So what if he occasionally fantasizes that Kerrianne is Logan? He feels guilty about that, and because of it, Mason knows he should break up with Kerrianne, especially since she talks about a future with him. He wanted to tell her it was over weeks ago. He couldn’t. Not with Kerrianne on the Snow Ball dance committee, planning tomorrow night for the past two months. What kind of jerk breaks up with his girlfriend after she’s bought a midnight-blue strapless dress? (Yeah, she texted him a photo of the wrist corsage she said would complement it best.)

Mason realizes he needs to focus on Mr. Bartley. He’s at the Smart Board. A picture of Hitler fills the screen. Sick. Mason lives with a brutal dictator in his father and coach. He certainly doesn’t want to advocate for one at school.

Out of the corner of his eye, he notices Logan running her fingers through her short choppy hair, gripping it like she wants to tear it out. When Mr. Bartley says, “Examine if there is any legitimacy for the arguments on your side of the debate,” Logan looks like she wants to strangle him.

Mason’s right there with her. Half the assignments he gets—including this one—are a waste of time. But there’s college, and he’s always known that if hockey isn’t his ticket out of Riviere, his grades have to be. He has both. Besides, he likes battling it out for valedictorian against Logan.

Again, he glances toward her, then refocuses on the evil dictator with the bad mustache. Mr. Bartley says, “History is one of our best teachers. Unfortunately, this assignment will show you that society hasn’t learned much at all.”

Who wouldn’t agree with that?

Chapter 5: Cade

As Mr. Bartley drones on about Nazis, snippets of the old story Grandpa told me in his workshop flash into my mind. I try to piece them together like the jigsaw puzzles we made. I know my grandpa told me he grew up in Poland on a farm with fields of wheat and apple trees. There was a barn filled with cows and a horse, goats and sheep. A river ran through their property, and he used to follow its bank to get to the nearest town. If he said the name, I don’t remember, but it was in Poland.