I needed to do something.

I climbed over the ticket counter, turned on the sink, and started washing pastry guns.

Squirt. Scrub.

That kid? It had to be me. Josh had been visiting his grandparents last Saturday.

Scrub. Rinse.

Besides, Josh was taller than most adults. And since January, he had shoulders like that guy in the circus who wears leopards around his neck like scarves. Nobody was going to call him “that kid.”

Squirt. Scrub.

And maybe we should let kids run for president! At least kids know when something’s not working and say it. And—

“Hey!”

I dropped the pastry gun, which was now cleaner than it had been when I bought it. I turned around.

It was Josh.

“Hey, do you know how to delete comments on our site?”

Josh let his hockey duffel fall to the floor. “Oh, jeez. I forgot. I usually do that, you know, but I was just…” He shook his hair in front of his face. “Did you see, I mean, was there something…” He didn’t finish.

But Josh didn’t need to finish. The truth was floating right over his head in all caps.

Chapter 3

“You knew we had a problem,” Josh said as he kicked his hockey bag behind the counter.

“But I thought we had time to figure it out.”

“We did.” Kick. “We do.” Kick.

“‘Don’t go to The Doughnut Stop?’ Obviously not!” I shut the water off so hard, the cold knob came off in my hand.

“Why are you mad at me? I didn’t write the stupid comments.” He’d turned to face me now but he was still hiding behind his hair.

“Because you lied to me.”

“I didn’t lie. I…withheld information because I thought sharing it would have a…destructive effect.”

I rolled my eyes, cracking a smile against my will.

In addition to being the star of the Petersville Ice Kings, Josh is the best English student at Waydin. It’s like all those words from all those books on the shelves in the library snuck out in the middle of the night and climbed upstairs into Josh’s brain while he was sleeping. He doesn’t even remember the names of all the books he’s read.

“What if I had told you?” he said. “How would knowing about those comments have changed anything?”

“That’s not the point.” I screwed the knob back into the faucet. “You should have told me.”

Josh blew out hard, sending hair flying. “I didn’t know what to do. I’m sorry. I just didn’t want to…”

“I know,” I said, because I did—because the reason he hadn’t wanted me to know was the reason he was my best friend in the first place. And now that the shock was wearing off, I could see his point. What good would my knowing have done?

But some part of me just wouldn’t let it go. “How many have there been? Total. Like these.”

“What does it matter?”

“I just want to know,” I said, but I knew why it mattered. For the first time ever, I had a thing: The Doughnut Stop. I even had a nickname, “Doughnut Boy.” There was no way I could go back to being plain old Tris.