SIX

Rock, rock, rock, rock, rock ’n’ roll high school.

—The Ramones, “Rock ’n’ Roll High School”

A week later I stood in front of my closet, yawning. Mom started calling it the Great Volcano because it was packed so tightly it was about to blow, but I thought it was perfect. What was life without a few thousand costume changes?

“It’s stress,” I said, leaning down and rubbing Balzac’s ears. “That has to be what’s making me see things.”

He was my number-one confidante, pre-Walt. He was also the silent type, which meant I got to ask the questions and answer them.

“Do you think a spa weekend would solve anything?” I said, not really knowing what that meant but hoping it included seaweed wraps, green juice and a distinct lack of episodes. Balzac purred and wrapped his body around my left calf like the stress whisperer.

“Sophie! You need to leave in ten!”

Mom was definitely not helping my stress level, but maybe the perfect outfit would.

“Nature’s calming, right?” I said, taking my tree skirt off the rack. Balzac batted it with his paw, a sign of feline approval.

The skirt was my favorite—gray wool, A-line style with a green tree pocket on the front and a brown trunk whose roots wrapped around the edges like trim. I threw on a black turtleneck, added a Clash Combat Rock T-shirt over it and ran a comb through my bangs, straight as Cleopatra’s. Green-and-brown-striped kneesocks, my Army Navy jacket, a green knit beret, and I was ready—just in time to save Finny from the Nosiest Mom on the Planet.

“Sophie has a curfew, especially on school nights,” I heard Mom say as I walked down the stairs. “Do you have a curfew?”

“Of course,” Finny said. “There’s nothing to do here at night anyway.”

Except listen to music and watch movies, which was what we’d been doing the past week. As it turned out, school wasn’t so bad when it came with Finny afternoons and evenings. Mom was so shocked that I had a new friend she hadn’t even insisted that she meet him, mostly because she hadn’t been around.

“And we’re off!” I said, rushing in and grabbing Finny’s arm.

“Not without breakfast you’re not,” she said, producing two Pop-Tarts on paper towels from behind her back.

“Moooom,” I said. I wanted to crawl under the coffee table and die.

“What?” she said, flipping her hair, trying to charm my new friend. “Growing minds need nutrition.”

“Fine,” I said, grabbing the paper towels. “But we have to go.”

“You know you two can hang out here anytime,” she said. “I can’t cook, but I make a mean frozen pizza.”

“Basil,” I said, dragging Finny away from the door. “She adds fresh basil. Bye, Mom!”

“Au revoir,” she yelled, waving. “Come back soon!”

“Your mom is cool,” Finny said.

“That’s because she’s not your mom,” I said, kicking leaves as I walked, leaving a trail of red and gold in my wake.

We munched on Pop-Tarts (brown sugar: me, strawberry with sprinkles: him) and talked about the White Stripes’ best album (Elephant: me, Icky Thump: him). When I mentioned Balzac, my talking cat, Finny choked, spraying sprinkles everywhere.

“It’s not like he speaks English,” I said. “He just meows on cue.”

“Adorable,” Finny said, wiping his mouth. “Kind of like your skirt.”

“I sewed the pocket on myself,” I said, twirling.

“No way,” he said. “Who taught you to do that?”

Kim Gordon from Sonic Youth helped me sew a button once, but it wasn’t like I could tell him that.

“My upstairs neighbor in New York,” I said, which was partially true. Martha gave me sewing lessons, occupying the endless, lonely hours after school or when my parents fought. But within a few months, I found a ten-dollar Singer at the flea market and began modifying my clothes myself, headphones on. I started with extra fabric and buttons and eventually moved on to pockets.

“That’s cool,” he said. “But I think this might be even cooler.”

Finny opened the door and ushered me into Café Haven like we were attending a ball. He wanted to go last week, but it had been closed for renovations, which were totally worth it. A bright red counter stretched across the front, barstools gleaming underneath; ceilings reached for the sky, spotted with twinkling lights and chandeliers; blue vinyl booths lined the middle, filled with people; and there, in the back, was a sitting room, elegant Victorian stuffed couches and curvy-legged coffee tables between them. I wasn’t sure which part was considered the haven—or if one room was a haven from the other—but I loved how it went from diner to coffee shop and back again.

