My face felt like it was on fire. I reached for the token. It was cool. I walked to my row in the back, where my friends Scratchy and Carlos sat, trying to put a broken pen back together.

“One time, I was messing with a spring from one of these things and it dug into my finger!” Scratchy pretended to whimper. “When I showed it to the teacher, she almost fainted!” Carlos and Scratchy laughed. They stopped when they saw me.

“Hey, Arcade,” Scratchy said. “I’m real sorry about Doug moving.”

“Yeah.” Carlos smoothed his hair. “That’s a terrible thing. He’s a really nice guy.”

“Wah, wah, wah, wah! One less goofball in the neighborhood,” one of the Tolleys chimed in from the middle of the room. Today they were wearing matching wrinkled blue polo shirts.

“Hey, Tolleys, can one of you smile for me? It will make me feel better.” Sure enough, the one with the chipped tooth smiled. Unfortunately, I still couldn’t remember which one had the chipped tooth. I gave him a little wave. “Thanks. It means a lot.”

“Don’t mention it. It’s the least I could do after you helped me with my tree house project last year.”

Casey! Write it DOWN, Arcade. Casey has the chipped tooth!

“OKAY, PEOPLE. TODAY IS YOUR FIRST TEST OF MIDDLE SCHOOL. I HOPE YOU ARE READY!”

Mr. Dooley was extra loud this morning. He walked over to his desk, inserted a little key in the top right drawer, and pulled out some papers, which he began to pass out. “Bailey, can you please grab a stack of computer scan pages from the back table and make sure every student gets one? DID YOU ALL BRING YOUR NUMBER 2 PENCILS?”

I raised my hand.

“YES, MR. LIVINGSTON? ARE YOU MISSING SOMETHING?”

Besides my best friend?

“Um, yes . . . sir. I . . . uh . . . forgot my pencil.”

And I sort of forgot that we were having a test too.

“WELL, YOU ARE IN LUCK, BECAUSE I ALWAYS HAVE PENCILS AVAILABLE FOR THOSE WHO ARE ILL-PREPARED.” Mr. Dooley pointed to a jar in the corner by the sink that held a few pencils. They each had a huge plastic sunflower taped to the end. I walked over and grabbed one, sniffed it, and everyone laughed.

“SORRY I HAD TO MAKE THEM SO OBTRUSIVE. IT’S THE ONLY WAY TO BE SURE NO ONE WALKS OUT WITH MY PENCILS!”

By the time I reached my desk, Bailey had made it to the back row with the computer scan sheets. She gave me a sad look. “I’m sorry about Doug. He drove me crazy when we were on the career expo team together, but other times he made me laugh really hard, which eased my anxiety.” She placed her last scan sheet on my desk. “Good luck with the test.” Then she walked back to her desk, cracking her knuckles.