I take the note back and write:

Definitely a guinea pig. But I already have two bunnies and a dog.

He looks at me, tilting his head, then writes again:

What are their names?

And I write back:

The bunnies are named Star Performer and Hammy. The dog is named Sandwich.

He looks at the paper and stifles a laugh, not wanting to attract the attention of Mr. Eckdahl.

Then I look at him and make some sort of non–sign language gesture for “Stop writing me notes. We’re going to get in trouble!” . . . pointing back at Mr. Eckdahl.

He nods, and then does a mock respectful salute.

After a few minutes of pretending to read from my textbook, I muster up the courage to look at him.

He smiles and waves his finger at me, then does the shush gesture, finger to his lips, mocking me. Like now he’s telling me to behave. When I was the one who told him!

I roll my eyes, but I know what my face is doing. My face is blushing.

My face is blushing and all my cells are blushing and my whole body is blushing. And I am going to have to hide in my textbook because I can’t stand to look at him. I can’t bear it. It makes too many things happen to me. It shakes everything up. It throws me off my game. (Not that I have any game.) But it makes me feel giddy and scared and dizzy.

And I can’t take it.

Chapter 29

In the dead of night, something much less cheerful happens.

I hesitate to tell you because it might sound crazy or, worse, make me go back to seeming a little insane.

But I’m pretty sure it happened.

Not bet-a-million-dollars sure.

But kind of sure.

I think it must have been around three or four in the morning. The quietest time. Some people call it the witching hour.

But this doesn’t involve a witch.

Nope.

This just involves me waking up in a haze, staring at the ceiling, and a thought . . . not a thought, really. But more like words, spoken to me . . . in my head. In a voice I’ve never heard. A man’s voice. Deep.

So not my thought.

Someone else’s thought.

Given to me.

And the thought is . . .

The voice whispers . . .

“Get the hammer.”

Chapter 30

Mornings are supposed to be quiet and peaceful. Birds are supposed to chirp and the sun is supposed to cast everything in gold.

But this morning isn’t quiet because this morning there is a horrible knocking, a rude sort of knocking, on the front door downstairs. Almost banging.

It’s the last thing you want to hear when you’re bleary-eyed and sweaty and disheveled and confused. It means: You have to get up, out of your warm, snuggly bed, and go downstairs and interact with whoever is banging away down there. Loud enough to wake the devil himself. And all his minions.