Free The Shadow Club Rising by Neal Shusterman Page B

your problem today, huh?"
    "Remember when you said you hated me?"
    He rolled his eyes. "Are we going to go through that again?"
    "Do you hate me enough to get me suspended? Do you hate me enough to get me thrown out of school?"
    He sat up, and answered me with the same directness I answered Mr. Greene.
    "No," he said, "I don't. I hate you enough to take the extra hamburger at dinner, so you don't get seconds."
    "Do you hate me enough to plant evidence on Alec's driveway?"
    "Are you accusing me of something?" He started to get that red-in-the-face look he always got when someone lit his microscopic fuse.
    "I'm just asking." I watched him closely, trying to gauge the truth in his answer.
    "No. I didn't." He thought for a moment, then said, "There was a time when I hated you more than anything and there are still times when I want to hate you, but I just can't—and unless you do something really stupid, I probably never will." Then he stormed across the room, and turned to face me again, but he kept his distance. "You're my best friend, OK? There, I said it. The guy who ruined my life is now my best friend. Pretty pathetic, huh?"
    "No, it's not," I said, feeling like a total jerk. There was no doubting his honesty about it.
    "It is pathetic," Tyson insisted, "because I know you're not really my friend at all."
    "What?"
    "You feel sorry for me . . . you feel guilty for what you did, but you really don't like me."
    "That's not true!"
    "Prove it," he said.
    I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. I couldn't prove to Tyson that I was his friend, any more than I could prove my innocence to Greene.
    "We'll never be on equal ground," said Tyson, "unless I ruin your life, and then turn around and save it, like you did to me. Then if you can tell me we're friends, that's when I'll believe you."
    I don't know if Greene had spoken to my parents, because they didn't talk to me about it. That, I think, was as unsettling as if I had been punished for something I didn't do. Still, I tried to convince myself that this was over; that three dirty tricks was the charm that would break the spell, and whoever was doing it would slink back into whatever hole they crawled out of. But, like I said, something was set loose in our school, and Alec, simply by being Alec, kept making himself the target. But what he did next—his own little counterattack—was as unforgivable as any of the pranks pulled against him. It wasn't a prank that he pulled, but it was despicable nonetheless. It was as mean-spirited as it was self-serving, but all it served to do was feed the fires of resentment.
    It happened on the day of the candidates' televised statements. About a year ago, our school had converted the audiovisual office into a television studio of sorts, and the school got wired for closed-circuit TV. This year, for the first time, each presidential candidate had recorded a five-minute campaign speech that would be televised throughout the entire ninth grade. I watched in social studies class—a class I didn't share with either Cheryl or Alec. Tommy Nickols came on first. The highlight of his rather dull speech was a top ten list—the top ten reasons why he should be voted in. It was supposed to be very funny, but was in fact so unfunny that people were laughing hysterically by the end of it. Unfortunately, they were laughing at Tommy and not with him. Next came Katrina's speech, which seemed like one long, rambling telephone conversation with herself. Cheryl's speech was masterful, as I knew it would be, and then came Alec's. No one, not even me, was prepared for what he did.
    "Hello, friends and classmates," his speech began. "It is with great regret that I share with you some information I discovered just the other day. Something that every one of you has a right to know." We all listened closely, wondering what sort of bombshell Alec had to drop. Like everything else he did, it fell like a nuke.
    "The video you are about to see was filmed a few