Being from New York, my glimpses of ocean – at least the kind with a beach – had been few and far between. I couldn’t help gasping when I saw it. And when I gasped, everybody stopped talking – except for Sleepy, who was, of course, asleep.

‘What?’ my mother asked, alarmed. ‘What is it?’

‘Nothing,’ I said. I was embarrassed. Obviously, these people were used to seeing the ocean. They were going to think I was some kind of freak that I was getting so excited about it. ‘Just the ocean.’

‘Oh,’ said my mother. ‘Yes, isn’t it beautiful?’

Dopey went, ‘Good curl on those waves. Might have to hit the beach before dinner.’

‘Not,’ his father said, ‘until you’ve finished that term paper.’

‘Aw, Dad!’

This prompted my mother to launch into a long and detailed account of the school to which I was being sent, the same one Sleepy, Dopey, and Doc attended. The school, named after Junipero Serra, some Spanish guy who came over in the 1700s and forced the Native Americans already living here to practise Christianity instead of their own religion, was actually a huge adobe mission that attracted twenty thousand tourists a year, or something.

I wasn’t really listening to my mother. My interest in school has always been pretty much zero. The whole reason I hadn’t been able to move out here before Christmas was that there had been no space for me at the Mission School, and I’d been forced to wait until second semester started before something opened up. I hadn’t minded – I’d gotten to live with my grandmother for a few months, which hadn’t been at all bad. My grandmother, besides being a really excellent criminal attorney, is an awesome cook.

I was sort of still distracted by the ocean, which had disappeared behind some hills. I was craning my neck, hoping for another glimpse, when it hit me. I went, ‘Wait a minute. When was this school built?’

‘The eighteenth century’ Doc replied. ‘The mission system, implemented by the Franciscans under the guidelines of the Catholic Church and the Spanish government, was set up not only to Christianize the Native Americans, but also to train them to become successful tradespeople in the new Spanish society. Originally, the mission served as a—

‘Eighteenth century?’ I said, leaning forwards. I was wedged between Sleepy – whose head had slumped forwards until it was resting on my shoulder, enabling me to tell, just by sniffing, that he used Finesse shampoo – and Dopey. Let me tell you, Gina hadn’t mentioned a thing about how much room boys take up, which, when they’re both nearly six feet tall, and in the two-hundred-pound vicinity, is a lot. ‘Eighteenth century?’

My mother must have heard the panic in my voice, since she turned in her seat and said, soothingly, ‘Now, Suze, we discussed this. I told you there’s a year’s waiting list at Robert Louis Stevenson, and you told me you didn’t want to go to an all-girls school, so Sacred Heart is out, and Andy’s heard some awful stories about drug abuse and gang violence in the public schools around here—’