High Score by Destiny Howell

Author:Destiny Howell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scholastic Inc.

“I can’t believe it,” Conor whispered as we watched Monty cash in his certificate for tokens. “He’s a total pushover. This is great!”

“Mm-hm.” His shy smile as he’d opened the door for us was playing in my head on a loop. He was genuinely excited to be making friends. I didn’t need to be a Face to read that.

“DJ? Yo, are you paying attention?”

“Huh?”

“Dude, get your head in the game. He’s coming back.”

“What? Oh, yeah, right.” I had to pull it together.

He came over with the fifty tokens divided among three little cups. “Here,” he said, holding two of them out. “There were two extra but I put them in these cups so you guys could have them.”

I could feel my karma levels dropping into negative numbers.

Conor clearly wasn’t having the same problem as me because he yanked away the cup he was offered and said, “Awesome! Let’s play Skee-Ball!”

“So,” Conor said as he slotted a token into his Skee-Ball machine. “I heard you’re new.”

“Yeah. My whole family moved from Canada because my mom got a job at the medical supply company in town.”

“Oh my gosh, Canada!” Conor mouthed when Monty glanced away from us to put in his own token. I quickly put a finger to my lips and then turned it to a nose scratch when Monty popped back up.

“Canada. Interesting. How do you like it here so far?”

He shrugged. “It’s OK. Kinda lonely.” He tugged nervously on his left jacket sleeve. “But it’s been fine. No one messes with me, so that’s good at least. And, now that you guys are hanging out with me, maybe I’ll start making friends.”

“I need to use the bathroom,” I said, setting down my cup of tokens and turning abruptly. I wasn’t even walking toward the bathroom; I was just walking away, like I could walk away from my guilt. Nope, it followed me, and so did Conor.

“Yo,” he said, grabbing my shoulder once we were hidden by a row of arcade cabinets. “What are you doing? You’re blowing it!”

“I can’t do it.”

“Do what? Play Skee-Ball and ask him some questions?”

“Manipulate him!”

“You manipulated Hailey,” he pointed out.

“That’s different.”

“How?”

“There was nothing behind that. She wouldn’t really care if she found out we were using her. But you saw him. He wants to make real friends!”

“So? Let’s play with him for a little bit. Make his day. Then get back to the job.”

“I can’t do this, Conor.”

He threw up his hands. “I knew it! This is about our last job, isn’t it?! You think it’s gonna turn out the same way but news flash! Monty isn’t—”

“Were you guys talking about me?”

For such a big dude, Monty was stealthy. Or maybe it was the combo of the loud arcade and our heated conversation. Either way, boom. There he was.

Conor and I shot each other a glance.

“No,” he said at the same time I said, “Yes.”

Monty’s shoulders dropped. “Oh. I get it.” He sighed and pulled out his phone, I guessed to call his brother.

“No, no, no.

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