We’re in the hallway now, and Mr. Hauser is saying the stuff teachers usually say, like, “This is a school, and for most of the students, this is an ordinary school day. They’re trying to learn. . . .” Some of the boys kind of snicker. “I’m ignoring that,” he says, “and what we’re going to do now is walk as quietly as we can—and that means without talking—to the gym, where . . .”

“Of course I know,” I tell Mabley.

“I just didn’t want you to think . . . the joke is on you, because it’s just something dumb . . . they say to each other. It’s like being included.”

But then Ms. Kaminski sees us talking and puts a finger to her lips.

The LBJ gym is like any other school gym but bigger. There are bleachers on either side, with groups of kids from different schools sitting on them, and rows and rows of tables set up on the court itself, which shines under the lights. Everybody’s talking; it’s not loud exactly, but there are a lot of small noises coming from different places. It’s very disorienting, like being in a swimming pool. It’s almost like even if you do say something you can’t hear yourself because the ceiling is so high it all just sort of drifts away.

All the kids from my school separate into their different nerd groups, so now it’s just me and Pete and Laura and Ms. Kaminski. Pete is still in his good mood, he’s having a good time. Laura is quietly concentrating; she doesn’t talk much either. There are two rounds of Number Sense: one in the morning, and then one after lunch, if we make it through. The team competition and the individual competition happen at the same time. Ms. Kaminski doesn’t know yet whether if we make it into the next round as a team we’ll automatically be considered for the individual competition, too.

“I’m trying to get clarification,” she says.

Sometimes when I look at my teachers now, I see my mom—the way she has to pretend every day and put on makeup and a matching outfit, just to go to school and do her job. That’s not the real person. Nobody would really want to say things like “trying to get clarification” if somehow they weren’t forced to, but my mom likes her job, too. Sometimes she seems happier at school, talking to the kids or with other teachers, than she does at home with me and Granma. So I don’t know. Ms. Kaminski has decided to be the kind of teacher who wears a lot of bright clothes and necklaces and bracelets, even though she’s isn’t particularly young or pretty, but she’s very good at being that person.

For some reason Pete has started saying gracias all over the place but not like the Spanish word—but like, grassy-ass, like he’s never actually heard anyone speak Spanish in his life. It’s incredibly annoying. So when Ms. Kaminski gives us our pencil packs, with number two pencils and a separate extra-large eraser (she’s got them all ready and says we can keep the clear plastic case afterward, with one of those zips you just slide across the opening—it says Hornets Math on the side, and I know she probably paid for them herself), Pete says, “Grassy-ass,” forgetting that he’s talking to a teacher, but maybe not really, because Ms. Kaminski doesn’t say anything. Then we have to find our seats and the competition begins.