Wednesday morning, I sleep in. Stupid James knows he’s supposed to get me up when he’s got early practice. Today, he must’ve hopped in Mom’s car and taken off, leaving me in la la land. Idiot! Now I’ll miss band—again. Mrs. Archibald is going to kick my butt out.

One thing I’m pretty good at is music. Not that it’s something to get pumped about at Oakdale Middle. Carrying a trombone case is about the same as having a big loser “L” stamped on your forehead. When I’m not there, the horn section blows. Hey, is that one of those pun things we learned about? Archie’ll notice I’m missing right away, since nobody else on trombone can even read music.

I yank on yesterday’s shorts and a clean T-shirt, do a quick sniff check, then put on extra deodorant. A splash of water on my face and I’m good to go.

“Hannah, get up.” I’m whispering and brushing my teeth at the same time. I wipe a bit of toothpaste froth off her cheek. “We’re late—hurry up!”

She jumps out of bed and gives me a big toothy smile. She’s always smiley, bouncy like Tigger, over-the-top happy. The worst of it is she’s not faking it. She’s really that sweet, like cotton candy, to everybody, even the nose pickers in kindergarten. If she wasn’t my sister, I’d call her a super butt-kisser.

I’m the stuck-in-the-middle kid—in between perfect King James and precious Princess Hannah.

“Thanks, Bobby.” She doesn’t even sound sleepy. “I guess James was too busy and forgot us again, huh?”

“He forgets we’re alive most of the time. You’ve got two minutes to get ready.” I go downstairs, slap together two peanut butter and grape jelly sandwiches, and stuff them into bags. No juice packs; water’ll have to do.

I throw on my backpack, grab my hoodie from the rack, take an apple off the table, and toss one to her. “Let’s go. We’re gonna have to run.”

She slides her arms into the sleeves of my old red soccer jacket, zips up her little monkey backpack, and follows me out the door. “Mom must’ve worked really, really late last night. Do you think Daddy had a good night?”

“I didn’t hear her come in. Maybe they both slept all night—I wish.”

My mom’s a continuing care worker, a babysitter for old people. My dad’s sick.

We get to the door just as the last buses are pulling out of the parking lot. “Bye, Bobby.” Hannah squeezes my arm. “Hope you have a super awesome day! See you later, alligator!”

I pull my arm away. “Bye, Hanny.”

“Bobby!”

“Okay, okay. In a while, crocodile.” When’s she gonna outgrow that little-girl huggy thing? I am so not into PDA—girly Public Displays of Affection.

Crap—there’s the first bell. I’m really late now. One more late slip and I’m in detention for the next tryout. I slide through the door just as Andrews is about to close it. I don’t think he likes me—probably because I’m no James, the Wonder Boy.

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen—nice to see you all looking so bright-eyed and bushy-tailed this fine, sunny morning.” Mr. Andrews strolls around the class with his hands behind his back, looking everybody over. Do we look like a bunch of squirrels? More like a bunch of slugs. He’s the kind of teacher who always thinks he’s hilarious. Doesn’t seem to notice nobody’s laughing. We’re pretty sure he wears a wig—now that is funny. His hair’s, like, dark brown and thick and curly—but he’s about a hundred years old. Sometimes you can see the nasty gray hairs on the back of his neck, sproinging up over the collar of one of his collection of 300 or so plaid shirts.

Maria peeks in through the skinny window on the door. She knocks and he opens the door, just a crack, and lowers his face to the same level as hers.

“Sorry I’m late, sir,” she whispers. “I promise it won’t happen again.” Then she giggles. “At least, not this week.”

Lucky for her, Andrews likes girls way better than boys. He doesn’t even say anything about a late slip. Maria sort of reminds me of Hannah. She’s friends with everybody—even the geeky kids and the ones that hide in the back corner of the cafeteria to eat lunch. She’s cute, but not gorgeous; her hair’s almost long enough to sit on. She mostly wears it in braids with different-colored ribbons on the ends. Most Grade 8 girls would be way too cool for that.

If I stop and think about it, Maria’s the only girl I ever really talk to at school. Maybe I’m one of those geeky ones I was talking about. She’s the only girl I know who plays the electric guitar. She’s not bad; I mean, she’s not into metal or anything, like me. But she’s more real than lots of Grade 8 girls, if you know what I mean. Not all painted and ditzy, orange-tanned and stunned.

“Ahem—sorry to interrupt your deep pondering, Mr. Prescott—bottom of page 78, please and thank you.”

“Sorry, Mr. Andrews … right, page 78 … got it.” I better start listening up—I can just see the smoke blasting out of Coach’s ears if Andrews gives me a detention. I’ve heard them going at it in the hall before, usually about some player missing practice time.

The thing I don’t get is why stupid Roy and his Siamese twin Kyle never get detentions from Andrews. I’m guessing he likes them because they’re basketball stars or something. Oh, yeah, and Jeff told me Andrews’s wife is Roy’s great-aunt; that might explain a few things. Like why Roy never gets his name on the board for being late and not doing his homework. Or skipping—he’s always missing class.

I put my head down and start working on the problems. Hey, there’s a pun. What kind of teachers have lots of problems? Math teachers—especially Andrews. Math is pretty easy for me—by that I mean, it’s soooo boring because Andrews teaches the same thing over and over. He sounds like the droids in those old Star Wars movies. How could anybody talk that much about numbers? I wish he’d come by and start teaching algebra some night when I can’t sleep. I check the clock for the tenth time. Is it lunchtime yet?