Free Liar & Spy by Rebecca Stead

Safer.
    “Didn’t you come down here with Safer to walk the dogs?” She points to the courtyard door. “Is he outside?”
    “Um. He was .…”
    Safer comes walking out of the laundry room. “Hi, Mom.” He holds up two wet hands. “Just washing up. After the dogs.”
    “Good idea,” she says. “Listen, can you stay upstairs with Candy for a little while? I have to run an errand.”
    “Sure. I just have to drop off Ty and Lucky.” He looks at me. “Coming?”
    “Yeah. I have to stop by my apartment first, though.” Because my leg is covered in smelly brown gook.
    I get in the elevator with Safer’s mom, and Safer waves goodbye to us, smiling through the little glass window in the elevator door.
    Safer’s mom stares at my sneakers with a funny expression until we get to the lobby. “You’re welcome to join us for dinner, Georges,” she says when the door opens. “It’s Candy’s night to cook.”
    “Candy cooks dinner?”
    “Why not? I believe she’s planning to make peanut butter and bananas on hot dog buns.”
    “Um, that sounds good. But I should check with my dad.”
    She nods. “And maybe change your socks, while you’re at it.”
    I look down and see that one of my socks has that brown garbage juice all over it. I look up to say something, but the door is already closing.
    The phone is ringing before I can get my sneakers off. Safer is very fast on those stairs.
    “I have something to show you,” Safer says. “Come right away.”
    “I kind of freaked out back there,” I tell him. “I think your mom noticed.”
    “My mom is a very accepting person,” Safer says. “Don’t worry about it. Just come up right away.”
    “As soon as I wash my leg.”
    “Did you say you’re washing your legs?”
    “Never mind.”

    Upstairs, Safer is in his beanbag chair with a big smile on his face. He holds up a little gold-colored key.
    “Seriously? That was in the dryer?”
    “Pants pocket,” he says. He tosses the key to me, first doing a couple of fakes so I know it’s coming, but I still miss and have to pick it up off the floor. At least he doesn’t laugh.
    It’s a funny little key. It looks like it should open a miniature treasure chest. “I can’t believe you found this.”
    “Now we just have to figure out what it opens.”
    I think Safer pictures a little box of evil in a corner of Mr. X’s apartment, and he thinks that if he can find it, he’ll save the world, or at least a small part of Brooklyn.
    And who am I to say that he’s wrong?
    “We’ve got to get inside,” Safer says.
    “Inside Mr. X’s apartment.”
    He nods. “Exactly. Tomorrow.”
    “Tomorrow?” I say. “ Tomorrow tomorrow?”
    My cell phone rings. “My dad,” I tell Safer, flipping it open. And that’s when I remember that I was supposed to meet Dad downstairs at five o’clock to go to the orthodontist.
    “Sorry!” I tell him. “Be right down.”
    “I can’t stay for dinner,” I tell Safer.
    “Were you staying for dinner?” Candy appears in the doorway. She must have bat ears or something. Either that or she was standing in the hall, listening. “No one even bothered to tell me! I would have bought more bananas!”
    “That’s okay,” I tell her. “I really have to go. I have an orthodontist’s appointment.”
    “Really? Is your orthodontist in the city?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Will you be taking the D train, by any chance?”
    “Candy, no ,” Safer says, hauling himself out of his beanbag.
    “I’m just asking .”
    “I’m not sure,” I tell her. “Why?”
    “There’s a newsstand on the uptown D platform at Fifty-Ninth Street that sells giant SweeTarts. They’re really hard to find around here.” Her eyes look all lit up. It’s like she’s glowing.
    “If you happen to be there,” she says, glancing at Safer, “and you happen to see them, would you buy two packs for me? I’ll pay you back. I have the money. I can show you the money right now.”
    “That’s okay,” I say.