“Hailey!” someone calls from behind me.
I turn around to find Brad leaning against the wall of the auditorium. We’re having a guest speaker today, and all the other students are filing in. “What are you doing?” I ask, stepping to his side and letting people behind me pass.
“Waiting on Adam. Want to sit with us?”
“Sure,” I reply, searching the sea of faces for Adam. I was originally thinking I’d sit with Brittany, but she’s scheduled to watch the second presentation instead.
“Yo, Moonshine!” a guy says, walking up to Brad and knocking him with his elbow. His nickname brings a smile to my face.
“Hey, Carlos,” Brad says. “This is Hailey. Hailey, Carlos. He’s cocaptain of the football team with me.”
I recognize him. He sits at Brad’s table during lunch every day and even though I don’t sit there—by my choice, not because Brad hasn’t invited me—I see all his friends when I walk by. Brad, Abbie, and Adam always smile at me; Michelle either ignores me or makes a face like she’s just taken a bite of the worst lunch ever.
“Nice to meet you, Hailey,” Carlos says. “You’re new here, right?”
I nod. “Nice to meet you, too.”
“So,” he says, looking at Brad with a smile, “you’ve taken it upon yourself to make the cute new girl feel welcome at Pinecrest, huh?”
My face heats up at the word “cute.” I’m not used to people talking like that about me, especially when I’m standing right here, and now it’s happened twice in two weeks.
“I have,” Brad says, grinning back at him before focusing on me. “Is it working?” he asks me.
“Um … yeah … I guess so,” I stammer, feeling totally caught off guard. He and Brittany have been awesome. I rarely see Brad since we aren’t in the same classes, but anytime we pass in the hall, he goes out of his way to talk to me, even if it’s just for a couple of seconds. It’s been a huge relief having both of them help me not look like a total loser in a new school.
“You going in?” Carlos asks.
“Yeah, let’s go,” Brad says. “I’ll text Adam and tell him to meet us inside.”
The three of us find a mostly empty row in the back of the auditorium and take our seats. After texting Adam, Brad opens a video on his phone. “Have you seen this?” he asks me, shoving it in my direction.
It’s a collection of guys doing stupid things and failing. Like trying to jump from a roof onto a trampoline and into a pool, but bouncing over a fence and landing in an overgrown weedy field instead. Brad laughs, while I cringe. “That had to hurt,” I say, as another guy does a somersault over the handlebars of his bike.
“But it’s hilarious, right?” Brad asks, laughing as someone falls through a frozen lake on his motorcycle.
I close my eyes and turn my head when it’s clear nothing good is going to come of a guy trying to pick up a massive snake.
“Seriously? You don’t like this?” he asks, snatching his phone away and showing it to Carlos. “Funny, right?”
“Yeah, I saw that last night. Laughed my ass off.”
Brad types on his phone, then pushes it back to me as a new video pops up. Baby pandas rolling around on the floor. “How’s this?” he asks.
I smile at a tiny baby trying to climb over another to reach its mom. “Much better.”
“Okay, quiet down,” the principal says from the stage. “We have a great speaker today, so stop texting and playing games on your phones. Ms. Reynolds is going to talk about the struggles she faced growing up and what we can do to promote diversity not only at school but also within our communities. Please help me welcome her.”
I lower the phone to the armrest between us and clap with the rest of the students as the speaker steps to the podium and begins her speech. Adam slips into the now dark auditorium and sits down next to me. Brad fist-bumps him and then picks up his phone and types something onto the screen.
A moment later, he hands it back to me as an adorable little otter drinks from a baby bottle. “Awww,” I whisper. “I might need to get one of these as a pet.”
“Dad’s probably allergic,” he whispers. “He ruins all my pet dreams.”
“Ahem,” someone says from behind us. We both turn around to find the vice principal there, holding two slips of paper. She hands one to me, then the other to Brad.
I take a look at it, and my stomach drops. It’s a detention slip for this afternoon. The reason scrawled into the open space is: Using phone during assembly.
I shoot Brad a freaked-out look, but he rolls his eyes and shakes his head, completely unfazed by what just happened. I’ve never gotten a detention. Ever. How in the world did Brad, king of the Goody Two-Shoes, land us both in detention?
I turn to stare at the speaker, afraid I’ll get in even more trouble if I look anywhere else. Brad nudges my leg with his own. I shake my head, still staring straight ahead. He does it again and whispers, “This is nothing.”
I ignore him.
He then bumps my arm with his elbow.
I ignore him again.
He then pokes me in the ribs.
I ignore him again. At least I try to. He hits a ticklish area, and I scrunch over to the side and bite my lip to prevent a laugh.
“Stop it!” I whisper-yell to him, scooting as far to the other side of my seat as possible. We already have one detention; we don’t need another.
“Just trying to get you to smile,” he whispers back. “Don’t be mad about the detention. I’ll take care of it.”
I roll my eyes. There’s no way he can take care of it. We earned it fair and square.
After a couple of minutes, he whispers, “You’re not mad, are you?”
