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  The bell rings, so faintly that I almost think it’s my imagination—like I sometimes hear my mom’s voice calling me when I’m biking with the wind in my ears. I walk past the hut and knock on Sam’s door, to give him the ball back and say thanks. Really, I hope he isn’t there, I feel shy around him, but he comes out with a sandwich in his hand. I can hear the TV on; there’s some soap opera music in the background.

  “Thanks for pumping it up,” I say. He’s a lot taller than me, but I try to look him in the eyes.

  “How come you have all those bags?” he asks. “Don’t you have a locker?”

  “They gave me one, but I don’t know where it is.”

  “Well, we can find that out,” he says.

  “That’s all right. I don’t really mind. This way I don’t forget anything.”

  He looks at me and shakes his head. “One of those kids, has to do everything his own way. . . .”

  “Anyway,” I tell him. “Thanks—for pumping it up, and sweeping the court and everything.”

  “It’s my job,” he says. I feel like he’s watching me as I carry my bags back to class.

  On the morning of the tournament, I have to take the bus as usual, but after homeroom all the kids who are going to compete meet in the parking lot, where another bus will take us to some high school gym. It’s not just the math nerds, but there are all kinds of nerds hanging around—Latin nerds, social studies nerds, French nerds. There are about twenty kids going. Some of them are two or three kinds of nerd at the same time. That’s what Pete says, getting on to the bus. “Man, what a bunch of weirdos, and I’m one of them.” Ms. Kaminski is coming along, too. She smiles at him.

  “There’s nothing wrong with being unusual,” she says.

  “I didn’t say unusual, Ms. Kaminski,” Pete says. “I said weird.”

  He’s in one of his moods, where he acts like he likes everybody and everybody is having a good time because he’s around. The bus isn’t full. Laura moves over to the window seat and says to Pete, “You can sit here,” as he walks down the aisle. There are rows of two seats each on either side. Pete looks at her and says, “Gracias,” which annoys me, because it’s like, for some reason he thinks it’s funny, or maybe he’s trying to be polite, or pretending to be polite, and that’s the joke. I don’t know, but somehow it’s annoying. Anyway, he doesn’t sit down with her but makes a sorry face and heads toward some boys at the back of the bus.

  Laura doesn’t say anything to me. The seats in the row behind her are free so I sit there, next to the window. Then Mabley comes on the bus, looking around, like everybody does, to see who they want to sit next to.

  “I didn’t know you were coming,” I tell her. “What team are you on?”

  “I’m a Latin nerd. Eamus, Crabrones!” she says loudly, almost like she’s talking to people at the back. But then she explains to me: “Crabrones means hornets,” and walks past me. A hornet is our school mascot. I look down the aisle to see where she’s sitting—with Pete and a few other kids at the back of the bus. Nobody sits next to me, so I spend most of the ride staring out the window or at the seat in front, where I can just about see the top of Laura’s hair. She has black hair. It’s only a fifteen-minute drive.

  LBJ High School looks a bit like our school, a big white building with a lot of green around it. We park in the parking lot, where there are a bunch of yellow buses lined up like number two pencils. Somebody behind me, one of the boys sitting with Pete, says, “Who’s going to get off the bus first?”

  “There’s no way I’m going to get off . . . the bus,” Pete replies, and everybody laughs. “Hey, Ben. You going to get off . . . the bus?”

  Mr. Hauser, one of the other teachers, stands up and says, “All right, guys. Cut it out. Let’s . . . exit in an orderly fashion.” It’s like he’s sort of going along with the joke but at the same time pretending not to. He has a badge hanging around his neck, and wears a brown shirt all buttoned up and tucked into his pants, even though he’s a little overweight. His hair is short and you can see colored patches of what looks like dried skin underneath it. He teaches science.

  There’s a flat roof over the school entrance, with words written along the side: LBJ Purple Pride. And underneath that: Preparing today to conquer tomorrow. This seems like the kind of thing kids make fun of, and since Mabley is sort of near, just a few kids away, I catch up to her and say, “Preparing today to conquer tomorrow,” in like a teacher’s voice, like I’m being serious, even though it’s stupid.

