The most interesting thing about Ivy’s second Monday in her new school was that her teacher made them breathe. It was almost time for the bell to ring and a bunch of the boys were throwing spit wads and bouncing up and down in their seats. Ivy was drawing a flower in her notebook. Not just any flower, but the lone tulip that had the guts to come up in their lawn.

You never knew where a flower was going to spring up, she guessed, or what it was going to look like. This one had yellow petals—really yellow, like the color you always made the sun when you were little—and Ivy felt compelled to make a picture of it. Because it was so brave, for one thing. Also because using the pencils Prairie had given her brought Prairie herself right along with them, a little.

She was absorbed in drawing the tulip’s leaves when Ms. Mackenzie thwacked her dictionary down on her desk. Everyone jumped. Ms. Mackenzie stood up and loomed over her desk—she was almost six feet tall—and smiled gently. It was funny, once Ivy’s heart stopped banging: the smack of the dictionary, and then Ms. Mackenzie’s tender, pleased smile.

“Dear children. To ensure that you cease this infernal racket, we shall now breathe. For the next seven minutes.”

“Breathe?” a girl named Tate asked. She was heavy and had long wavy red hair she always wore loose so it trailed out behind her.

Ivy’s own hair was thick and wheat colored, and today she’d done it in one long braid, a braid she pulled over her shoulder and tugged on when she was deep in thought. She tugged on it now. If she ever did make a movie, she’d have a character who looked like Tate. Her hair would stand for her independent nature and fiery spirit. She hadn’t really watched Tate long enough to be one hundred percent sure what her nature and spirit were like, but the fact that she was questioning big, bold Ms. Mackenzie made independent seem likely.

“Breathe,” Ms. Mackenzie confirmed.

Tate shoved her black-rimmed glasses up with one finger. “Like just—in and out?”

Ms. Mackenzie nodded. “Right. In so your belly inflates like a balloon. Out so it goes flat.”

“Oooh, sounds exciting,” a boy named Billy Wells said.

Ms. Mackenzie beamed her gaze on him. “It is. It’s the most interesting thing ever. And hard too. Most people can’t do it.”

“Can’t breathe.”

“That’s right. Can’t breathe. Not for long, anyway. Not just breathe. And certainly not quietly.” She made a circle in the air with her pen, like she was circling Billy’s face, and gave the center a little poke. Then she pulled the projector screen down and hit a couple of keys on her computer. The stopwatch appeared, set for five minutes. “We’ve wasted two minutes of all our precious lives. NO MORE!” Everybody jumped again.

Ms. Mackenzie smiled the pleased smile. “We have no time to waste. Remember that. When I start this watch, you all start to breathe.”

She hit the timer. Everyone started to breathe, out and in, and a great peacefulness swelled up inside Ivy. It was like the time-release film of a seed growing into a tree they’d watched for their science section last week.