CHAPTER 1

I settle onto the couch with the chocolate pudding I saved from Friday’s school lunch. This silence is amazing. Well, it’s not complete silence—Hector is spinning the whirring dragon on his baby seat while he eats Cheerios—but it’s pretty close. I savor a spoonful of pudding. How long do I have before Bryce and Aurora burst out of our bedroom arguing about something? When I left them in there Aurora was pretending to be Bryce’s cat, and he was pretending to feed her milk, but that can’t last. I mean, they’re four and three. That’s not how it works. I take another bite with my eye on the bedroom door, but it stays closed.

This never happens.

I glance down at my backpack. My debate prep packet is inside, and I’m actually tempted to work on it. I’m not a kid who does homework. And I definitely don’t do big projects, which usually require glitter and markers and poster board and all sorts of things. None of which I have. Plus, last year in sixth grade, when I actually turned in a poster project, Kaylee Vine announced to the whole class, “Everyone! Alert the authorities! Zoey Albro turned in a project. The world must be ending.” Then she made that ahgn ahgn ahgn sound like a fire drill, and did it every time she passed me in the hall for the whole next week.

But this project doesn’t need any glitter. And everyone else won’t have fancy poster boards with foam letters that make my flimsy piece of newsprint that the teacher gave me look like gray toilet paper. All I need is to know something—and I do. And maybe, just maybe, if I do this—and if I can rock it—all the other kids will have their minds blown, and it’ll be completely satisfying to watch. “Who would have guessed,” they’ll say, “that Zoey knew so much cool stuff? I had no idea! I thought I knew who she was, but clearly I didn’t at all.” Maybe Kaylee Vine would even stop holding her nose and switching seats on the bus to get away from me.

I take out the debate prep packet and lean over the coffee table. Which animal is the best? Support your selection with as many details as possible, including what it takes to survive in a variety of situations. Ms. Rochambeau, the social studies teacher, says this debate will help us understand the debates that led up to the Civil War, and Mr. Peck, the science teacher, says it’ll be a good assessment of all the work we’ve been doing about animals.

And the thing is, I already know which animal is best. The octopus. When Bryce was a tantrumming toddler and Aurora was a baby, we moved four times over the course of that year. But the one constant was this little TV/DVD combo that we toted around with us and an old DVD from the library free shelf: The Mysterious and Fascinating World of the Octopus. That DVD would send Bryce into an instant trance, and we watched it so often that I happily memorized every word of it.

Then, last year, when I couldn’t go on the sixth grade field trip to the aquarium in Boston (my mom kept “forgetting” to send in the payment), Ms. Giddings, the guidance counselor, brought me back a book on octopuses.

And actually, “octopuses” is correct. You don’t have to say “octopi” if you don’t want to. The book told me so.

I find a pencil nub at the bottom of my backpack and start filling in the blanks with awesome things. Like their ability to instantly camouflage themselves, which they’re amazing at because they have these things called chromatophores—that word was in my book—so the color of their skin can change to match what’s around them. They even have muscles that change their skin’s texture. Of course, it means that when they get mad or nervous they turn red and pimply, but nothing’s perfect, right?

Ms. Rochambeau will be as surprised as anyone else when I stand up for the debate and use a word like chromatophore.

I settle deeper into the couch. If this were a regular Sunday (or really, any day), Frank would be here, watching TV (usually angry news guys). Frank is Lenny’s dad, and Lenny is the owner of this trailer. Lenny is also my mom’s boyfriend, and that’s why we get to live here with his nice curtains and end tables that are perfectly aligned with this couch. Lenny even has an alphabetized DVD collection. He also has a recliner that Frank sits in like he’s glued to it.

But today Frank went out for a walk to check the tree damage from a recent ice storm, and since Lenny and my mom are both at work, Hector and I get the main room of the trailer to ourselves. So even though Ms. Rochambeau announced that we needed our completed packet to be part of the debate, this time I can actually do it. This time I don’t have to be counted out.

I’m three pages into the four-page packet when Hector starts throwing the Cheerios all over Lenny’s nice carpet.

I get down on the floor so I can pick them up. “Those are for eating. Not for throwing,” I tell him, but he keeps throwing them anyway. I remove his ammunition, so naturally he starts screaming. Then—since Hector’s scream seems to work like the Bat signal—Bryce and Aurora burst out of our bedroom door, trampling all the Cheerios in their path. Bryce is yelling about his imaginary Bucket of Doom. Aurora climbs into my lap and covers her ears.

