly bloody lip.

  J
ake and Daphne rushed over, and when I looked up, I don’t know what it was, but Jake was bent over me and the sun was shining, making a halo of light behind his head, and he looked so cute and concerned, and something started in my heart and I knew then that nothing would ever be the same. Okay, so that’s dramatic, but I knew that I liked him, at least. But then I had to go home because I was bleeding, and Jake left the next morning for camp and I haven’t seen him since. Daphne says maybe the only reason I think I like him is because I had a brain injury when I fell off that skateboard.

  “In fact,” Daphne’s saying now, “I haven’t really seen anyone from our school yet.”

  Our locker and homeroom numbers were sent to us over the summer, in an effort to “limit confusion on the first day of school,” and so all around us, kids are running up and down the halls, looking for their lockers. All the elementary schools in the district feed into Millboro Middle School, but so far, except for Daphne, I haven’t seen one familiar face. Daphne and I survey the chaos in front of us, searching for people we know.

  “Oh, look!” I say. “There’s Ronald Hughes!” We watch as Ronald Hughes, a kid from our elementary school, runs down the hall, screaming, “Welcome to middle school!” and making ape noises. Hmm. Not exactly the best representation of our elementary school, but whatever.

  “Wow,” Daphne says. “He really does sound like an ape.” Ronald adds a stomp to his routine, and now people are actually moving out of his way and staring. I can’t help but feel a little bit of pride. I do know him, after all.

  “Oh!” Daphne says as Ronald disappears around the corner at the end of the hall. “I almost forgot. Look what I made you.” She opens her binder and pulls out a piece of shiny pink paper. “It’s an advertisement for your secret-passing business.”

  I look down at the flyer.

  HAVE A SECRET YOU JUST NEED TO GET OUT?

  IS YOUR BEST FRIEND’S NEW BACK-TO-SCHOOL SHIRT A TOTAL FASHION DON’T? WANNA ANONYMOUSLY TELL YOUR CRUSH YOU LIKE HIM?

  Save yourself the embarrassment and pass your secret through me, Samantha Carmichael. Drop your secret along with a dollar into locker number 321, and it will be delivered to the recipient of your choice. **YOUR SECRET WILL NOT BE READ.**

  Please do not forget to specify a name, as it is impossible to deliver secrets without knowing who they are for.

  To ensure confidentiality, you may want to consider disguising your handwriting or printing your secret from a computer.

  “These are awesome!” I squeal, running my finger over the navy blue letters.

  “I figured we could hang these up around school, since a lot of the kids from the other schools won’t have heard of you.”

  Last year, in sixth grade, I started my own secret-passing business. Basically, kids would leave a note in my locker along with a dollar, and I’d pass the note to whomever they wanted. I never read the secrets, and it was totally anonymous. By the end of the year I’d made enough money to buy myself an iPod and pretty much a whole new wardrobe.

  The bell rings then, and Daphne carefully places the sheet back into her binder. “Do you wanna hang out tonight?” she asks, as the throng of kids around us starts moving in an effort to get to homeroom. “We could discuss the day.”

  “Can’t,” I say. “I’m going into the city for my photo shoot.” Recently I found out that I’m going to be featured in an upcoming issue of You Girl magazine (motto: America’s number one tween magazine) as one of the finalists for its Young Entrepreneur of the Year award. My dad entered me in the competition a few months ago, and last week we got the call that I made it through to the next round. It’s supposedly this really big deal, with a big banquet in a few weeks to pick the winner. I’m excited, but it’s also a little nerve-racking. Last year’s winner sold cloth bracelets or something to help the situation in Darfur. All I do is pass scandals and gossip. So not the same thing.

  “I’ll call you later, then,” Daphne says. Then she grabs my arm, looks me in the eyes, and says, “Good luck” very dramatically before turning on her heel and heading in the direction of her homeroom. I take a deep breath and turn toward my own homeroom, room 167. Here goes nothing.

  I PICK A SEAT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE room, halfway back, next to a friendly-looking girl who’s doodling flowers in her notebook. I decide it’s time to make new friends, since I still haven’t seen anyone from my old elementary school.

  “Hi,” I say, sliding into my seat and giving her a friendly smile. I read in You Girl that if you want to make new friends, you have to step out of your comfort zone and be proactive and smiley. “I’m Samantha.”

  “Hi,” she says, smiling back. “I’m Charlie.” Wow. Charlie. For a girl. What a cool name. “It’s short for Charlea,” she says, as if she’s reading my mind. “But everyone calls me Charlie.”

  Wow. Even cooler. I wonder if I should change my name to Sam? Sammi? Samara? My mom doesn’t like shortened names. “I named you Samantha,” she says. “And if I wanted people to call you ‘Sam,’ that’s what I would have named you. Or I would have had a boy.”

