Free The Secret Identity of Devon Delaney by Lauren Barnholdt Page B

something. “It’s going to be fun.”
    “We have to hit Nordstrom,” she says. She grabs my locker door and swings it out, almost hitting me in the face. “Devi, where’s your mirror?” She frowns.
    “I don’t have one,” I say.

    “You don’t have one? Why not?” She runs her hands through her hair and pulls a small mirror out of her purse. “Never mind, we’ll get you one today.” She runs her tongue over her braces and smiles at her reflection.
    “Listen, I have to be home by six,” I tell her. I slam my locker door shut. The metal makes a clanging noise that reverberates through the hall.
    “That doesn’t give us much time,” she says, frowning. “Why do you have to be home so early?” She leans in close to me and lowers her voice. “Is everything okay with your parents?”
    “Yeah,” I say. “Everything’s totally fine.” In fact, last night my parents stayed up until after midnight, watching DVDs and giggling in the family room. I know this because I was still awake and I could hear them all the way upstairs. It was nice of Lexi to ask, though, and I realize how cool it will be to spend time alone, just the two of us, without having to worry about anyone else being around, saying things that could cause problems. Not only is this whole lie causing problems in my friendship with Mel, but with Lexi also. I swallow around the lump in my throat.
    “Cool,” Lexi says. “So why do you have to be home?”

    “Because Luke is coming over to work on our project,” I tell her. I don’t tell her my mom is sketched out because she thinks Luke might be my boyfriend.
    “Fun,” Lexi says, rolling her eyes. “I gotta get to homeroom.” She flounces off down the hall, her hair bouncing behind her and her skirt flouncing. Lexi is very flouncy.
    “Where were you this morning?” Mel asks me later in study hall. “I waited for you by my locker.” Crap. I totally forgot that I was supposed to meet Mel this morning. That’s the second time in two days I’ve forgotten about her.
    “I’m so sorry,” I tell her. “I got to school late and I was rushing around to make it to homeroom on time.” Which isn’t actually that much of a lie. I did get to school late. My mom had to drive me because I missed my bus. I’m still struggling to keep my eyes open after my late night.
    “That’s okay,” Mel says. She pulls open her binder and takes out a sheet of paper. “Did you work on the English assignment?”
    “No,” I say. “I didn’t get a chance to start it last night. I was busy planning some of my social studies project.” And looking for clothes to wear until really, really late.

    “Oh,” she says, looking a little disappointed.
    “But we can work on it now,” I say, pulling out my book. “It probably won’t be that hard.”
    “Cool,” she says, pulling out her English anthology. “Did you get a chance to write in the notebook?”
    I pull our BFF notebook out of my bag and hand it to her. I finished the note I had started writing to her in study hall last night. It was one of the things I did while staying up super late. I wrote her a really nice note, talking about how much I appreciated everything she’s done for me lately. Of course, I kept a lot of it deliberately vague, since, you know, I wouldn’t want it falling into the wrong hands.
    “Thanks,” Mel says. She slips it into her bag just as Brent Madison walks by our table.
    “Hey, Melissa,” he says, nodding his head at her as he goes by. He’s with his friends James Johnson and Brad Button, and they nod at us as well. They’re all in their football jerseys, since our school has a game tonight.
    “Hey,” Mel squeaks back. A stunned look comes over her face.
    “Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod!” I shriek once Brent is out of earshot. Melissa has had a crush onBrent since, like, forever. Last year at the sixth-grade dance she spent the whole time obsessing over whether or not she should ask him to dance. She finally