If I were an octopus, things would be so much easier. I’d have one arm to wipe Aurora’s nose. Two more for holding both kids’ hands when I pick them up from the Head Start bus stop to keep Bryce from wandering into the street after some rock he’s spotted. One to hold Hector and his diaper bag on the afternoons when my mom works at the Pizza Pit. One to adjust my shirt because it doesn’t really fit and it can get too revealing if I’m not paying attention, and I don’t want to be “that girl.” One so I could do my homework at least some of the time if I wanted. One to pick up the Cheerios that are always on the floor. And the last one to swipe a can of Easy Cheese from the Cumberland Farms convenience store. Because little snowmen out of Easy Cheese are the most magical thing little kids have ever seen. And Easy Cheese letters on a saltine is totally different than having to eat regular saltines. Aurora knew the letter A before she even turned two, thanks to Easy Cheese letters.

The main door opens and I hear Lenny stamping the snow off his boots in the hallway. I drop my debate packet into my backpack and get the rest of the Cheerio dust scraped into my hand as fast as I can.

“How’s my baby?” Lenny booms as he comes around the corner into the main room. He pats Hector on the head, and then heads to the fridge to get a soda.

Lenny is Hector’s dad. He’s not Bryce and Aurora’s dad. That was Nate. Nate used to take me hunting, which was cool. No meat tastes as good as the stuff you’ve caught yourself. But Nate’s not around anymore. And my own dad was gone long before I could throw Cheerios. My mom doesn’t seem to think he’s worth talking about too much, but you never know … maybe he secretly liked documentaries as much as I do.

It’s all okay though, because I like football, too, and so does Lenny. Plus, tonight is a playoff game and when my mom gets home from her shift, she’s going to make her bacon-wrapped hot dog bites. Those are what got us Lenny in the first place. Maybe they’ll make up for all the other stuff.

That evening my job is to keep Bryce and Aurora in our bedroom so they don’t grab the bacon-wrapped hot dog bites before they’re cooked. With Hector balanced on my hip, I position myself as a human shield near the door while simultaneously keeping my eye on Lenny’s nice lamp, ready to leap for it if necessary.

Hector sucks hard on his pacifier as he watches Bryce and Aurora launch their plastic battlebots into the blanket “volcano.” But then Bryce picks up Aurora’s precious stuffed sea turtle, Petunia, as the next sacrifice, and Aurora starts shrieking at the top of her lungs to stop him. That’s one benefit of living in a town like this—when the rich people donate their old stuffed animals, you can end up with an awesome sea turtle that even has a fact printed on the tag about the dangers of shrimp nets. And anyway, we’re not as poor as we used to be. We’re living in Lenny’s trailer now. I mean, it’s a really nice lamp.

I hear the clang of a spoon against the bowl as my mom mixes the barbecue sauce, the second-to-last step before the bites go in the oven. That means just a few more minutes before we can leave this room and I can settle onto the couch like a boss to watch the game.

Unfortunately, I’m not the only one who can hear that spoon against the bowl. Both Bryce and Aurora have suddenly forgotten all about the volcano.

“Bacon bacon wap!” Aurora shrieks.

Bryce makes a break for the door.

Instantly, I’m in full-on barricade mode. “You’re not eating one until they’re cooked—just like everyone else.” I don’t need to remind them what happened the last time my mom made these. The barbecue sauce stain on Lenny’s wallpaper doesn’t let anyone forget.

Bryce is trying to push me out of the way using every bit of his scrawny four-year-old arms, but I am immovable. Plus, Hector is helping to weigh me down.

“No fair, Zoey!” Aurora wails. “What if they’re all gone?”

“There’ll be one for each of you when they’re ready.”

Aurora puts on her “sour eyes” face. “I don’t bewieve you.”

“Trust me. Both of you will get a bacon-wrapped hot dog bite.” I pry Bryce’s hands off of my sweatshirt, but he keeps pushing on me with his head like a silent slow-motion ram. “I promise!”

Bryce stops his ramming and looks up. “Pinky promise?”

I nod and hook my pinky around his. “Pinky promise.”

It’s only when I hear the oven door closing shut and the beeps of my mom setting the timer on the stove that I release them. “Remember,” I whisper, pulling them close before they can zoom by me. “No yelling, no running, no messes.”

Magically, they settle right down on the far side of the living area and start playing quietly with their toy cars. The promise of a bacon-wrapped hot dog bite is a powerful thing.

Frank is back in his recliner. The pregame show is on, but even though we’ve lived with him and Lenny for a whole year and a half I don’t know if he even likes football. I don’t know if he actually likes anything. He’s like a beetle propped belly-up, especially if that beetle is the kind that spends most of the time with either a cigarette stuck in its mouth or a strand of cinnamon-flavored floss hanging from its teeth. One’s healthier than the other, but both are gross.

I sidle up to my mom in the kitchen area, but she doesn’t thank me for my heroic feat of keeping the kids out from underfoot. She just takes Hector from me. “He needs a bath,” she says.

