Double Dare (From the Files of Madison Finn, 14) (11 page)

“Fiona’s face!” Chet howled. Egg laughed even louder.

Madison stood there with her arms crossed until the boys stopped laughing. Egg turned and looked at Madison coldly.

“Just our webpage,” he said.

“Um … Can I see it?” Madison asked, trying to be nicer again.

Egg shrugged. “Whatever.”

The boys’ page was up on their screen, and Madison scanned the images and text. At the top was a picture of two Jedi warriors from the latest Star Wars movie—only Chet and Egg had put their own heads on top of the bodies. Their light sabers clashed every couple of seconds, letting out an electronic
pzzzap
sound. Chet scrolled down the page to reveal a message:

A short, short time ago

in a galaxy not too far from here

lived two heroes who struggled with

homework so boring that it put them to sleep.

Our heroes decided that there had to be a better way.

And so they created the Science Stunner—a webpage

packed with cool science and games

for when they needed a break.

Now they could work for hours—or at least make their

parents
think
they were working.

This is their website….

Music bleated from the computer speakers as Chet continued to scroll down. The two had packed the page with links to many different science and gaming sites. They even had little video clips of themselves, dressed as Jedi knights, giving reviews of each site. Madison pressed her lips together. She had to admit it—Chet and Egg’s page looked
great.
The page she and Fiona had been working on, which had looked so cute with its simple graphics and fun, rhyming text, was boring by comparison.

Way
boring.

Mrs. Wing appeared at Egg’s elbow. “How’s it coming along, boys?”

“It’s coming along very well, Mrs. Wing,” Egg said, blushing a little.

“Take a look,” Chet said.

“Hmmmm,” Mrs. Wing peered at the webpage. “You boys really put a lot of effort into this.”

Chet and Egg grinned at each other. “Yessssss!” they both said at the same time.

Mrs. Wing took the mouse and clicked on one of their links. She waited a moment, but nothing happened. “Hmm …” she said, clicking the link again.

Madison tried not to smile, even though she was secretly happy about Chet and Egg’s misfortune.

Mrs. Wing hit the
REFRESH
button.

“I think the computer is frozen,” she said. “I’m not getting anything. Try refreshing the page a few times more, please. Otherwise, you guys had better reboot. We don’t want our classroom systems crashing.”

Egg frowned. “This always happens,” he moaned.

“Well,” Mrs. Wing said, “sometimes that happens when you’re dealing with a lot of graphics. A few other people are having that problem.”

Madison gulped. Other people were having that problem? Did that mean that everyone else in the class had used more graphics than she and Fiona had? Would their links work?

“I’ll come back around to see you boys once you get that page up again,” Mrs. Wing promised. She moved along to Madison and Fiona’s station.

Madison felt her heart start to beat. What would Mrs. Wing think of their site—especially now that she’d seen Egg and Chet’s superdeluxe page?

“Let’s see what you girls have done,” Mrs. Wing said. Her bracelets rattled against the keyboard as she viewed the page. Madison held her breath as Mrs. Wing punched a few of the links. Thankfully, they had each tested them all the night before.

Mrs. Wing stood up. “Class, may I have your attention? Everyone, please come here for a minute.”

“Is everything okay?” Madison asked, suddenly worried that her favorite teacher was going to point out everything that was wrong with their page in front of the entire class. She suspected the worst.

“Yes,” Mrs. Wing said. “You and Fiona have done a wonderful job. This is a really useful page. I would like everyone in the class to see it.”

Fiona turned to Madison and squeezed her forearm. “Did you hear that?” she said softly. Madison sat up straight in her chair, smiling, while Mrs. Wing pointed out the finer points of
MADISON AND FIONA’S HOMEWORK CENTER
.

Mrs. Wing said their page followed the rules exactly and was just the kind of practical site the contest judges would be expecting. Madison made a silent mental note to thank Dad for his help. He’d been right all along.

