Dee put his laptop back on the computer cart. Then he ran across the room to the trampoline. He didn’t run fast, just real intense, the way cartoon characters run in place before they can get going, with lots of arm pumping and knee lifting. He stepped onto the trampoline and started jumping again.

“We’ll get you set up,” Ms. B. said. “Either here or in Ms. G.’s room or with whoever you have for fifth grade. Mr. J. maybe? We’ll figure it out.”

I took my eyeball paper and the laptop to a table, and before I knew it, I had the three ways Bertie and I were similar all written out, with lots of specific language and illustrating details. I thought it looked pretty good, even if none of it was true.

21. Sky Blue

“Guess what!” Ms. B. said suddenly. “We’re late.” She said it like it happened all the time.

“Leave your stuff where it is, everybody. We’ll come back to it after lunch. Let’s skedaddle before Chef Gail closes the kitchen.”

Lunch was pizza. Most schools throw some tomato sauce and a slice of cheese on a soggy English muffin and call it pizza, but I knew this would be the real deal. I picked up a tray. I picked up a milk. As I waited in the line, I watched Chef Gail toss circles of dough into the air. I picked up some fruit.

The class was already sitting down. I stood there for a sec, smack-dab in the middle of the cafeteria, holding my tray like a statue.

I saw Bertie wedged between Mia and Nia. Their heads were so close together, it was hard to tell where one kid stopped and the next one started. I wondered how the class had lined up to get that way. And I wondered if Bertie didn’t see me or was just pretending not to see me.

Dee came up behind me and pushed me to the table. I mean, he didn’t really push me. It was more like he moved me the way magnets that don’t stick together can make each other move away.

Then he sat right next to me and way too close. He cut his pizza into tiny squares, and his elbow kept jabbing me in the side that was already sore from all that crying over the weekend. But at least he didn’t talk the whole time or ask me a million questions.

“Five-minute warning, Ms. G.’s class,” Kayla called from the other end of the table.

Even though it was early, Dee got up and started clearing his tray. I followed him.

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