Emma and Jackson took their seats in the Taft conference room and watched from the audience as two other schools battled it out on their topic: “Should school uniforms be required?”

“That’s such an easy one!” Emma complained to Jackson. “Uniforms suppress creativity and originality. You can’t express yourself if you have to look and dress like everyone else. Your style is a reflection of who you are . . . a mirror into your soul!”

“Great, so we’d win that one. What about our topic?” Jackson groaned.

“We’ll do fine,” Emma said, leaning back in her seat. “These teams aren’t so scary.”

Just then, she noticed Jessalyn and her classmate staring in their direction. “Why is she giving me the evil eye?” she asked Mr. Carter.

He checked his schedule. “Perhaps because they are your opponents. They’re the con side of your argument: The program says Austen Middle versus All Plains Day.”

“No way!” Emma said, grabbing the roster out of his hands. Now it was her turn to freak out. How could that snooty girl who hated the greatest female writer of all time be her opponent? Obviously, Jessalyn was trying to shake her confidence—but Emma wouldn’t let even a crack about her taste in literature do that!

“It doesn’t matter. Stick to your argument. It’s rock solid,” her adviser instructed her.

The two teams sat back down and now it was Emma and Jackson’s turn to take the podium. Jessalyn and her teammate took their seats in the wings, whispering to each other.

“All right, don’t forget everything I told you,” Mr. Carter said, giving Jackson a slight push toward the stage when Jackson paused a few feet shy of it. “And, Emma, stay on track.”

“Oh, I will,” Emma said, clutching her box of cards. “They’re so going down!”

“We now have Austen Middle arguing pro for ‘Should physical education be mandatory in schools?’ Emma Woods is up first.” It was just their team’s luck that the head judge was presiding in her conference room! Mr. Hartfield looked so stern and intense, like one of those presidential portraits you see hanging in the Smithsonian.

Emma stood and walked purposefully to the podium. She took out her first index card, glanced at it, then began to speak with confidence and conviction as the large digital clock on the judge’s desk ticked down: “Physical education should be mandatory in all middle schools for several important reasons, the first being the stress that exercise can alleviate in a student’s daily life . . .” She recounted each of the points on her card, quoting statistics, stressing every single research study, fact and figure, then looked up to see the clock: two minutes, fifty-eight seconds. She’d made it just in time!”

“Thank you, Emma. Jessalyn McCutcheon, your rebuttal please,” Mr. Hartfield instructed.

Jessalyn swaggered past Emma and smirked. “Physical education in middle school is a useless and ineffective waste of valuable study time,” she began. “Most PE programs lack any exercise benefits, are poorly structured, and fail to even raise a student’s heart rate.”

“Wow,” Jackson whispered to Emma. “She doesn’t waste any time, does she? She’s tearing our argument to shreds.”

“No, she’s trying to poke some holes in it,” Emma said. “That’s okay. Let her. Facts are facts and our argument is stronger and more supported.”

When it was Jackson’s turn to take the microphone, he took a deep breath. “Rama lama lama,” he told Emma. “Here goes nothing.”

He looked at his card, then directly at the judges. “Physical education should be mandatory in schools because it contributes to a student’s moral development and character. Through PE, students assume leadership positions, cooperate with others, and accept responsibility for their behavior. Several studies have found this to be true . . .” He rattled off each of them, summing up his argument just before the three-minute buzzer sounded.

“Yes!” Emma cheered him from the wings.

Mr. Hartfield was taking diligent notes. “Billy Davis. Your counter,” he said. Billy brushed past Jackson and could barely wait to launch into his counterargument. “Physical education encourages hostile behavior and aggression according to a recent medical research study . . .”

Jackson looked at Emma. “Okay, we have to nail the next one. It’s your closing. Go with the long-term health benefits. It’s impossible to argue against that.”

Emma nodded and waited until Billy was done before she stood. She walked to the podium and reached in her box for the yellow cards with all her points outlined. There were red ones and purple ones, but where were the yellow ones? She looked back at Jackson, panicked.

What’s wrong? he mouthed.

She held up the box and shook her head.

“Ms. Woods, are you ready to begin?” Mr. Hartfield asked impatiently.

Emma did the only thing she could think of . . . she sneezed.

“I’m—ACHOO—sorry—ACHOO—I just—ACHOO seem to be having an allergy—a-a-a-CHOO—attack.”

Mr. Carter raced up to check on her. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“I lost my yellow cards,” Emma whispered. “Go with it.”

“Oh dear!” Mr. Carter improvised. “I’m afraid my student is violently allergic to . . . to . . .”

