After Nate had set everything up to his satisfaction, he and Junie left his table and circulated around the room. Once he would have felt funny to be seen at school with his little sister like this—even if she hadn’t been wearing boots and a party dress with three different necklaces and a large rhinestone brooch of a horse. But today he held his sister’s hand as they walked around the exhibits, and when she asked questions, he tried to come up with the answers.

Junie’s favorite projects were those that featured animals, though she hated it when the experiment might have been bad for them, like the one in which someone’s pet rabbit had been fed a diet of only soft food. The rabbit’s teeth had grown so long, they curved out its mouth. She liked the guinea pig maze and “The Life Cycle of a Butterfly” and the project titled simply “My Cat,” where Priscilla Ingersoll had just brought her cat to school, in a cat basket, with a report on his six and a half years of life to date.

Heading back to his display, Nate noticed his mother moving slowly through the room, examining the projects as the eyes of the other parents turned to follow her. She kept her hands wrapped tightly around her purse in a way Nate knew would keep them from trembling.

Her last stop was Nate’s exhibit at the back of the gym. “I had no idea this would be such a big deal,” she said when she reached him. “It looks wonderful. Your grandparents and I will be rooting for you from the bleachers.”

Just as her mother left, Junie returned from up front, where she’d gone to check out the first-prize trophy. “It’s not as big as I was picturing, but never mind,” she whispered to Nate. “The really big ones are probably over in Butte.”

Mrs. Unger stepped onto the stage. “People,” she said, “I want to welcome you and thank you for attending the first annual Lonetree Junior High School Science Fair. As you can see, our youngsters have put a lot of time and effort into the projects displayed around the room. I know you’re going to want to study each and every one.”

Nate wasn’t listening. He was worried about Amelia Swanson, who had built a pretty impressive display on electricity, with a series of batteries and wires hooked up to make three different-sounding buzzers go off depending on which button you pushed. Nate knew that Amelia’s father was an electrician, but he doubted the judge did.

“Don’t worry, Natie,” Junie told him, following his eyes to Amelia’s display. “Electricity’s not that exciting. You’ve got genuine alpha rays.”

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