“You look pretty morose.” Ms. Rait sat at her kitchen table with her hands folded.

Danny wrinkled his mouth. “What’s that even mean?”

“Glum. Upset. Sad. A good vocabulary word for you.” She wrote it out on the scrap paper in front of her. “You can use it on your friends.”

“Perfect,” he said, slouching down into the chair opposite her. “Where’s Mrs. McGillicuddy?”

Ms. Rait took a sip from her glass of iced tea. The cubes clinked. Her face glowed. “I think she had her kittens!”

“What? Really?” Danny stood up and went to the window to look out at the old chicken coop.

“I think so. The door is painted shut, so I can’t get in there, but she’s in there most of the time, looking slimmer, and acting funny, so . . .”

“How will you get them out?”

“They’ll come out when they’re ready. I imagine it’ll be a couple weeks before you can take one home.”

Danny returned to the table and sat down. He hadn’t gotten an answer from his mom yet. He planned to just show up with a kitten and hope her heart melted. “Ready?”

“Always.” She took out her first sheet and they began to go over it.

They worked hard for an hour. Danny felt good. He was getting it, and Ms. Rait praised him.

“Let’s do the practice test,” Danny said.

“Um . . . you might want to wait until the weekend. We’ve got more to do.” Ms. Rait tapped her pen on the side of her glass.

“I can do it. C’mon, Ms. Rait. You always say, ‘reach for the stars,’ so I’m reaching.”

She paused and looked at him for a moment. Then she nodded. “Oh, okay. But call your mom and tell her we’ll be an hour late. I don’t want her to worry.”

Danny called his mom, who said it was fine.

Danny took the test. It was harder than he thought. There were words he didn’t know and couldn’t guess. They left gaping holes in the paragraphs he had to answer questions about. Still, he told himself he only needed two out of every three to be correct, and some answers were easy. He kept his spirits up and handed it over when she said, “Time.”

He watched her grade it, slashing the wrong answers with her red marker that left a little streak like blood. Finally, she wrote “57%,” circled that in blood, and looked up at him.

“So, I’ll pass the real test though, right?” He was smiling, but when he saw the doubt on her face, it melted. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Danny, you’re doing very well, especially this past week.”

“But?”

“But it’s a lot to expect that you’ll just learn to read fluently and put it all together for the first-marking-period test.”

“I’m doing good, so . . . I don’t get it. If I’m close, you’ll pass me, right?”

She looked at her red marker, then pointed it at herself before pointing it at him. “I won’t pass you or fail you, Danny. You’ll do that. You might pass, but you might not. We’ve been through this.”

Danny pushed his chair back and rose to his feet. “Yeah, but that was a month ago. I’ve been here every day you asked me. I’ve done all the work. I read books. And now you’re saying you’d fail me? What’s wrong with you? I thought we were friends.”

“Danny, I’m your teacher. I like you and I care about you. That’s why it has to be you who does this. No more exceptions.”

“That stinks! You’re . . . you’re just like Coach Kinen.” Danny gathered his things. “I do everything you say and you still stab me in the back!”

“I am not Coach Kinen,” she said, sputtering.

“No. You’re not. At least he said he’d think about it before he sticks it to me. I’ve got a chance with him. But not you. You’re the reading police. I gave you everything I have, now just line me up and shoot me. Can I have a blindfold? Will you give me that?” Danny grabbed his backpack and raced out of the house.

He was nearly to the center of town when Ms. Rait pulled up beside him in her car and rolled down the window. “Please get in, Danny. I told your mom I’d drive you home.”

Danny burned inside with the desire not to get into her car. He did not want to give her anything, but he knew better than to overdo it on his foot this last week. He got in, determined not to say a word.

“Thank you,” she said, and began to drive.

Danny didn’t have to worry about talking because Ms. Rait wasn’t either, until she pulled into his driveway. “I’ll be ready for you from six to seven tomorrow. If you come, fine. If not, that’s your call. The final is in two weeks, so you’re running out of time.”

He got out and shut the door.