We reached Elm Street, the main street of our town, with all its green canvas awnings and the store names written in white on their scalloped hems.

“Let’s get a Snickers at Healey’s,” Ed said, and we turned down Elm instead of going straight on Winthrop to the house.

Becca Salinero and her little brother were choosing sodas from the cooler, their backs to us. I spun around and tried to leave but Ed grabbed me and whispered, “It’s her, isn’t it?”

I didn’t answer but it didn’t matter. He went directly to the cooler. I meant to leave the store but my legs were stuck in place.

“Don’t worry,” Grant said. “He’s good at this.”

“Good at what?”

“Good at making friends.”

He waited for them to choose their drinks. Becca’s little brother had taken off his shirt and stuffed the collar and sleeves down the back of his shorts so the rest of it flapped behind him. He was so skinny you could see every rib in 3D.

Ed pointed to the soda her brother had chosen and said, “What, no diet drink for you, Fatty?” And Becca laughed her deep laugh.

I hid in the back aisle while they talked. Becca and her brother paid and left.

Ed had found out that she was a counselor at the summer camp at the community center. When we got home, he said, we’d call up the center for the camp’s hours. And then, he explained as we stepped back into the sun and the heat pouring up from the sidewalk cement, we’d make our plan of attack.

If I hadn’t glimpsed her in the store, hadn’t been physically reminded of her, I might have protested. But I was putty and he knew it.

“Interesting choice,” Grant said, and they both cracked up.

It was true that Becca was going through an awkward stage. She had recently shot up, but only in the legs, so that, especially in shorts, her squat torso looked like it was supported by stilts. She had gotten her braces off in the spring, though now she wore some sort of thick retainer whose fake kitten-tongue pink made her real gums look gray and sickly.

“A diamond in the rough, perhaps,” Ed said, forcing a straight face. “Seriously, it shows good taste. She’s not hiding anything. She’s like a clear stream. That’s exactly what you want. I went for the other kind and it’s ruined my life.”

“Ruined your spring,” Grant said.

“Ruined my spring, summer, winter. What did I miss? Fall. God, I can’t even think about fall. Anyway, not quite as adorable as Celia Washburn maybe, a little Animal Kingdom.” Ed stretched his neck and pretended to rip leaves off a tree. Grant snorted and Ed’s voice quavered then righted itself as he finished: “But very sweet.”