“It’s amazing,” I said, looking up at the lights. And then, as I brought my eyes down, they got stuck on a cute guy in a sparkly blue booth. He held a mug of coffee in one hand, On the Road by Jack Kerouac in the other and was dressed like he’d just stepped out of the book: white T-shirt, skinny leg jeans and ankle boots.

Finny nudged my arm.

“Looks like coffee isn’t all you want this morning.”

“Very funny,” I said, grabbing my vanilla latte off the bar. “I was just checking the place out.”

“The place or the patron?” Finny might be a scientist-in-training, but he was also romantic—just not toward me or anyone else of my gender, I suspected. And I was more than fine with that.

“I’ll be outside,” I said, “warming up with Love and Rockets.”

I put my earbuds in and stood by the door, bopping my head to “All in My Mind” while I waited. I looked inside, hoping to see Finny, but I saw Literary Loner instead. And before I had a chance to look away, he saw me. And smiled.

“Ooooh!” Finny joined me on the sidewalk. “He loves you.”

“More like he busted me,” I said, but I smiled back.

And then I hurried off, Finny in tow, racing away from one embarrassing situation and—if my history was any indication—probably into another one.

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Since I’d met Finny, I’d discovered having a best friend was like having a boyfriend without all the drama. It was great until I realized it wasn’t entirely true. Finny had plenty of drama, it just wasn’t about people. It was about physics.

“Isn’t it amazing that my view of time and space could be different than someone else’s view of time and space?” Finny asked, his voice bubbling like carbonation.

We’d just come from a class lecture on special relativity and Finny was freaking out about it.

“What Mr. Maxim was saying was that space and time are relative to velocity. Which means you can’t say that time is something different than space.”

“Your point would be?” I said, trading my physics textbook for global studies, which was just as heavy.

“Relativity is applicable to real life,” he said, almost squealing. “At this moment, someone is especially relative to you. And he’s right over there.”

He pointed, I turned, and there was Literary Loner, sans the coffee, standing ten lockers away. Smiling at me.

“Omigod, that makes three,” Finny said. He was more clued in to my budding social life than I was. “Three smiles, Sophie. That means he’s going to ask you out.”

“Crap!” I said, turning around as quickly as I could. “What do I do now?”

“I’d run like crazy, but I’d like to think you’re more skilled at this,” Finny said.

“Well, I’m not. My class is that way,” I said, pointing in Loner’s direction. “But I’m going this way.”

I turned and walked away from him, not sure how I was going to get to history, but at least I’d avoided Confrontation with a Crush.

“Come on, Sophie,” Finny called after me. “You’re a city girl! Be brave enough for the both of us!”

Thanks to a recent recurring panda, I wasn’t strong enough to carry anyone but myself.

“I’ll see you in the cafeteria,” I said, dreading it. “That’s bravery for you.”

As a rule, I avoided the cafeteria. Most new kids did. But since Finny was the first real friend I’d made since New York, and since he’d told me he loved Pizza Fridays more than anything, I was going to make a concession. That’s what you did for members of your tribe. Even if it was only a tribe of three. And even if one of those three was technically a cat.

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“Cheese or pepperoni?”

A cafeteria lady with a crooked hairnet waved a spatula at me. I’d been waiting for Finny for ten minutes but finally got in line. And now, instead of arguing about realities, I was being accosted by a common kitchen utensil.

“Pick one or move on,” the cafeteria lady said, tapping her spatula on the metal pizza tray.

“Cheese,” I said. I could have gotten one for Finny, but he wasn’t there. And people who ditched didn’t get rewarded.

“You’re lucky—that’s the last one,” she said, handing me cardboard covered in tomato sauce.

“Oh, man,” said the guy behind me. “They’re out of cheese!”

He said it like his life was ruined, even though he was on the football team and had tables of people waiting to sit with him. Without Finny, I had no one, only the emptiness that came with leaving the line and having nowhere to go. The best I could hope for was that the floor would open up and swallow me whole.

“Walk much?” Heather, the head cheerleader, said as I bumped into her, spilling soda all over my tray.

