“Nothing happens to me. I sit around all day. Sometimes I sit in the yard, sometimes I go for a bike ride. Nothing happens.”

“Write what you’re thinking about, write what you’re feeling.”

“I don’t really think anything.”

“We both know that’s not true, Ben.” But a few minutes later, she says, “Just write anything. Write down the weather.”

So that’s what I do. Every morning I check the temperature on Granma’s outdoor thermometer, which is shaped like a fish for some reason and is nailed to the wall by the back door. After breakfast, I describe what I had for breakfast, and I check the overnight scores in the sports page and write some of those down, too. But sometimes I add a few lines before going to bed, about what I did that day, before Mom turns my lights off. It’s usually a good excuse for staying up a little later. Sometimes I write about where I went on my bike, the different routes, or list what we watched on TV after dinner. It turns out to be pretty easy to fill a page.

Then it’s the new year and school starts again.

Mom wakes me up at six thirty in the morning, which hurts again, because I’m used to getting up whenever I want. But I put on my clothes and brush my teeth and eat a bowl of Cheerios and head out the door. It’s still dark outside, and it feels like this is real now, this is my life.

Mabley is already at the bus stop, talking to other kids, but she stops talking and comes over to give me a hug. “Did you have a good Christmas? What did you get?” she says, but then the bus arrives and she climbs on with other people. I sit behind her and I can hear their conversation.

Some girl says, “It doesn’t feel like Christmas unless you at least see some snow.” Her grandparents live in Colorado; she went skiing on Echo Mountain.

Mabley says, “For me it doesn’t feel like Christmas unless I’m clearing out horse manure from the stable. I guess everybody’s different.”

Then we drive under the highway, and through the neighborhood streets around the school, and pull into the parking lot. It’s just another school day.

In social studies class, Mr. Tomski pulls me aside after the bell rings. “I look forward to seeing you at basketball practice today.”

I stare at him.

“Your mother said you wanted to be the manager,” he says. “Just go to the main gym after the last bell. I’ll show you what to do—it’s all pretty straightforward.”

When I don’t say anything, he puts his hand on my shoulder. “Give it a try, son. Everything looks worse from the outside. We’ll have some fun today.”

After lunch, I run into my mother in the hallway—she’s talking to one of the other teachers, and laughing, the way she does sometimes with other people, because she wants them to like her.