“Come on in and let’s get your vest and packet, Piper,” Mrs. Bailey says. “I see you already have a sash with lots of badges and pins. Good for you!”

I try on several vests while Mama and Mrs. Bailey talk about this and that.

“We got here to the city almost two weeks ago, and every day has been a challenge.”

Mrs. Bailey shakes her head. “I hear you, there’s nothing easy about it.”

“I just never thought we’d be in this kind of situation,” Mama says.

I don’t want to hear them talk about how hard life in a shelter is, so I stop listening. I run my hand over and over the bright-blue vest. I put it on, then carefully drape my sash across my chest. I hear a whole bunch of voices laughing and calling back and forth.

“Sounds like they’re coming,” Mrs. Bailey says.

Ten girls come shuffling, bouncing, skipping into the room. There’s a couple of other white girls like me, but most of them are black and Latina. Back home in Cyprus Point, there were lots of black and Latino folks—Vietnamese too. My best friend, Robin, was from El Salvador. She taught me lots of Spanish. I miss her.

But the biggest surprise that just about makes my eyes pop out of my head is the sight of a dad bringing his daughter into the room. Wait’ll I tell Daddy! Except for Byron, we haven’t seen many men even though this is a family shelter. Seems like it’s mostly single moms and their kids.

A small girl with a big smile struts over. “Look at you in that vest,” she says, grinning. “I bet in no time, your sash will be looking amazing like mine.” Her sash is, in fact, pretty awesome. She has all kinds of badges and pins, more than I do.

A tall, serious-looking girl comes over and smiles a slow, quiet smile. “Hey,” she says. “Glad you came.” She touches a pin on my sash. “Looks like you’ve been busy.” She puts out her hand. “I’m Karina Bailey.”

Soon all the other girls, big and little, are crowded around me, introducing themselves. They’re chattering a mile a minute. I don’t think I’ll ever catch all their names. One tiny girl who doesn’t look much older than Dylan takes my hand and smiles shyly up at me. “I’m Chloe,” she whispers. “Karina’s my big sister. She’s the real troop leader, not our mom.” She looks at her big sister with pride.

“Okay, everybody,” Karina calls from the front of the room. “Roll call.”

In my old troop, roll call took forever because everybody was busy talking and cutting up. Plus, it was at least twice this size.