“More like get dressed much,” Stacey said, pointing at my tree skirt.

Stacey was second in command. She was also only half as funny, which was probably part of Heather’s plan. She knew what all evil leaders knew: the best way to stay on top was to surround yourself with those closer to the bottom.

“It’s pathetic,” Heather said, laughing, brunette ponytail bobbing as they both walked away.

“Environmental is in,” I wanted to say, but I just stood there, arms trembling, mouth closed. Saving all my witty comebacks for later when they wouldn’t help me at all. And since Finny wasn’t coming, there was no reason for me to stay. I headed for the door, which is when I heard it.

Clang.

Metal on metal.

The pizza lady banged her spatula on the metal tray not once, but twice. Three times. Ten times—in a rhythm I knew all too well. Soon all the lunch ladies joined in with spoons and spatulas, beating on cookie sheets and countertops. When a woman popped out of the trash can strumming a saucepan as a guitar, I knew I was in trouble.

“Well, I don’t like pepperoni—cheese, cheese, we’re out of cheese pizza,” she sang. “’Cause that’s not what I want to eat—cheese, cheese, we’re out of cheese pizza,” she continued as the hairnet band kept the beat.

“I just wanna have my pick, eat some lunch, just a little bit, cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese, we’re outta cheese pizza . . .”

I tried to control myself, but it was hard to stand still while the lunch ladies covered “Rock ’n’ Roll High School” by the Ramones. So I didn’t. None of us did.

Math nerds hopped on tables and played air guitar, sending their iPhones flying; cheerleaders swung their collective ponytails in circles, littering the linoleum with scrunchies; drama kids mimed the lyrics, showing shock and awe with the “out of cheese pizza” line. When the football players formed a circle and ran around slamming into each other like punks, I danced just outside of them. It felt good to be a part of something, even if it was only a mosh pit.

“Bum, bummer, outta cheese pizza.”

“Too bad, we’re not gonna eat ya.”

“Guess I gotta have a burri-taa . . .”

The guitar wailed. The drums pounded. And as the chorus built, I knew I had nothing to lose.

“Cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese, we’re outta cheese pizza,” the woman sang as I ran up onstage in front of my fellow moshers, gave the rock-and-roll symbol and dove, headfirst, into the welcoming arms of my new friends.

Time slowed, skipped and jumped as my body flew through space, arms outstretched like a superhero. The sound of the Ramones faded, and the deafening clatter of the cafeteria appeared instead—dishes clanging, girls squealing and one voice, in particular. It belonged to Heather.

“Holy crap, you broke my arm!” I heard her say as I slid down the brown laminate table until I was stopped by a bowl of cottage cheese and peaches. Her cottage cheese and peaches.

“Get off of her!” Stacey said, rushing in and pushing me to the side. “Heather, are you okay?”

She was, but I wasn’t. Somehow, I’d managed to land directly in the middle of the table, ruining my skirt (dipped in French dressing), my shirt (flung in tomato sauce) and, of course, my face (covered in cottage cheese). Luckily, no cheerleaders were harmed in the making of this episode.

“Maybe it’s just sprained,” Heather said, cradling her arm.

“Nobody worry about me, I’m fine,” I said, hopping off the table. I had a massive stomachache and my skirt was turned around backward, so on top of everything else, I had a tree on my butt.

“Were you trying to commit suicide?” Stacey looked at me, big eyes blinking.

“Social suicide, maybe,” Heather said.

At least her mind was intact.

I smoothed down my hair, which felt like it had gone through a wind tunnel, wiped my face with a napkin and looked around the cafeteria. It was obvious I was the only one who had witnessed my stage dive. The rest of them only saw the new girl, crazy as they came, doing a belly flop into the cheerleaders’ table.

“Ms. Sophia? Would you come with me?”

Ms. Shipley, the school nurse, extended her hand. I didn’t take it, but I followed her out of there, away from the scene of another episode and, after a quick checkup, on to the scene of another one: the principal’s office. It was like San Francisco all over again. I didn’t have much on my side, but I did have a little something I’d created last time I went to a principal’s office: my list.