  “What?” she says.

  She didn’t hear me, and so I have to repeat myself, but it’s not even worth it. “Purple pride,” I say in the same dumb voice, and she kind of sidles off with me, I think she puts her hand on my elbow, as we’re walking into the school—you can already feel the air-conditioning coming at you through the double doors.

  “You know what they were joking about, right?” she says. “Back on the bus.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “It’s just stupid,” she says. “It’s not even really mean. It’s just a dumb boy thing, but I guess if you don’t know what they’re talking about . . . Anyway, you probably know anyway.”

  We’re in the hallway now, and Mr. Hauser is saying the stuff teachers usually say, like, “This is a school, and for most of the students, this is an ordinary school day. They’re trying to learn. . . .” Some of the boys kind of snicker. “I’m ignoring that,” he says, “and what we’re going to do now is walk as quietly as we can—and that means without talking—to the gym, where . . .”

  “Of course I know,” I tell Mabley.

  “I just didn’t want you to think . . . the joke is on you, because it’s just something dumb . . . they say to each other. It’s like being included.”

  But then Ms. Kaminski sees us talking and puts a finger to her lips.

  The LBJ gym is like any other school gym but bigger. There are bleachers on either side, with groups of kids from different schools sitting on them, and rows and rows of tables set up on the court itself, which shines under the lights. Everybody’s talking; it’s not loud exactly, but there are a lot of small noises coming from different places. It’s very disorienting, like being in a swimming pool. It’s almost like even if you do say something you can’t hear yourself because the ceiling is so high it all just sort of drifts away.

  All the kids from my school separate into their different nerd groups, so now it’s just me and Pete and Laura and Ms. Kaminski. Pete is still in his good mood, he’s having a good time. Laura is quietly concentrating; she doesn’t talk much either. There are two rounds of Number Sense: one in the morning, and then one after lunch, if we make it through. The team competition and the individual competition happen at the same time. Ms. Kaminski doesn’t know yet whether if we make it into the next round as a team we’ll automatically be considered for the individual competition, too.

  “I’m trying to get clarification,” she says.

  Sometimes when I look at my teachers now, I see my mom—the way she has to pretend every day and put on makeup and a matching outfit, just to go to school and do her job. That’s not the real person. Nobody would really want to say things like “trying to get clarification” if somehow they weren’t forced to, but my mom likes her job, too. Sometimes she seems happier at school, talking to the kids or with other teachers, than she does at home with me and Granma. So I don’t know. Ms. Kaminski has decided to be the kind of teacher who wears a lot of bright clothes and necklaces and bracelets, even though she’s isn’t particularly young or pretty, but she’s very good at being that person.

  For some reason Pete has started saying gracias all over the place but not like the Spanish word—but like, grassy-ass, like he’s never actually heard anyone speak Spanish in his life. It’s incredibly annoying. So when Ms. Kaminski gives us our pencil packs, with number two pencils and a separate extra-large eraser (she’s got them all ready and says we can keep the clear plastic case afterward, with one of th
ose zips you just slide across the opening—it says Hornets Math on the side, and I know she probably paid for them herself), Pete says, “Grassy-ass,” forgetting that he’s talking to a teacher, but maybe not really, because Ms. Kaminski doesn’t say anything. Then we have to find our seats and the competition begins.

  There are brown envelopes on the tables with the questions on them, and we each get a sheet of paper for writing down the answers, but we’re not allowed to write down any calculations or notes. So it’s like the opposite of a normal math test, where you have to show your work. Number Sense is totally mental.

