BEN WITHERS MIDDLE SCHOOLalways looked shabby, its paint peeling around the windows, its roof drooping in. But today, under the gray sky, the school looked sad and lonely. It lay curled up behind its fence like a huge stray dog. Ollie imagined that the building was actually a giant dog. It would come to life and be Ollie’s friend and they would go on adventures...
Her dad drove into the parking lot, bouncing over potholes. The car shuddered to a halt, and Ollie’s daydream disappeared. She hunched in the passenger seat, one finger holding her place in her book.
“Can’t you leave that with me?” asked her father hopefully. “You might try talking on the bus instead. Jenna misses you—and I know Coco Zintner wants to be your friend—”
Something in Ollie’s face silenced him.
“Jenna just wants to talk about how she feelsbadforme.Still.I hate it. Coco’s from the city and just silly.” Ollie pointed to her book. “I think Jonathan might have just sold his soul to the smiling man!”
“Well,” muttered her dad, “it was worth a try.”
Ollie picked up her polka-dot backpack and grabbed the door handle.
“Look, Ollie...” said her dad.
She waited.
Her dad sighed, and changed whatever he’d been about to say. “Okay, how about this one? What’s the difference between a cat and a comma?”
“Dad—”
“Well?”
“I don’t know, what?”
Her dad grinned. “A comma,” he informed her, “is a pause at the end of a clause.”
Ollie saw where this was going. “Dad.”
“But acat,” her dad finished blithely, “hasclawsat the ends of itspaws.”
He busted up laughing and Ollie snorted despite herself. “That was better than usual.” She slouched out of the car.
“Oh wait, I forgot. Here,” said her dad. He reached into the back seat and thrust her lunch box out the window. Ollie undid the clasps and peered into the depths. Carrot sticks and peanut butter cookies—way too many of both—and a very large turkey sandwich, cut in quarters, on homemadebread. Maple granola, with sugared walnuts. A chocolate chip muffin. Dad really must have baked all night.
“I’m too old to pack a lunch,” Ollie said, but not very convincingly. The muffin looked fantastic. “They’ll have lunch at the farm.AndI think someone is supposed to bring donuts to homeroom this morning.”
“Pah, donuts,” said her dad. “That’s not food, that’s like anti-food.”
Ollie was fond of cake donuts. “They’re totally food.”
“Come on,” said her dad, abandoning that argument. “Take it anyway. You never know. You might get hungry!”
Her dad was smiling. But his eyes were dark and a little sad:Please, Ollie, I made it for you, come on,and so she took the lunch box and stuck it hastily into her backpack. “Thanks, Dad,” she said. Her lunch box was pale blue, with a pink unicorn on the front. She had loved it when she was younger. Her dad refused to hear her hints about switching to paper sacks.
“Love you, Ollie-pop!” he called as she strode away, loud enough for the entire town, let alone the middle school, to hear.
—
Ollie had her hand on the front door when she remembered that she had to go to the principal’s office. Gah.
Principal Snyder’s office was down a long hallway. Thehallway had green walls, not so nice a shade as Ollie’s kitchen, and green-and-brown-freckled linoleum. The office door had a largeWELCOMEsign on it, with a worm waving from a hole in an apple.
Ollie disliked this sign. One of her dad’s jokes went, “What’s worse than finding a worm in an apple?... Findinghalfa worm in an apple.” Ollie had found both worms and half worms in apples before. Most kids from Evansburg had.
Thinking of apples, Ollie went in.
The first person she saw was Brian Battersby, looking helpful and sincere. It was not an expression that sat naturally on his face, in Ollie’s opinion. He spent too much time acting cool.
