“Uh . . . yeah, I’m Rose, and thanks for c-crashing into them.” The very word was hard for her to say since her mom’s accident. She hadn’t been allowed to watch the news that night or in the days that followed the accident. Caroline, her mom’s friend from work, stayed with her until they could figure out where Rose was to live. She had unplugged and hidden the cable box, so Rose wouldn’t hear about the crash on television. But Rose still heard snippets of the phone calls whenever Caroline thought she was sleeping: “Engulfed in flames . . . died instantly . . . no remains.”

I’m sort of a remain, Rose thought. In her mom’s will, it said that Rose was to go to her grandmother’s house if something ever happened to her and that proceeds from the sale of the house were to go to Rose.

“Yeah, Myles. You showed up at the right time.”

“My pleasure,” Myles said.

Rose looked off toward the girls, who had retreated to another corner of the schoolyard.

“The girl with the ponytail—she’s Brianna, right?”

“Yeah, but the real ringleader is Carrie. The short one with the streak in her hair. Kind of the Cruella de Vil look, except the streak is blue and not white. She thinks it’s cool and ‘creative.’ NOT. And that’s Lisa. Uh . . . not much to say about her except she likes sequins, glitter. Sparkle on the outside. Dim on the inside.” Myles tapped his head. “But she is a good horseback rider. Watch out for her spurs.” He laughed. The chuckles sounded a bit like bubbles breaking through water.

Just then, the bell rang. He gave a jaunty salute with his right hand, then buzzed off in his wheelchair.

Rose was standing alone now. So alone. If her mom were alive, she would have gone home and told her about these obnoxious girls. And her mom would’ve said something like “Oh there’s always kids like that. . . .” And maybe told her about some bully from her own school days. And Rose would’ve whined and said, “You don’t get it, Mom.” But now there was no mom to try to understand her. There was no mom for her to whine to. “Puleeze, Mom, gimme a break. Things have changed since your day.”

There simply was no mom.

The Philadelphia house had sold quickly, and the very next day Rose was bundled up like some sort of package and put on a flight to Indianapolis to live with her grandmother, Rosalinda. Caroline came with her to help “settle her in.” But there was no settling in to speak of. Rose felt entirely adrift.

That first night she had been too tired, too shocked, too sad, too everything to even eat. So Rosalinda’s live-in cook sent dinner upstairs to her bedroom. But she just pushed the food around on her plate.