“Ah.” Mr. Rallis stops and puts his finger in the air. “Aha. Tomorrow, she says. Mañana. So. Ten days is the magic number, is it? X equals ten. Not nine, but ten. Ah yes, the precision, the exactitude, of math. If only vacation were ten days long instead of nine, there would be no problem. Is that it?” His sarcasm washes over me and sinks in like the next wave on the beach.

“Mr. Rallis, I don’t think I’m the one with the problem.”

He spins on his heel and stares at me. He points at the door. “Get out!”

So I go to the girls’ room to wait out math class. I sit on the windowsill and close my eyes. I’m trying hard to hang on to what Bo’s face looked like, but it’s already fading. Another bell rings. I walk down the hall to my mother’s office instead. She’s in there with the chairman of the school board. I watch them through the plate glass door to her office. Before Mrs. Kmiec can stop me, I open the door and walk in.

“Hi, Mom.”

The chairman frowns at me. “Can you excuse us, please?”

“Serena!” My mom comes around her desk and runs toward me. She hugs me—not a stiff hug, not a conditional hug, but a real hug. Both of her arms get involved. “Oh, Serena. Thank God you’re back. What an odyssey.” She holds me at arm’s length. “Look at you.” Tears are in her eyes. “It changed you.”

“It’s the jacket,” I tell her. “It makes me look tough. Were you worried about me?”

She smiles. “Well … yes and no. I knew God was watching, and He’s pretty tough Himself. I prayed a lot. What else could I do? But I am glad you’re back.” She keeps an arm around me as she turns back to the chairman. “Dick, thanks for coming by. I need to take my daughter out to eat. She looks like she hasn’t had a square meal in a week.”

It takes her so long to arrange to leave the office for breakfast that it’s lunchtime when we pull up in front of Wayside Tavern. She orders each of us a Reuben sandwich.

“So what did the chairman want?” I ask.

“Oh, the chairman,” she scoffs. “His digestion is off because …” She sighs. “He’s actually in a very fragile position these days. He’s running for state assembly this fall, but he’s got this young guy to his right—telegenic, handsome, full of zeal—creating problems for him in the primary. The chairman’s trying to stick to the issues, but he needs the school to be a platform.”