“Now, class, I want everyone to download and print your pages. I want to put them on display on the bulletin board.” Mrs. Wing pointed to a blank board at the back of the room. Madison hadn’t noticed it when she walked in, but now she saw that at the top was a large banner that read:
HOW A WEBPAGE IS MADE.

Fiona and Madison couldn’t stop grinning, which must have annoyed Chet and Egg. They stood across the room, moping. Their webpage screen froze again right after they rebooted the computer.

Madison glanced over, hoping to catch Egg’s eye. He looked straight at her as she mouthed the word.

“Sorry,” Madison said silently.

Unfortunately, Egg didn’t take that as an apology. He thought Madison was rubbing it in.

“Hey, Maddie,” Aimee said, leaning against the locker next to Madison’s. The last bell had just rung and they were out for the weekend, but Aimee could tell that Madison wasn’t in a great mood. “What’s wrong? Fail locker inspection again?”

“Ha-ha,” Madison said as two spiral-bound notebooks fell from her locker, a pile of papers fluttering after them.

Madison shoved everything back into her own messy locker and slammed it closed.

“Seriously,” Aimee pressed, “you’re looking a little down.”

“I know. I had this terrible fight with Egg … and I feel like even though Fiona and I got some compliments on our webpage, we could have done a better job,” Madison admitted.

“Egg, shmeg … your page was the best.” Aimee gave Madison a little poke in the shoulder. “You should be happy!” She did a little twirl. “Besides, the You Know What for You Know Who is this weekend—and we’re going to the You Know Where, which will be a blast!”

Madison laughed. Aimee was practically leaping down the hall. Once again, her BFF cheered her up. It was too late to worry about the contest. Madison needed to be thinking about the party instead.

“Hey, wait up!” Fiona shouted behind them. Madison and Aimee stopped to wait for their friend. “You are the best, partner!” Fiona said happily to Madison as she jogged up. “I think we have a chance of winning the contest, don’t you?”

“Your teacher saw the webpage?” Aimee asked.

“Mrs. Wing totally loved it,” Fiona explained. “She made everyone in the whole class look at it!”

Aimee stared at Madison. “That is so excellent. So why are you moping around like a sourpuss?”

“I just said that I thought it could be better….” Madison said lamely.

Aimee blew her bangs out of her eyes with an impatient burst of air. “Okay, no more talking about this. You definitely don’t get any sympathy from me now that I know everyone loved it.”

Madison grinned sheepishly. “Okay,” she said. “You’re right.”

“So, Fiona,” Aimee said slyly as she pushed open the heavy school doors, “want to get together tomorrow? We could go to Freeze Palace or something for your birthday.”

Outside, the late September sun was warm on Madison’s face, and she smiled up at it. Aimee was trying secretly to get Madison’s head in a different place. If she thought about the birthday party, she wouldn’t think about the webpage anymore.

“Sorry, I can’t really do anything on Saturday,” Fiona said. “My dad is taking us to see these old college friends of his—we’ll be gone all day.”

“He
what
?” Madison asked, as if she didn’t understand English. She gaped at Aimee, who was staring at Fiona, openmouthed.

“Your—your dad?” Aimee stammered.

“Yeah,” Fiona said, rolling her eyes. “Since we moved, our aunt and uncle can’t come over this year. So he’s taking us to see these old friends of his. They have kids our age, and I guess we met them once about five hundred years ago and had a good time playing in the sandbox, or whatever. I don’t even remember them, but Dad’s all excited about it, even though Chet and I both said we’d rather stay here.”

“Does your mom know about this?” Madison asked.

“Of course,” Fiona said. “But it was just a last-minute thing—that’s why I didn’t tell you about it before.”

“Wow,” Aimee said hoarsely, “that’s—that’s great.” Madison could tell by her voice that Aimee thought the plan was anything but great. What about the surprise? Had Mrs. Waters forgotten? It didn’t make sense.

“But we can get together on Sunday,” Fiona said. “If that’s okay. I do want to do
something
fun for my birthday.”