  Most of the questions are pretty easy, but the point is, you have to answer them as fast as you can. Questions like “1/2 of 39 is _____” or “3/5 equals _____%.” There are tougher questions, too. “517 × 25,” for example. Or “69 × 17 − 45 × 12.” Basically, the trick is to break down all the questions into different parts, where each of the parts is pretty easy, like 7 × 60, but then you have to remember your answers to all the other parts, too, and add them together. As soon as I sit down, my palms start to sweat. The test lasts forty-five minutes, but I hardly even notice the time. Then the bell rings and I haven’t finished. There are eighty questions and I’ve answered seventy-three of them.

  Afterward, I ask Laura, “How many did you answer?” and she says, “I got to the end, but I skipped four or five along the way.”

  Pete overhears us. “If you don’t know something, you should just guess. I mean, why not.”

  I say, “How many did you answer?”

  “All of them.” He smiles at me.

  Ms. Kaminski lets us wander around the gym, as long as we don’t disturb any of the other tests. Pete knows kids from other schools. Laura brought a book along—she’s reading Children of Dune, it’s as thick as a brick. There are hundreds of kids in the gym, a lot of them sitting at the plastic fold-out tables on the court and writing furiously, with their heads down, concentrating, and the rest just hanging around and talking, so there’s like this continuous noise that never really gets louder or softer.

  For lunch, I eat my usual sandwiches, sitting with Ms. Kaminski on one of the bleachers. “Your mom must be really proud of you,” she says. I mean, it’s just something to say, because we’re sitting there, and she doesn’t know what else to talk about.

  “I guess.”

  “I know she is,” Ms. Kaminski says. “She talks about you all the time. She wants to know how you’re doing.”

  I don’t say anything—it’s not really a question—and anyway, it bugs me that my mom talks to my teachers about me in the staff room. That’s not something an average kid should have to deal with. But I can’t really say that to Ms. Kaminski, who eventually breaks the silence herself.

  “You’re doing great, that’s what I tell her. Because you are.”

  She has a nice face. I guess she’s older than most of my teachers, but she still wears makeup and has long dangly earrings that are long enough you can actually hear them sometimes. When she talks to you, she lets you know that you’ve got her full attention, like that’s what you want; but the truth is, I don’t want it—I don’t want her attention at all, so I feel bad and just kind of don’t say much, because I don’t know what to say.

  But then her phone pings, and she scrambles to take it out of her handbag because she’s waiting for the results. Laura came third, I came eighth, and Pete came twenty-second. The top ten kids get to compete in the next round to go to sectionals, but we did well enough so we can compete as a team, too. Ms. Kaminski looks very excited. Laura is there; she puts her book down to find out the results but doesn’t really respond in any way except to nod, and after a minute she starts reading again. But we can’t find Pete—I can’t see Mabley, either.

  I say, “I’ll go look for him.”

  The afternoon Number Sense test is at one o’clock, which is in twenty minutes.

  “Okay,” Ms. Kaminski says. “You’ve got a watch, right? Meet me back here at ten to one,” and she wanders off, too, with her head going from side to side. She has to keep adjusting her clothes when she walks.

  There are some emergency exit double doors at the back of the gym, but they haven’t been properly closed, so I figure the alarm probably won’t go off. Anyway, Pete is just outside, having lunch with Mabley. He’s lying on his back in the grass and Mabley is sitting cross-legged and picking bits of grass and throwing them at him, which he doesn’t seem to notice.

  “We’re not supposed to be outside.”

  That’s the first thing I tell them, which makes me feel stupid—like a teacher’s pet or something.

  “Oh my God.” Pete pretends to be scared or not even pretends really, but just enough to make me feel dumb. He sits up suddenly.

  “Ms. Kaminski is looking for you. The next test is at one o’clock.”

  “I don’t really feel like taking any more tests.” He sweeps some of the pieces of grass off his shirt. “I’m not a calculator.”

  “We got the results back from this morning.”

  “So how’d you do?” It’s like he thinks that’s why I told him, so I can brag.

  “Not great. Like I told you, I didn’t even answer all the questions.”

  “So how’d you do?” He’s looking at me properly now.

  “I came eighth.”

  He’s still looking at me, smiling a little. “How’d I do?”

