“No,” I said. “I didn’t realize we had coyotes around here.”

“They’re uncommon this far south,” the sergeant said. “But it’s also uncommon to find a bear in town. I think some creatures moved in after everyone moved out.”

“So, wait, they dispatched a whole squad and two Humvees to track down a random coyote?” I asked.

“Disease,” Ears said. “At least that’s what we were told.”

The sergeant scowled at Ears, apparently not happy to hear his input.

“You should call the vet here in town: Dr. Gooding,” I said. “She deals with that kind of stuff.”

“We can handle it,” the sergeant said sharply. “Now head off to practice.”

Ears kind of smiled, a little redness in his face. “If you see anything, let us know,” he said. “Here, let me give you my number. Call me when you join up.” He scrawled his number on the back of an “If You See Something, Say Something” flyer.

“Will do.” I hoisted myself back onto my bike seat and put my foot to the pedal before I stopped myself. “Hey, Ears. Do you know about anyone called Ishango or something like that?”

Ears’s eyes widened, and he started to move his head from side to side before the sergeant stepped in front of him and pointed down the road. “I said move!” he ordered.

Yipes. I put a big grin on my face and said, “Thank you, sir. Good luck with that coyote.” And I rode off, though not before I shot Ears a sly wink.

As I went on my way, I thought about Maggie’s dog and that mad bear. Maybe the animals were pissed that we’d come back to their homestead. But Maggie’s dog was with her family the whole time, and that didn’t explain why she kept launching herself into the cage bars. Ouch. I wondered whether I’d see Maggie at practice so I could talk to her about it. I was surprised to see her at the previous one. In the meantime, I stuck to well-traveled streets for the rest of the way to school just in case. I could do without encountering a batshit-crazy coyote in an alley.

When I arrived in the locker room, everyone got quiet. In my head, I heard Charlie exclaim, “Crickets!” As I walked to my locker, Tico gave me a fist bump.

“Welcome back, buddy,” he said softly. “Now we can get started for real.”

I opened my locker and retrieved my pads.

“Hey, Conners,” came a gruff voice behind me: Jimmy Dubnar, an offensive lineman and one of a handful of black players on the team. He was enormous—six foot four and probably more than three hundred pounds—yet wasn’t even our biggest lineman. That was Sammy Justice, who had to be six eight and liked to be called “Two Tons of Justice.”

“QBs don’t wear pads at practice,” Jimmy said. “Here. Coach told me to give this to you.”

He flung me the green quarterback jersey. Aiden Cole, also wearing a green jersey over his slight frame, watched me pull it on.