“What’s that got to do with me?”

“This is my long-winded way of agreeing with you. I don’t see you as a wolf or a sheep either. You’re a good kid, even if you don’t always believe it. I’m going to be straight: you might even have a hint of wolf in you, but in your heart, you’re still more . . .”

“Sheepdog?” I shake my head.

“Look, this sounded a lot more cool in my head.” Mr. Blackmon tips his water bottle to his mouth.

The lesson of recess is controlled chaos.

The day builds to the moment we pass through the double doors that open to outside. Outside is our world. It begins as soon as Mr. Blackmon stands to escort me, Rodrigo, Nehemiah, and Twon. Whether by design or by negligence, enrichment time seems like yard time in prison.

In order to maintain the illusion of control, the rule is that the students have to continue “personal discipline” until we reach the end of the sidewalk. Ten steps count down the long march to freedom. Eyes widen and dart about. Coats zip up, miniature knights donning their armor in preparation for the combat we call play. Our pace quickens, excited hops peppering our footfalls, but not quite running because we’d be sent back to the door to “try it again.” As a crush of bodies, we surge forward without shoving because that, too, would get us sent to the back of the line.

Three steps.

Two.

One.

Crossing the line, we explode in screams despite the “no yelling” warnings of our teachers. Peals of laughter and whoops follow as we chase one another. The playground erupts in a tempest of activity. Rodrigo assumes his usual post, walking the line surrounding the basketball court. He earned ten minutes of time-out for running his mouth to Mrs. Horner and she always collects.

“I got something on Kutter.” Even with the bright sun, Nehemiah draws his jacket tight around him. Besides being able to get into the school administration’s computer system whenever he wants, Nehemiah can go places I can’t and talk to people who won’t talk to me. Apparently my mouth burns a lot of bridges and, hard as it is to believe, some people consider me a know-it-all jerk.

“You peek at his records?”

“Thought about it. RaShawn, too. Teachers around here don’t guard their passwords or laptops for anything. But I didn’t need to. I just started asking around. Word is that Kutter has folks terrified.”

“Makes sense. He used to squad up with Nyla,” I say. Like Marcel, she’s part of the power group that basically runs the school. “Then he went solo. Thug for hire. Especially when we start looking at motive: either who would want to bring a gun to school or why would someone need to bring a gun to school. This puts Kutter at number one.”

“So what do you want to do, T?” Nehemiah asks.

“Give me a sec. I have to talk to a couple folks.”