Access Denied (and other eighth grade error messages) Read Free

never looking back at us—the eighth graders.
    “Your hair looks great,” Jilly said as the bus lurched down the street.
    “No thanks to you,” I laughed. Back in July she’d tried to put red highlights in my hair and turned parts of it orange. Not
     attractive. Now it was back to plain brown. But the sun had brought out some natural red and I’d gotten it cut so it fell
     softly around my face.
    “Yeah, well, I
thought
I knew what I was doing.” She laughed and brushed her own blondish-brown hair over her shoulder. She had it pulled back in
     a barrette with two tiny braids hanging beneath it, tied off with beads. Her light eyeshadow brought out the gold flecks in
     her eyes and her blush and mascara were just right. Of course, she started wearing makeup at the beginning of seventh grade
     so she had lots of practice, plus two older sisters who gave her tips. I was pretty new at the makeup game and didn’t wear
     much. Jilly tried to get me to wear more, but it felt weird, so I didn’t. And I never wore any when I played sports, though
     lots of girls did. I mean, it was
sports.
Get a grip.
    “So,” Jilly said, bringing me back to the bus. “Is Mark in any of your classes?”
    Oh, here we go. She thought I still
like
liked him.
    The bus screeched to a stop and Kara got on, sitting two rows ahead of us with some of her friends. She hadn’t ridden our
     bus last year because her mom drove her. But now her mom was working so she had to take the bus.
    Jilly watched Kara. “It’s very rare that girls and boys can just be friends, you know. There has to be the exact right mix
     of things.”
    I sighed. I knew she wouldn’t give it up.
    “I guess Mark and I have the right mix,” I said.
    Tapping a polished nail on the seat in front of her, Jilly shook her head. “There has to be absolutely no physical attraction,
     you should have things in common but not things that might bring you together romantically, and it helps if you’re both involved
     with someone else.”
    “We’re friends,” I said.
    “Because he has a girlfriend.” She applied lip gloss using a small mirror.
    “We’d be friends even if he didn’t have a girlfriend.”
    “Not for long,” Jilly said. “It’s the
When Harry Met Sally
syndrome.”
    “The what?”
    “It’s an old movie my mom told me about.” Jilly pulled out a mirror and lip gloss. “It’s about how men and women can’t ever
     really be just friends.”
    “That’s crazy,” I said.
    Jilly raised an eyebrow. “If you try to be real friends with a boy, friends like you and I are, it won’t stay just friends.
     It will always turn into something more.”
    “Do you have proof of this?” I asked. “In real life?”
    “Well, no,” Jilly admitted. “But I bet if we thought about it, we could come up with some.” She rubbed her lips together before
     shoving the tube and mirror into her makeup bag.
    “You can look me right in the eye and tell me you have absolutely no feelings at all for Mark ‘Cute Boy’ Sacks?”
    I cringed at the nickname I had used for him in my blog last year. “Don’t call him that,” I whispered.
    “No one’s listening,” she said, leaning closer. “So?”
    “He’s my friend, Jilly. Geez. Not everything is about romance, you know.”
    She sighed. “Okay, so I’m a little bit jealous.” She grinned her look-at-my-mouth grin. “Do I have anything in my braces?”
     She’d gotten them right after the spring dance last year.
    “All clear,” I said. Then, “Jealous?”
    Jilly ran her tongue over her teeth. “I wish Mark and I could have stayed friends. He’s really nice and he was easy to talk
     to.” She sighed. “But it just felt weird afterward, though it’s easier now that so much time has passed and we’re both going
     out with other people.”
    I nodded, grateful to see Rosie getting on the bus. Even though Rosie had her share of crushes, she wasn’t into talking about
     it all the time so I could count on her to