Shades of Simon Gray by Joyce McDonald Read Free Book Online

secretary’s printer, anyway? Who’s got Abel Dodge’s English class?”
    She looked at Kyle, who shrugged. She and Kyle were in the same English class, and it wasn’t Abel Dodge’s. They both turned to Danny. “It was you, wasn’t it?” Devin said. “You’re the one who printed out the English test to the wrong printer.”
    “Hey, how was I supposed to know where the damn test was going to end up? It was an accident. It wouldn’t have happened if Simon hadn’t bolted on me before the job was done.”
    “Meaning what?” Devin said. Her chest was so tight she could barely take a breath. She was just now remembering that Simon had promised to come to her rehearsal after school last Thursday.
    Danny shrugged. “He had to meet someone. Like you’d have thought it was the President or something.Like he couldn’t wait five more minutes for me to print out the test?”
    “So you printed it out yourself after he’d found the file for you?” Devin said.
    “Well, yeah. Why not? I told him I could do it myself. No biggie.”
    “Apparently,” Devin said, clenching her teeth, “you were wrong about that. God, what a moron.”
    “It’s done, okay?” Kyle said, breaking into the conversation. “Blaming Danny or Simon or anyone at this point is a waste of time.” He rubbed his eyes, trying to collect his thoughts. “They know someone’s gotten into the system. They know it was the English test they were after. They’ll be looking for anything suspicious.” He turned to Danny. “When’s your test?”
    “You mean, when
was
it?”
    “You already took it?” Devin shook her head. “Oh, god. It’s over.”
    “What? I ace all my tests,” Danny said. “They’re not going to suspect me. They’ll be looking for some kid who usually screws up and suddenly pulls an A plus.” He was on his feet, pacing in front of the fireplace. “If I flunked the exam it would look a hell of a lot more suspicious. I’ve been acing most of my tests since I was a sophomore. They think I’m a frigging genius. If I’d suddenly blown this one, it’d send up red flags for sure.”
    “He’s right,” Kyle conceded. “We can’t do anything to call attention to ourselves.”
    “Oh, really?” Devin said. “Have you considered howwe’re all going to get through the rest of senior year without messing up?”
    “Two and a half months till graduation,” Danny said. “We can chalk it up to senioritis. We all got into the schools we wanted.”
    Devin ignored this last remark. Although she’d been accepted by Lafayette, she was still hoping to hear from Cornell, even though most universities had sent their acceptance letters and packets, and their denials, more than a week earlier. By now almost all the kids in Bellehaven High who had applied the past winter knew what their options were. “The admissions directors will expect us to keep our grades up,” she warned. “You can’t just start flunking courses and expect them to chalk it up to senioritis.”
    “Who said anything about flunking?” Kyle frowned at her. “We’re not exactly a remedial teacher’s nightmare. Who says we can’t keep our grades up for the next two months? We just have to study. You can manage that, can’t you?”
    Devin looked away. She hated it when Kyle made her feel stupid. And she was still steaming because he hadn’t told her sooner about the conversation between Schroder and McCabe.
    “We’re going to have to take this one day at a time,” Kyle said. “For now, we do nothing. Except keep our ears open. If we see anyone new spending lots of time in the computer lab, especially after hours, that’s a bad sign. If they start taking PCs out for ‘repair,’ also not good. We’vegot to find a way to ride this out. Maybe they’ll never figure out what happened. There’s only one person in Bellehaven High smart enough to do that.”
    They all nodded.
    “Simon,” Danny said, barely above a whisper.

    With the heat wave in its third