Read All About It! by Rachel Wise Page B

closed, and I was able to click back onto Michael’s Buddybook page. I
     adjusted my features. All I felt was shock, but I couldn’t let Hailey see it on my
     face. Especially because I hadn’t begun to process all that her letter meant.
    â€œHere we go!” Hailey sang, coming into the room with a plate
     of cookies and two milks.
    â€œThe cookies are made with spelt flour, sweetened with agave
     nectar. They have dried cherries and pistachios in them. And here”—she
     offered me my glass of milk—“skim and organic, baby, with extra vitamin
     D!”
    I was glad for the distraction. I selected a cookie and took a careful
     nibble. It wasn’t bad. Then Itook a swig of milk and
     carefully eyed Hailey over the rim of the glass, my face hidden from sight by all that
     milk.
    Hailey had no idea what I now knew. And I couldn’t imagine how I
     was going to get through the rest of the night pretending like nothing had happened.
    â€œOh, hey! I have a new message! Oh look! It’s from
     Michael!” Hailey’s face was glowing and her smile beaming so wide it
     practically touched both of her ears. How could I not have noticed before that she loved
     him? Am I a total idiot?
    Then I had a sickening thought: What if he liked her
     back?!
    I felt like I’d been punched in the stomach. Bad enough to have
     your best friend betray you by falling in love with your lifelong crush, but to have the
     crush like her back?! Oh my goodness! My face burned hot but my body felt cold. I was in
     a full panic.
    â€œLet’s see . . . What does he say . . .” Hailey was
     clicking around Buddybook happily. No wonder she was all up-to-date on that cute photo
     Jeff had posted of Michael at football practice. Iwas surprised it
     wasn’t her screensaver!
    â€œYay! Sammy, he has your notebook! He says, ‘Tell Pasty I
     found her notebook. If she gives me a call, we can arrange a drop-off,’ and then
     it has his phone number. Hey! We should call him!” Hailey turned to me with a look
     of excitement on her face. “Want to?” she added.
    Now I was starting to understand. I was kind of the pawn in her crush.
     She could use me as the buffer or the go-between, as an excuse to check in on Michael
     and talk to him and everything. Like she’s reporting back to me, but it’s
     really for her.
    â€œNo,” I said in as flat of a voice as I could manage.
    â€œWhat?” Hailey looked surprised. I think she’d been
     assuming I’d say yes.
    I felt a mean prick of pleasure at having burst her bubble. Ha! Take
     that! I’m not going to be your excuse to call your lover boy. No way.
    â€œWhy?” she asked again, kind of forlorn.
    I shrugged, relishing my power. “I’m tired. I just want to
     go to sleep. I’ll deal with it in the morning. Anyway, he’ll probably have
     read through the whole thing and he’ll have something mean tosay about my reporting skills and my to-do lists. It’s all just . . .
     embarrassing. Why did it have to be him who found it?”
    Hailey was reluctant to give up. “All right. If you say so . .
     .”
    â€œI say so. Plus, he’d just tease me and call me Listy or
     Trippy or Pasty or one of those annoying nicknames.”
    Hailey bit her lip and was quiet for a minute. “At least you have nicknames from him.”
    That made me mad. “What? You’d like your lifelong crush to
     call you insulting names based on your personality flaws or mistakes you made when you
     were five? That’s fun,” I said bitterly.
    Hailey shrugged. “Okay, maybe not those names . . .”
    â€œYeah . . .” I said, nodding hard, “definitely not those names.”
    I kind of hated Hailey right then. I almost wanted to tell her flat out
     that I knew she loved Michael too and that she couldn’t have him. But then