Later!

The bus ride from base camp back to civilization was kind of… weird.

I shook hands with Carmen, if you can believe that. I guess I never should have listened to her in the first place. Not that I knew any better. Sure, it seemed like she got in the last word, but at least she hadn’t broken my face yet.

Maybe I was learning. Maybe after this, every other girl was going to seem easy to figure out and talk to. Maybe Carmen was as tricky as it got.

“Later, Rafe,” she said to me.

“Later,” I said back.

“I still think you’re kind of cute,” she said, which was just about the weirdest part.

And I thought, Have a nice life, Carmen. But I didn’t say it out loud. She could still punch me in the throat if she wanted to.

After that, I moved to a different part of the bus.

“What happens to you now?” Burp said. Everyone suddenly wanted to know what everyone else was doing after this.

“Just middle school,” I said. “That’s it.”

It was kind of depressing. A week from that Monday, I was going to be running around HVMS and wishing I was anywhere else. That seemed pretty boring compared to what I’d been doing for the last seven days. I’m not saying I loved every minute of The Program—or any minute of it—but you know what else? It was definitely an experience I wouldn’t forget.

“What about you?” I asked Burp.

He kind of shrugged. “I’ve got big plans,” he said. “I’m going to be… um…” But then he stopped and thought about it for a second. “Actually, just middle school. Same as you,” he said.

“Well, good luck,” I said. I meant good luck with his lying problem, but also with the whole middle school thing.

In a way, it felt like we were all going back to our own war zones. I had Stricker and Stonecase waiting for me, and Miller the Killer, and Jeanne Galletta, and all the other new kids and teachers I didn’t even know about yet. Not to mention the math, English, social studies, and science that I did know about.

But I also had Mom. And Grandma. And cheeseburgers and apple pie at Swifty’s, plus free milk shakes when Swifty made a mistake. And Jeanne Galletta. (She goes on both lists.) And my own bed. And indoor bathrooms. And toilet paper.

And yeah, okay, my sister too. I guess. But only after Mom, Grandma, real food, Jeanne, my bed, bathrooms, and toilet paper.

Because those were the things I really missed.