If that wasn’t enough of a surprise, the audience was abruptly shocked—then dazzled—when Emelyn suddenly launched her wheelchair off the edge of the stage. A budding wheelchair-stunt enthusiast, Emelyn made a perfect landing and then left the event surrounded by her friends, leaving the crowd cheering. When asked what inspired her to do this, Emmie shrugged. “Sometimes you just want to show what you can do. Ask any athlete.”

When asked whether he felt the school buildings’ current level of accessibility was sufficient, or how many students and staff at ELPJHS would potentially benefit from improved architectural accessibility, Dr. Bruce Grayling, principal at ELPJHS, said he would “be certainly looking into the matter.”

According to several school board members who were in the audience, the accessibility issue will be on the agenda at next month’s board meeting. Community input is welcomed.

“Your dad’s going to kill us, Emmie,” Ale says cheerfully as she unloads a stack of beekeeping supplies onto one end of the longest new worktable.

“Nope.” I finish trimming the piece of fabric in my hand and set the scissors down. “Not this time. Was his idea.”

Ale and I are trying out the brand-new workspace in the shop that Dad helped us set up. It’s got long, low tables, stacked and labeled plastic totes, and even one of his big tool chests, freshly cleaned and emptied of tools. Plenty of storage for supplies for our shop, plus loads of space to spread out and work. Dad said that with as hard as Ale and me have been going at it, the least he could do was help us with some better infrastructure. Especially since he can’t exactly work in three shop bays at once.

Same old Dad. Always the logistics guy.

The new spot’s perfect, though. Ale and I already have our wall thermometers hung up, and pictures of my wheels and her beehive to help keep us motivated.

“How much longer you think it’s going to take us?” Ale asks, as if she’s read my mind.

I ball up a fabric scrap and toss it at her. “Depends how much time I’m going to be spending with you and those bee books.” Going to have to get to work on that bee fear of mine, too.

Ale looks pointedly over at the half-pipe across the work bay—my biggest rush and worst temptation by far these days. Good thing Devontae and me managed to scrape a B-minus on our project proposal … and have a few more weeks to write the final presentation.

“Okay, okay.” I give in. “We’ll keep each other motivated.”

Ale takes a closer look at the latest wheelchair bag I’m piecing out. “Another cusswords one?” She raises her eyebrows. “I thought you gave those up?”

“I did,” I tell her, then explain I’m sending this one as a gift to a certain island in Alaska. To thank a certain cuss-loving, salmon-catching grandma for giving me some good advice when I needed it. She was right about a lot of things—I do need to find my voice in my own way, which isn’t exactly the same as hers. Or my mom’s. Or anyone’s but mine.