  “I like your shoes, Samantha,” Charlie says, glancing down at my pink Skechers.

  “Thanks.” I pull a light blue spiral notebook out of my bag and open it to the first page, getting set to write down any important information about middle school that might be given to us in homeroom. My schedule is taped to the inside of the notebook so I don’t lose it. I’m not so good at hanging on to important things, so I figured I’d better tape it down. But then my older sister, Taylor, pointed out that I would probably just lose the notebook, which wasn’t very nice of her, but then she let me borrow her Skechers, so I kind of halfway forgave her.

  “Hi!” Charlie suddenly squeals next to me. I’m so surprised I almost jump out of my seat.

  “Hi!” I say back, confused since we already said that. Then I realize she’s not talking to me. She’s talking to another girl who’s just walked into the room. The girl has crazy curly red hair that reaches all the way down her back, a short nose, and large green eyes. She’s wearing a pair of jeans and a soft gray and pink sweater that dips down over one shoulder. On her head is a pink beret. A PINK BERET. As in, those weird hats they wear in France. You’d think she’d look silly, but somehow, she’s able to pull it off. It looks cool and trendy, as if she’s about to walk into a café and order a cappuccino or something. Most of the boys in the room turn to stare, and most of the girls do too.

  Pink Beret rushes over to Charlie. “Charlie!” she says. “I tried IMing you last night, but my mom was being a total nightmare, she just—” And then she catches sight of me, and she stops talking.

  “Hi,” I say, giving her my we-should-be-friends smile. “I’m Samantha.” How cool is this? First day of school, homeroom even, and I already have two new friends! Two cool new friends, who wear berets and have moms that are total nightmares. Not that I’ll forget my old friends of course, that would be very mean of me. I’ll have to plan a joint sleepover or something.

  “Oh.” Pink Beret ignores my introduction and puts a hand on her hip. She doesn’t seem to be carrying any school supplies. What if she needs to take notes and write down important information pertaining to middle school? Hmm. I wonder if I have an extra pen. “You’re in my seat.”

  “What?” How can I be in her seat? Has the teacher already assigned seats? Did I miss some sort of before-school mailing that alerted everyone to where they would be sitting in homeroom for the year?

  “Oh,” I say. “I didn’t know we had assigned seats.” Next to me, Charlie shifts uncomfortably.

  “We don’t,” Pink Beret says. “But that’s my seat.”

  I’m confused. “Hi,” I try again. “My name’s Samantha.”

  “I heard you the first time. And you, Samantha. Are. In. My. Seat.” What can I do? I get up and move over. I mean, wow. I didn’t know middle school was going to have a seat dictator. The worst part is that since everyone watched Pink Beret walk into the room, they al
l saw the horrible exchange in which she kicked me out of my own seat! Honestly, kind of a lot of people were watching. But that’s okay. I’m regrouping. I’m calm. No need to panic. In fact, I’ll just—

  And at that moment, Jake walks into the classroom, plops down next to me, smiles, and says, “Hey.” I’m so shocked that for a second, I can’t answer. Jake is not supposed to be in my homeroom. He’s supposed to be in room 241. I know because Daphne and I ran into his mom over the summer at the grocery store and she told us (after a little bit of prodding and a slight stalker mission in which we followed her down the cookie aisle and ended up having to spend all our allowance on five bags of Oreos).

  “I didn’t know you were going to be in my homeroom,” I blurt.

  “I didn’t either,” he says, “but there was some sort of mix-up with my schedule.” He’s wearing long board shorts and a long-sleeved blue T-shirt and his brown hair is all mopsy and cute and his eyes look the same as when he looked at me during The Scandalous Skateboard Incident.

  “Oh, well,” I say, trying to sound coy. “Their mix-up is our gain.” I give him a look with my eyebrows, but he just looks a little confused. Maybe because my eyebrows aren’t completely grown in from when I tried to pluck them myself over the summer. They’re almost grown in—honestly, you really can’t even tell—but maybe I shouldn’t be using them to convey meaningful looks. “How was camp?” I had figured I might get all tongue-tied when I saw Jake, and the first thing I would say is, “Hey, did you know I like you now?” because it would be on my brain. But honestly I’m pretty much fine. Not freaking out even a little bit.

  Well, except for when Jake smoothes his hair away from his face and says, “It was all right. But I missed you guys.” I missed you guys! Obviously by “you guys” he means me and Daphne, of course, but he probably only means ME, since, hello, I’m the one who wrote him a few postcards over the summer (just a few, no need to seem needy), and Daphne only sent him one very short note for his birthday.