  “You can ask Ms. Kaminski.”

  “But I bet you know.”

  I feel embarrassed in front of Mabley. I feel like—I want her to know that I did better than Pete, but I’m annoyed that Laura did better than me, and I also feel like there’s something not nice about the fact that I want to tell Pete how he did, which makes me look bad.

  “She told all of us. Laura came third.”

  “And what about me?” He’s still smiling.

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Yes, you do,” Pete says.

  “I don’t know. Something like twenty, but I don’t know.” It’s hard not to sound like I’m rubbing it in. There’s this thing my voice does, which even I can hear. The best thing is just to keep talking. “The next test is at one o’clock. We have to go. Ms. Kaminski is looking for you.”

  “I told you, I don’t feel like going.” He lies down again, like he’s bored with the game. “Mabley and I are going to do something. I don’t know what we’re going to do.”

  “We’re playing hooky,” Mabley says. It’s the first thing she’s said since I got there—but she likes the word. She’s the kind of kid who likes to use phrases like that. “Why don’t you come with us?”

  I can’t tell if she wants me to or not. “But we’ve got to take the test.”

  “My test is over,” she says. “I don’t know how I did and I don’t care. Sometimes I get too hung up on that stuff. My grandmother once told me, it’s important sometimes to break the rules. So that’s what we’re going to do.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  Pete is laughing, like a kid who can’t stop—he’s doing the laugh you can just do if you want to laugh. Most kids have a laugh they can force, just to show they’re laughing.

  “I don’t know.” Mabley is laughing a little, too. It’s infectious. “We’ll think of something.”

  “But we need you, Pete. For the team competition. You need three people to compete.”

  But he can’t stop himself—he’s even losing his breath. I look at them both for a moment. It’s like we’re playing some game, but I don’t like the team I’m on. There’s nothing I can do about it, though, because that’s just how it is, that’s who I am, the kid who is going to go back inside to take the test, because his teacher is looking for him.

  “You should come with us,” Mabley says. She brushes the grass off her lap and stands up. There’s a kind of park outside the school, with a few trees, but most of the leaves have fallen. It’s a sunny day, though, the sky is blue, and everything feels weird—warm and dead. “Let’s go, Peter.�
� She pulls him up, and he looks at me.

  “You coming, too?”

  For a second I think, maybe he wants me to. There’s a parking lot next to the grassy area, and after that, a quiet street with a few houses on the other side. And after that, who knows. Somewhere in the distance you can hear highway sounds, a lot of cars driving smoothly at the same speed.

  “What are you going to do?”

  And Mabley pulls something out of her pocket. “I’ve got ten dollars. I’m going to find something you can get for ten dollars.” She leans her head a little to the side. “You coming or not?”

  “I’ve got a test.”

  “Suit yourself,” she says.

  And they walk off together through the grass toward the parking lot. I watch them go, then suddenly worry that the double doors have locked behind me. For some reason, panic rises up in me, like water spilling over a glass, but when I push against the doors, they open—and I go back inside the gym and close them behind me. It takes me a minute to get used to the change of light. There aren’t any windows, just long rows of electric spotlights in the ceiling.

  When Ms. Kaminski asks, “Where is he? Did you find Pete?” I shake my head.

  “This is serious,” she says. “We need to know where he is.” But it’s almost one o’clock so Laura and I have to find our seats again, because the test is about to begin.

  Afterward, on the bus ride back to school, Mabley and Pete sit in front together with all the teachers. I can tell they’re in trouble. Mabley doesn’t look happy—when I walk past them in the bus, she doesn’t even look at me, but she’s not looking at Pete either. She’s sitting next to the window and staring out. They’re not talking to each other, Pete is playing with his phone. By that point I already know that I’m not going to sectionals. Nor is Laura—only the top four get through, and she came fifth. I came seventh. Because only two of us competed, we can’t go as a team either. In a funny way, I’m almost glad: it makes things easier with Pete because now I have a reason not to like him.