I hear Lenny in the entryway, coming in from outside. He went out to check on his car an hour ago, and I bet he ended up talking to everyone in the trailer park. Everyone knows Lenny, and everyone loves Lenny.

He strides across the living area into the kitchen, the frigid January air still clinging to him. “How’s my pair of cuties?” he says to my mom and Hector. His voice is loud enough for him to still be talking to the neighbors. He takes Hector from her and bends down with him so they can peer into the oven window. “And look what’s in there! You see how she wrapped up each hot dog bite real tight, Hector? That’ll make sure each bite begins and ends with bacon. And they’re going to come out nice and crispy because your mommy knows to take them out at the exact right time to add the extra barbecue sauce.”

My mom stops drying her hands to give a little laugh and a curtsy. Maybe making these will remind Lenny why he got together with her in the first place. She used to tell great jokes, too, ones that would have Lenny doubled over laughing at her impressions, but it’s been a long time since she told one.

Once the coin toss starts the game, Lenny gives Hector back to my mom and settles onto the couch with his soda (he never drinks beer) and the giant tub of cheese puffs he gets from Walmart just for football games. I sit down next to him, and he hands me the cheese puffs without a word. I like that—how it’s just understood that I get to hold them.

My mom disappears with Hector into the bathroom for his bath, but that’s okay. Patriots’ games are my time with Lenny anyway. Not only do I get to hold the cheese puffs, but if there’s some football rule I don’t get—like knowing where the defenders’ hands can’t be when a receiver is trying to catch the ball—then Lenny explains it. Both of us are always on the edge of the couch for every third down, me eating those cheese puffs and him drinking his soda. Basically, it’s the best time ever.

By the time the game gets under way Bryce and Aurora have shifted to right in front of the TV, but they still only pay attention for commercials, when it’s “more fun.” Mostly they’re zooming the toy cars around, pretending they’re trying to outrace the Death Star (they haven’t seen the movie yet, so they don’t exactly get it).

“Come on, defense!” Lenny mutters. “You got this.”

“Let’s get a sack right here,” I say, leaning forward.

Lenny nods and takes a swig of soda without taking his eyes off the screen. “That’s right. Push ’em out of field goal range. Listen to Zoey.”

We watch as the Colts hike the ball and our defensive linemen close in on the quarterback. The pocket’s closing around him, and then—ooh! Even better! It’s a fumble!

“Yes!” Lenny yells, pumping his fist in the air as the refs unpack the pile of players and signal the Patriots now have possession.

Lenny and I high-five, and then I lick the orange cheese dust off my fingers in celebration. This is how things are supposed to be. I’ve got a nice couch to sit on—which, thanks to Lenny, is perfectly centered in the room—cheese puffs to eat, and a great game to watch.

At halftime, when no one’s looking, I reach into my backpack for my debate packet and slip it into my front hoodie pocket. I’ll finish it after the game.

But when I look up, I realize that when I wasn’t paying attention, Bryce and Aurora got so excited about a commercial that they started hurling toy cars at the TV. Before I can stop them, Frank erupts from the depths of his recliner.

“THROW ONE MORE STUPID CAR AT MY TV, AND I’LL POUND YOU INTO THE GROUND!”

He keeps shouting, and it’s like watching an ancient, wrinkled mountain explode, revealing an interior that’s straight-up burning, swear-filled lava. Bryce and Aurora scream and run into our bedroom, tripping over each other as they go.

They slam the door shut, and I hate myself. Because in the far back corner of my mind, a horrible part of me is glad that I can watch the rest of the game in peace.

That’s when the power goes out.

Of course it does.

Next to me, Lenny stands up and immediately trips over the coffee table. My mom bursts in from the bathroom, using her phone as a flashlight and carrying a soaking wet Hector on her hip.

Lenny calls over to her, “You got any guesses why we’re in the dark?”

But she doesn’t say anything. She just heads for the oven and takes out the bacon-wrapped hot dog bites. “I’m sorry. Hopefully, they’ll still be crispy.” She props the phone/flashlight under her chin, hefts Hector up higher on her hip, and transfers the hot dog bites onto a plate with a spatula.

They smell amazing. Like the pig is roasting on a spit right in the living room, dripping delicious grease all over the carpet.

Lenny makes his way into the kitchen as my mom pours the rest of the barbecue sauce over the top of them. He pops one in his mouth, and then shakes his head. “I’ve had better.”

“I—I’m sorry,” my mom stammers. “And I’m sorry you can’t watch the rest of the game.”

Lenny takes the plate of hot dog bites and shrugs. “I’ll watch it at Slider’s.”

And with that, Lenny and the plate are out the door, and I’m left sitting on the couch.

No Lenny.

No game.

No bacon-wrapped hot dog bites. And I’d promised.