I shake my head, still staring straight ahead. I’m not angry with him, more like myself.
That must be all he wanted, because he leaves me alone for the rest of the assembly.
When the speaker finally thanks us for our attention and leaves the stage, I turn and look at him. “Your parents are going to kill us.”
“No, they won’t,” he says, standing. “Let’s go talk to Mrs. Little.”
Adam smiles and shakes his head. “Twenty bucks says you won’t even have detention after Brad works his magic.”
“What?” I ask, glancing between the two of them.
“He’s a pro at negotiating his way out of these situations.”
“There’s nothing to negotiate,” I say. “They told us not to use phones, and we were playing on one.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Brad says, leading us out of our row and then through the doorway. “The principal told us to stop texting and playing games. We were doing neither.”
“That seems like a minor technicality.”
“Minor, but important,” Brad says with another smile. “Come on.”
I follow him to the office, where we wait for only five minutes before being let into the vice principal’s office.
“What can I do for you two?” Mrs. Little asks.
“Thanks for seeing us, ma’am. We’d like to discuss the detention slips you gave us,” Brad says, sitting in a chair opposite her desk. I take the other one and swallow against the lump in my throat.
“What’s there to discuss?”
“We were watching an important video on the phone, not texting or playing games.”
She raises her eyebrows. “And?”
“No one said we were not allowed to watch videos, especially important ones.”
She takes a deep breath and says, “That was inferred.”
“With all due respect, inferred rules can be confusing for students. If we were not allowed to use our phones at all, perhaps it would have been better to tell us to turn them off rather than ‘stop texting and playing games’?”
She shakes her head and asks, “Why was the video you were watching so important?”
“We were considering options for pets. You know that Hailey is in foster care, right?”
“Yes.”
“It’s been scientifically proven that pets can help heal trauma, especially in adolescents and teens. This could be an important piece of the puzzle for Hailey’s growth and development.”
“So, let me get this straight—you’re claiming that you weren’t aware that phone use was prohibited during the assembly because of poorly worded instructions? And, furthermore, that what the two of you were doing was more important than the speaker because it could have lifelong ramifications for Hailey?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Brad says with a smile, his dimple dancing with pride.
I sit motionless, staring at the two of them. I can’t believe Brad is even trying to argue this. It’s ridiculous. Of course they didn’t want us on phones. And baby pandas and otters are not going to change my life.
She taps her fingers on the desk for a few moments. “Considering your outstanding academic and athletic record, Bradley, I’ll let you two off with a warning this time. Let’s show more respect for our guests from now on, though.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Brad says, standing. “Thank you.”
I stand, my mouth gaping, and follow him outside, too stunned to say anything.
Adam’s waiting in the hall for us. “Well?” he asks.
“I—I guess I owe you twenty bucks,” I say, finally finding my voice.
“Nah, you don’t,” Adam says, rocking his shoulder into mine. “But I told you. He has everyone at this school wrapped around his little finger.”
He really does. I can’t believe how smooth he looked in there, getting us out of a punishment we absolutely deserved.
“Well?” Brad says, holding his hands out. “What’d you think?”
“That was impressive.”
“Glad I could help you out.”
“You do realize you’re also the one who got me into trouble, right?”
“Only because you have no sense of humor,” he says with a twinkle in his eye, teasing me. “If you had just laughed at the first video, I wouldn’t have had to find the others.”
“So, I’m completely responsible for getting us into trouble, and you’re completely responsible for getting us out of it?” I ask with raised eyebrows.
“Something like that,” he says with a smile, laying his arm across my shoulders. “We make a good team.”
I shake my head and smile. I wouldn’t call what we did today good teamwork, but at least I can still claim I’ve never had detention. I look up at his beaming face and say, “Well, thank you, Brad, for saving the day.”
“Anytime. That’s what I’m here for.”
He’s trying to be funny, but there’s some truth to what he’s saying. I used to lie awake at night, picturing a knight riding in on a white horse to whisk me away from everything. The face of the knight changed from my dad to Chase to people I didn’t know, but no matter who I pictured, I was always met by disappointment in the morning when my mom stumbled out of her bedroom and my stomach grumbled for food I wouldn’t get.
As I got older, I realized what a ridiculous dream that was. That’s what happens in movies, not real life. In real life, you wake up every morning and trudge through your day, hoping nothing too horrible happens. That was my life. I had accepted it. I figured it was the best I could ever hope for.
But maybe that doesn’t have to be my life. A few weeks with the Campbells and my life has taken an abrupt U-turn. Who would’ve thought a couple good decisions could change so much? The bleak, miserable future I had accepted is transforming before my eyes. All it took was surrounding myself with people I could count on. Like Brad, who now has his arm casually draped over my shoulders.
I smile up at him and say, “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” he replies, not realizing I’m thanking him for a lot more than just saving me from detention. He squeezes my shoulder and leads me down the hallway toward the cafeteria while more than a few people do a double take.
I have to bite my lip to stop myself from smiling. This is what life is like when you’re not simply trudging through your day.