The Secret Recipe for Moving On by Karen Bischer (ebook reader for manga txt) 📕

“Is that so?” Luke says. Then he grins at me in a way that I swear to god makes me think he can read my mind. “Everything all right?”

“I’m a little stressed with classes and stuff, you know,” I say, heat creeping into my face.

“Ah, don’t let our in-class competition stress you out,” Luke says. “We may be tied for second place, but that’s not the end of the world.”

We all kind of stare at the dry-erase board with the group rankings hung up at the front of the room. The Bukowskis are still leading everyone, followed by us and Synergy, then Jersey Strong, then the Bakers.

“But tied with Synergy isn’t exactly beating them now, is it?” I say, and I know it comes out as snappish as it sounds in my head because Luke’s eyes widen in surprise. I can’t tell if it’s fueled by my annoyance by the sex dreams or the frustration that somehow, no matter how hard we work in class, we can’t seem to pull ahead of Hunter and Brynn for longer than a day or two.

“Sorry. I shouldn’t have asked Mrs. Sanchez about the extra credit for our day at the races in front of everyone,” I say. “We’d be ahead of them now if not for that.”

“Yeah, but how were you supposed to know they’d do an activity, too?” Isaiah says.

I glance over at Synergy, where Brynn is lecturing Steve for brushing too much milk on top of their scones. “Oh, I totally should’ve known.”

“We at least need Jared’s group knocked out of first or I’ll hurt someone,” A.J. mutters as he sprinkles sugar on top of our scones.

“We’re only ten points out of first,” Isaiah says. “Totally catch-able.”

A.J. lifts our cookie sheet full of scones and places it in the oven. We survey the rest of the kitchens, and it looks as if we’re the first ones to get our scones baking. “That ought to buy us a few points,” A.J. says.

“That ought to buy us few points,” a mocking voice parrots from nearby.

We swoop around to see Jared, sporting a paisley beret today, opening the refrigerator and shaking his head at us.

“You got a problem, jackass?” A.J. asks.

“No,” Jared says, clutching a fist to his chest, and making a face like he’s about to fake cry. “I’m just so touched that you guys have come together so well. You’re like a Hallmark movie or something.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Mrs. Sanchez watching us from her perch at the front of the room. I nudge A.J., in an effort to keep him from blowing up, but he ignores me.

“Dude, I swear to god, if you—”

“I have a question, Jared,” I interject cheerfully. “Do you wear your beret to keep from getting cold when you’re standing in front of the fridge for so long or are you just trying to hide premature male pattern baldness?”

Luke bursts out laughing, a funny, high-pitched cackle. I notice even the rest of Jared’s group is fighting a smile. Jared, however, scowls at me. If Mrs. Sanchez notices this is going down, she doesn’t say anything.

“Shut up, Ellie” is the only thing Jared can come up with. He fills a measuring cup with milk from the refrigerator, then storms off to his kitchen in a huff. I suspect I’ll be the victim of some kind of mean-spirited blind item on The Buzz tonight as a result.

Isaiah is giggling and Luke is wiping tears from his eyes and patting me on the shoulder, making me all tingly. But A.J.’s face is stony.

“Why didn’t you let me say what I needed to say?”

“Because Mrs. Sanchez was watching and I didn’t want to lose any points. You want to beat Jared, right?”

“I don’t need a babysitter,” he says sulkily as he starts to clean off the counter.

Luke shakes his head as if to say, “Let him be.” So I back off and return to the sink, where I wring out the sponge and watch A.J. scrub the counters so hard, his paper towels rip apart.

“Okay, everyone,” Mrs. Sanchez says a few minutes later. “Since you’ve all got your scones in the ovens, I wanted to make an announcement.”

For a moment, and I have no idea where this comes from, I’m terrified she’s going to tell us we have to switch our groups. Like what she has just seen go down between my group and Jared has inspired her to shake things up a bit in the name of bonding.

“As you may know, the winter dance is scheduled for December fifth,” she says, and I’m flooded with relief. “And every year at the dance, there’s a refreshment table. This year, in the interest of saving money, the school has asked if my classes will provide homemade snacks. And they’re going to need people to man the tables.”

The whole class groans, but Mrs. Sanchez holds up her hands.

“But since I have six classes, I’ve figured out a way for this to work. Whichever group is last in points from each class will have to work the table for a half hour.”

I check the dry-erase board. We’re only twenty points ahead of Jersey Strong and thirty ahead of the Bakers, and there’s four weeks of class left before the dance. We may be tied for second, but it’s not a far fall to the bottom. I have no plans to go to the dance as it is and I’m certainly not looking forward to the prospect of being forced to watch Hunter and Brynn slow dance while I dole out cookies and brownies to the hungry masses.

Callie Gorman, one of the Bakers, who is always on the verge of making a grandstanding speech (she once told me she was a suffragette hooker in her past life), stands up. “We’re being forced to partake in after-school activities because the school board is cheap?”

I can’t argue with her there.

“You won’t be forced into anything, Ms. Gorman, if your group