Best Kept Secret Read Online Free Page B

beesting incident. Few traces of the real family were left behind. No photos even. That, too, was part of the Pinsky approach.
    â€œA person has to be able to imagine him- or herself living in a place,” Mrs. P. said.
    Nervously, I padded around upstairs. I found Forrest’s room quickly. I knew where it was because we used to visit when I was younger. It made me chuckle that so little had changed. His room still had a locomotive train theme and even train sheets and pillows on the bed. What really made me laugh is when I saw a worn old teddy bear on his bed. So cute! I thought about sliding the note under his pillow but then thought that was too personal. I decided to place it on top of his pillow, and then I bolted from his room and down the steps.
    My heart was pounding as my feet hit the landing and then carried me out the front door. I knew I had a small window of time when I could run back in and take the note and forget this ever happened. I thought about it for a long moment. Then I hopped aboard my bike, yelling “Bye, Piper!” as I raced toward home.
    I rode along, thinking of that last moment in his room. I had looked at the note on his pillow one final time and adjusted its angle. I’d folded it into a tabletop-football shape and labeled it “Ax-man.” I thought of how the note was resting there, waiting for Forrest to come home. I was happy that after Friday, I could finally stop wondering endlessly if Forrest liked me. I ached for his answer, a simple yes or no.

Eight
    You know how the days pass so glacially slow when you are waiting for something to happen, like your birthday or Christmas? Well, multiply that times ten, and that’s how time moved for the entire week that followed the note delivery. I wanted to speed up life, just hit the fast-forward button. But whenever I tell my mom that I wish time would move faster, she always says the same thing:
    â€œJemma, don’t play the ‘I’ll be happy when…’ game. Be happy in this moment. It won’t come again.”
    Can you tell she writes poetry, does yoga, and meditates? I thought so. You can probably picture her with dangly earrings and those half-glasses people wear when they start having trouble reading menus. Good old mom.
    But anyone who is young knows what I mean. Most days, nothing happens. So is it any wonder that I wanted to speed up time, especially if it meant not having to wait, biting my nails, for Forrest’s answer to my note? I wanted to scream: Which is it—YES OR NO?!
    A true gentleman would have given me his answer on Monday morning before school, so as not to let my heart twist into a pretzel. But no. Monday came and went. Forrest returned my nod in the hall as usual, and one time on the bus, but that was it. A nod, without words or anything special.
    Could the note have fallen off his bed or be somehow stuck between the bed and the wall? Or maybe he went to bed and never even saw it, and it’s now somewhere in his sheets? Or, even worse, if his mom took off the sheets to wash them, the note might have been reduced to flakes of wet paper snow.
    The bell rang, and I went off to algebra to count the fifty-three minutes until class would be over. Then I counted the fifty-three minutes of the next class, the next one, and the one after that. Then it was off to lunch, the one time all day I didn’t watch the clock.
    At our lunch table, we were still debating the Backward Dance. Bet was doing a survey, asking students if they thought the dance should go forward as planned. Ms. Russo and some others were pushing for a different format, one where everyone could just go on their own, no dates required. I hadn’t voted yet.
    â€œI love the idea of no dates,” Kate said. “No pressure.”
    â€œYou love that idea because you’ll be there with Brett either way,” I said.
    â€œWhat about you, Piper?”
    She just shrugged.
    â€œWho’d you ask? You