Access Denied (and other eighth grade error messages) (25 page)

I WAS STILL IN SOME kind of Jeff Massey haze when I got to school the next day. I didn’t even tell Jilly about him because
I wanted it all to myself, at least for a little while. Besides, it was just a crush and he was way too old for me and I didn’t
want another relationship anyway.

Right?

“Something going on with you, Erin P. Swift?” Mr. F squirted Windex on the glass outside the library and wiped it down.

“Nope,” I said, turning so he wouldn’t see my face. Did he know? Did it show?

“Um hm.” He said it in a way that told me he didn’t believe me.

Later I passed Reede near the gym. All she said was, “You’re over one and into another. Is it the Hottie with the Hair?”

When I shook my head automatically, she grinned. “New blood. I like it.” How does she
do
that?

But besides Mr. F and Reede, no one else seemed to notice. I got through the day with only a few teachers tapping their desks
to get my attention and Mark teasing me once—“Earth to Erin”—right before history class. I could smell his BO and when he
flipped his hair back, it kind of annoyed me and I didn’t know why. I looked at him. Three zits had erupted on the sides of
his nose and he had a black thing between his teeth. They were nice teeth, and he’d never had braces, but still. The black
thing. The zits. The wrinkled shirt. How could I have ever thought he was a hot tamale? He looked like a little kid. It was
a good thing we were just friends.

“You’ve got a thing,” I said, pointing to his mouth.

“Thanks.” He rubbed his teeth with his finger, then bared them at me. “Is it gone?”

“Yeah,” I said, looking away quickly as I walked down the hall.

He fell into step beside me. “So, I heard you and that dude broke up.”

I shrugged. “It just didn’t work out.” An image of Jeff Massey sprung before my eyes. Those muscles, those eyes, that amazing
ponytail. The way he said my name, and smiled a little crooked smile when he joked about my alien markings. It might have
been flirting. If only I’d had a good comeback. If only—

“Hello? Erin?” Mark snapped his fingers in front of my eyes. “Anybody in there?”

“Sorry. I guess I’m a little distracted.”

“Yeah, I noticed.” He glanced at me. “So tell me how long I need to wait before I ask someone else out.”

Jeff and his ponytail disappeared in a poof of imaginary smoke.

“You already like someone else?” I shook my head. “And I thought girls switched crushes fast.”

“I liked her before but only kind of realized it,” Mark said, stopping to look up at a READ poster outside the library.

I stopped too, my eyes following his gaze. “Uh huh.”

“Then I thought I didn’t,” he said, “but now I think I do.” We started down the hall again.

“It’s like this undercurrent of liking that kind of came up to the surface,” he said. “Like those hot springs in the mountains.”

“Undercurrent of liking?” I said as we turned down the hall. “Where did you get that?”

Mark’s face turned red and he shrugged. “I kind of made it up.”

I laughed. “It figures.” I felt almost giddy with relief. I had absolutely no feelings for Mark Cute Boy Sacks. No sparks,
no undercurrents, nothing. I felt free.

“So, how long do you think?”

“I don’t know,” I said, trying to ignore the flashes of Jeff’s face that kept popping up. “I thought you were taking a break
from the whole girlfriend thing.”

“Yeah, that was my plan but now I don’t know.”

“Huh.” I wondered if Jeff might come over again and how I could find out without asking Chris, who would totally make fun
of me or tell me I was stupid. “Well, do you know if she likes you? Do you think she’s waiting for you to ask her out?”

He paused, looking away so I couldn’t see his face. “I thought she did,” he said finally. “But maybe I’m wrong.”

“Oh,” I said, keeping my eyes glued to the head of the person in front of me. Was he talking about
me
? No, he couldn’t be. We had just had that whole “we’re proof we can be friends” talk. I must have mis-read his look. “Do
you want me to see if I can find out?” I asked. “Jilly’s a master at that kind of thing.”

“That’s okay,” Mark said. “Taking a break is a good idea.” He stepped ahead of me into the classroom.

I slipped into my seat and opened my folder, peeling back the papers to expose the blank back of the folder itself. Using
my blue sparkly pen I wrote
JM is hot
in large, looping letters.