Madison bit back a groan.
Sunday
? She wondered briefly whether she would now have to call all the guests and tell them to come the next day. There was no way everyone would be able to make a new date on such short notice. What a mess! Not even Aimee could cheer her up after this. Fiona’s dad had really thrown a King Kong–size wrench into things. After all the work they’d done, now Madison and Aimee were going to be sitting at a bowling alley with a ton of guests, twin chocolate cakes—and no guests of honor!

Madison could already hear what Poison Ivy Daly would have to say about that.

Party Time


I can’t believe it—the day of the party is finally HERE!!


Yesterday, I thought Fiona’s surprise party was toast, as in
flambé.
So I sent Fiona’s mom a way frantic e-mail, asking her whether we should tell everyone that the plans were off. But it turns out that Mrs. Waters was just being a supersneak! She and Mr. Waters totally handed Fiona and Chet this fake story about going to visit these college friends of his. The only place they’re going is for a long drive around Far Hills … and then to the bowling alley! It’s perfect, because this way, Mrs. Waters, Aimee, and I will have plenty of time to set up.


I have to admit, Mrs. Waters has a way with the surprise party … she even fooled Aimee and me!


I can’t wait I can’t wait I can’t wait.


Only two hours and forty-eight minutes to go.


Madison closed her file and powered down her laptop. She had to start getting ready.

It was warm, even for September, and sunny. Madison guessed it would probably be one of the last real summer days before fall swept in with its cool breezes and rain—so she wanted to wear something summery and fun. Besides, there was no point in getting super dressed up just to go bowling. She selected a red Hello Kitty T-shirt and her jeans.

But then she thought about the fact that Hart Jones was going to be at the party. She didn’t just want to wear a pair of grunged-out jeans. She went back into her closet and picked out a pair of faded blue denim capris and a neon blue top that just grazed the top of her pants. It wasn’t a belly shirt (Mom didn’t like those), but it was better than a regular T-shirt.

Madison slid her feet into her favorite pair of clogs and tucked some low socks into her bag to wear inside the rented bowling-alley shoes. She ran a brush through her hair and slicked on some strawberry-kiwi-smooch lip gloss. Then she gave her armpits a sniff to make sure they weren’t stinky.

All clear. There. She was ready. Almost.

She still had to wrap her gifts.

Madison walked to the hall closet and pulled out a roll of gold-foil paper and some royal-blue ribbon. She decided to wrap Chet’s gift first. Madison knew he was seriously into basketball, and he liked computers a lot. So, inspired by the disk of screen savers that Mrs. Wing had given to her, Madison had picked out a screen-saver disk of NBA superstars for Chet. Well, Mom had picked it up in the software section at Stationery Barn.

Once that was wrapped, Madison went to her desk and pulled out Fiona’s gift. Madison had decorated an old cigar box with a collage of words and pictures from magazines. She had wanted to use photographs of Fiona, but Fiona hadn’t lived in Far Hills very long, so Madison didn’t have a gazillion pictures of her as she did of Aimee or Egg. Instead, Madison had found magazine pictures of women from the gold medal–winning U.S. soccer team. She’d put a bunch of words in between, like
Way to go
and
Superstar!
Once Madison had glued the art to the outside of the box, she covered it with a thin coat of special decoupage glue, so that everything stayed lacquered on. When the lid of the box was dry, she’d used a silver paint pen to write FIONA with squiggly hearts and flowers. She had also decorated the inside of the box with blue-and-white paper for sky and puffy clouds.

Before she taped the wrapping paper around the box, Madison hesitated. Would Fiona like this? Or would she be disappointed that Madison hadn’t
bought
her something?

She decided it would be okay and used the scissors to make a curly bow.

Dingdong!

“I’ve got it, Mom!” Madison shouted. The digital clock read 10:59, just about the time that Aimee was supposed to come over so Mom could drive them to the bowling alley. Madison was glad that Aimee had picked today to be on time—usually she was about ten minutes late for everything. They needed all the time they could get to set up for the party.