Dear Mike,
If you ever want to know what panic smells like, it’s not sweat. It’s Expo marker and cafeteria ketchup and that chemically preserved mango scent that follows Keith around like a curse.
Today started out normal-ish, which at Dover Middle School means “nobody has cried in the hallway yet.” Trevor and I were at our lockers, still recovering from the whole Cream Puff situation. (Yes, Phil’s Sharpie masterpiece is gone now, but I swear my forehead still feelsbullied.)
Then Vice Principal Greeley’s voice crackled over the intercom.
“Students, please remember that lockers are school property. Random locker checks will take place this week.”
Trevor froze like someone had just announced random wand checks at Hogwarts.
“Random locker checks?” he hissed. “Julian, that’s like… the school version of a search warrant.”
I didn’t answer, because at that exact moment, Zoey Ball appeared.
Not like, walked up normally.
No—she came out of nowhere, from behind the trophy case, holding something in her fist like she’d just stolen the Declaration of Independence.
“Hey,” she said, and glanced both ways down the hallway like she was in a spy movie. “I need you guys.”
Trevor pointed at himself. “Us? Why?”
Zoey leaned closer. “Because you’re invisible.”
I almost laughed, but then I remembered: people literally wrote Cream Puff on my face and walked away. So, yeah. Invisible.
Zoey opened her hand. It was the Polaroid.
Phil M’Kraken, grinning like a villain in a low-budget superhero movie, giving Keith a thumbs-up beside her busted-up locker.
“Evidence,” she whispered.
Trevor’s eyes got huge. “You still have that?”
“Obviously,” Zoey said, like Trevor had asked if she still had a brain.
Then she did something even more terrifying.
She smiled.
“VP Greeley is doing locker checks,” she said. “Which means someone is nervous. Which means someone might slip up. Which means… we can catch them.”
I swallowed. “Zoey, I do not want to be involved in any more drama. I already got Sharpied.”
Zoey nodded like she respected my feelings.
Then she immediately ignored them.
“Not drama,” she said. “A trap.”
And that’s when Trevor made the fatal mistake of looking interested.
“What kind of trap?” he asked.
Zoey’s eyes gleamed. “A locker trap.”
Mike, I know what you’re thinking.
Lockers don’t trap people. Lockers trap textbooks.
But Zoey had a plan.
She pulled a crumpled sticky note from her pocket and unfolded it. On it was a diagram that looked like something you’d draw if you were planning a heist at the mall.
“Okay,” she said. “We bait Keith. He can’t resist laughing at people’s stuff. He literally wrote ‘lol weak sauce’ on Harper’s poem. He’s addicted to being a jerk.”
Trevor winced. “That was messed up.”
Zoey continued. “We set up a locker with something he can’t not mess with. Like… a fake apology note. Or a fake poem. Or a fake bottle of hair gel.”
At the word hair gel, Trevor made a face.
“Keith’s weakness,” Zoey said.
I shook my head. “And how does this not get us suspended?”
Zoey pointed at the Polaroid. “Because we don’t do anything. We just watch.”
Trevor nodded slowly. “So, like… nature documentary style.”
Zoey smiled again. “Exactly. We’re the cameramen. Keith is the raccoon.”
I hate that this made sense.
We met after lunch by the science hallway, where nobody ever goes except kids who need the nurse, and the one kid who eats paste. Zoey said that was perfect because “criminals love low foot traffic.”
Trevor whispered, “Zoey, you’re talking like you’ve committed crimes.”
Zoey shrugged. “I’ve committed observations.”
She chose locker B-17because it was empty and the lock was slightly broken, like it had given up on life.
Then she pulled out the bait.
A small bottle of gel.
Not Keith’s actual gel, obviously.
It was Trevor’s.
“Trevor,” I said. “Why do you own hair gel?”
Trevor looked offended. “Because I have hair.”
Zoey held it up like a sacred artifact.
“Perfect,” she said. “Now we need a note.”
She took out a pen and wrote on a torn piece of notebook paper:
KEITH,
I’m sorry for taking your gel.
Meet me after school behind the gym.
—H
Trevor stared. “That’s so fake.”
Zoey added:
PS: don’t tell Phil
Trevor blinked. “Okay, that’s… actually believable.”
Zoey folded the note and tucked it under the gel bottle in the locker.
Then she turned to me.
“Julian,” she said. “Your job is to be normal. If anyone asks, you were here getting your binder. Your face looks trustworthy.”
Mike, my face does not look trustworthy. My face looks like it’s one prank away from becoming a yearbook meme.
But I nodded anyway.
Trevor’s job was to stand at the end of the hallway and watch for teachers.
Zoey’s job was… Zoey’s job.
She positioned herself by the drinking fountain with her backpack open, pretending to look for ChapStick, except she was actually holding the Polaroid like a weapon.
The trap was set.
All we had to do was wait for Keith to take the bait.
And, Mike… I swear on my life that the first person who walked down that hallway wasn’t Keith.
It wasn’t Phil either.
It was Harper.
She walked slowly, like someone who didn’t want to be seen, and stopped directly in front of locker B-17.
Trevor’s eyes went wide from across the hall.
Zoey’s smile vanished.
Harper reached for the locker.
And before any of us could move, she yanked it open.
The gel bottle toppled forward.
The fake apology note fluttered to the floor.
Harper stared at it.
Then she looked up.
Right at us.
Her face didn’t look angry.
It looked… hurt.
Zoey’s fingers tightened around the Polaroid.
Trevor muttered, “Oh no.”
And I realized something, Mike.
We didn’t just set a trap.
We set the stage.
And now the wrong person was standing in the spotlight.
Hope you liked today’s entry,
Julian Tran,
7th grade,
Dover Middle School
ns216.73.217.116da2
and then Add to home screen.