“Roses!” Emma shouted, spying a vase on the judges’ table. “ACHOO! ACHOO! ACHOO!”

“Well, we will take a small break, remove the flowers from the room, and allow you to regain your composure,” Mr. Hartfield said.

“ACHOO! Thanks!” Emma said, running out of the room with both Jackson and Mr. Carter trailing behind her.

“What do you mean you lost them?” Mr. Carter asked frantically. “When did you last have them?”

“On the train. Jax and I were talking and . . .” Emma half remembered having the cards in her hands but couldn’t recall where they went after that or if she had put them back. She and Jackson had their “moment,” then Mr. Carter rushed them to pack up and exit the train.

“Do you remember everything that was on them? We went over it dozens of times,” Jackson said. “I’m sure you can do it without the cards.”

“I’ll try,” Emma said.

Mr. Carter looked like he was going to explode. “You will not try, you will do it. Now! Before we are disqualified.” He stomped back into the ballroom.

“Disqualified?” Emma gasped. She couldn’t bear the thought of that happening, of letting Ms. Bates, Mr. Carter, or Jackson down.

“Emma, calm down,” Jackson said, putting his hands on her shoulders and gazing deeply into her eyes. “I know you’re freaking out, but everyone feels that way sometimes.” He paused. “Someone really smart told me that once—maybe some advice blogger?”

Emma smiled slightly. “I wonder who?”

“The point is, you can do this,” Jackson continued. “I believe in you.”

“Okay,” Emma replied. “I got this.”

“Of course you do,” Jackson said, as he turned her toward the ballroom door and gave her a gentle push. “You’re Emma.”

Emma walked back inside, taking her spot once again onstage. Focus, she told herself. Stop daydreaming about the missing index cards and Jax’s dimples. Focus!

“Are you all right?” Mr. Hartfield asked her.

“Yes, all better!” she said brightly. “No more sneezes.” She wiped her nose with the back of her blouse sleeve for emphasis. “I’m ready.”

Over the next two minutes she listed the important points in her argument. She even remembered the complicated medical study that proved “aerobic activity has been shown to increase the size of essential brain structures and the number of neural connections.”

The judges were nodding, impressed. Then Emma totally blanked. There was still one minute left on the clock, and she couldn’t think of another thing from her cards to say. She saw Mr. Hartfield stifle a yawn. In fact, as Emma glanced around the room, she noticed most of the audience looked so bored they were about to doze off. So she improvised.

“Everyone, up on your feet!” she called. She saw Mr. Carter in the audience, waving frantically at her to stop. Was he trying to signal her “time out!” or communicate in sign language? Still, she kept going. “Do five jumping jacks with me. Right here, right now.”

Amazingly, the audience obeyed. Even Mr. Hartfield was on his feet, jumping and waving his arms in the air with a surprisingly big smile on his face.

“Now, think about what you just did,” Emma told the crowd. “You’re smarter, more energized, more emotionally balanced, happier, and less likely to die of a horrible disease. How awesome is that? Don’t you want to do more? Don’t you believe PE should be mandatory in schools?”

“Yeah!” a kid cheered from the audience.

“Totally!” said another. “I was falling asleep and that was awesome!”

Soon the entire audience erupted in applause.

Emma looked to the wings to see Billy and Jessalyn staring in disbelief, and Jackson pumping his fists in the air.

Jessalyn made her closing remarks but barely anyone paid attention. Emma’s little show had left a lasting impression.

“You hit it out of the park!” Jackson said. “That was incredible!” He leaned forward and swept her into a hug.

Emma could barely catch her breath from all the excitement—and frankly, the feeling of Jackson’s arms around her.

“It was okay, right?” she asked.

“It was more than okay. You won this for us, Em!” Jackson said, beaming.

“No, we definitely did it together,” Emma insisted. “Your arguments were really strong—and your pep talk helped me a lot. I think we have a good chance.”

“I agree,” Mr. Carter said, catching up with them to await the judges’ decision. “It was a bit unorthodox, but it truly drove the point home.”

They waited more than twenty minutes before Mr. Hartfield finally appeared onstage with the panel’s decision. “This was a difficult one,” he stated to the crowd. “Both Austen Middle and All Plains Day made very strong, convincing arguments. But in the end, we decided that one team communicated their evidence in an innovative and indisputable way. Congratulations, Austen Middle.”

Emma and Jackson couldn’t believe it—they were going to the semifinals tomorrow morning!

Mr. Carter looked pleased but not as ecstatic as they were. “Good job, you two,” he told them. “Now the real work begins.”