The next day, Sofia and Antonia get a ride to their new school in one of Joey’s cars. Antonia does not tell Lina. They are silent on the five-minute ride and once they arrive, they both stand, staring, at the monolithic gray building in front of them. Students stream in and out of the brass double doors. Sofia and Antonia stand close enough that they could be holding hands. On their way up the steps they are jostled by someone they assume is an adult man—he’s bearded!—but who they realize is a student, like they are.

Sofia and Antonia are quickly separated by the crowds in the gymnasium where they register. “Russo” is a different line entirely than “Colicchio.” The big room echoes with the screeches of teenagers, the rumble of the pecking order, the shuffle of files on the folding tables where maudlin administrators hand out typewritten schedules to each of the students in turn.

Antonia scratches her thumbnail against the cuticle of her pointer finger until she feels skin begin to peel away from her fingertip. Her own breathing echoes in her head. The dress she chose feels too tight and too short and too childish. She watches the room move around her and tries not to look like she might panic.

Sofia is just as nervous, but takes out a lipstick her mamma disapproves of and applies it, using a sliver of mirror she keeps in her bag. In the mirror, she looks like she’s playing dress-up: a child’s face with a darkened adult mouth.

“That’s a sweet color,” says the girl standing behind Sofia. Sofia turns and smiles. She offers her lipstick. The line keeps moving and someone has to say, “It’s your turn,” to Sofia. “I’m Sofia Colicchio,” she says, as she steps forward to get her schedule. The woman who hands it to her looks bored and gray, like the building itself.

The girl Sofia shared her lipstick with is in her homeroom. Sofia learns her name is Peggy. Peggy has three friends named Alice, Margaret, and Donna. They eat lunch together, in a cafeteria that smells like old rubber and old grease, and Sofia cranes her neck for Antonia before they sit down, but does not see her.

At lunch, no one asks Sofia about her family. No one asks her about her religion. No one tells her she has responsibilities, or tells her how she is different from these girls. Instead, they ask which boys she thinks are cute. They ask which classes she likes. They eat their carrot sticks and throw their soggy chicken into the trash and no one tells them not to. They hitch their skirts up another half-inch and tighten their belts in the bathroom mirror and toss their hair.

But Sofia aches for Antonia until the final school bell.