Well! Surely he was not interested in perpetual motion. I barely was myself! So, I reasoned, continuing our discussion would drive him away. I dove back in, and when the conversation started to peter out, I came up with my own ideas on perpetual-motion machines. I was like a perpetual-idea machine, spinning ridiculous suggestions right out of the air.

And still he wouldn’t leave. He didn’t say anything, he just stood there, listening. Then when Mrs. Loski announced that dinner was ready, Bryce held my arm and whispered, “Juli, I’m sorry. I’ve never been so sorry about anything in my whole life. You’re right, I was a jerk, and I’m sorry.”

I yanked my arm free from his grasp and said, “It seems to me you’ve been sorry about a whole lot of things lately!” and left him there with his apology hanging wounded in the air.

It didn’t take me long to realize that I’d made a mistake. I should have let him say he was sorry and then simply continued to ignore him. But I’d snapped at him in the middle of an apology, which somehow made me the rude one.

I sneaked a peek at him across the table, but he was watching his dad, who was asking my brothers about graduating and their plans for college.

I had, of course, seen Mr. Loski many times, but usually from a distance. Still, it seemed impossible that I’d never noticed his eyes before. They were blue. Brilliant blue. And although Mr. Loski’s were set farther back and were hidden somewhat by his eyebrows and cheekbones, there was no mistaking where Bryce had gotten his eyes. His hair was black, too, like Bryce’s, and his teeth were white and straight.

Even though Chet had called Bryce the spitting image of his father, I’d never really thought of them as looking alike. But now I saw that they did look alike, though where his dad seemed kind of smug, Bryce seemed… well, right now he seemed angry.

Then from the other side of the table, I heard, “Your sarcasm is not appreciated, Dad.”

Mrs. Loski gave a small gasp, and everyone looked at Lynetta. “Well, it’s not,” she said.

In all the years we’ve lived across the street from the Loskis, I’ve said about ten words to Lynetta, and she’s said fewer back. To me she’s scary. So it wasn’t a surprise to see her glaring at her father, but it was uncomfortable. Mrs. Loski was keeping a smile perched on her face, but she was blinking a lot, glancing nervously around the table. I looked from one person to the next, too, wondering if dinner at the Loskis’ was always this tense.

Suddenly Lynetta got up and dashed down the hall, but she was back in a flash with a CD in her hand. And when she put it in the player, I recognized one of my brothers’ songs blaring through the speakers.

We’d heard this song, “Candle Ice,” pouring out of my brothers’ bedroom at least a million times, so we were used to it. But I looked over at my mom, worried that she might be embarrassed by the distorting guitars and the gritty lyrics. This was definitely not caviar music.

She seemed a little uncertain, but in a happy way. She was sharing secret smiles with my father, and honestly, I think she even giggled. My dad was looking amused, although he was very reserved about it, and it took me until the end of the song to realize that he was proud. Proud that this noise came from his boys.

That surprised me. Dad has never been real big on any rendition of my brothers’ band, although he’s never really criticized it either. But then Mr. Loski started grilling Matt and Mike about how they’d afforded to record their own music, and they explained about working and saving and shopping for good deals on equipment, and that’s when I realized why my father was proud.

My brothers were feeling pretty good, too, you could tell. And it was no wonder, with the way Lynetta was carrying on about how great “Candle Ice” was. She was positively gushing, which seemed very odd, coming from Lynetta.

As I looked around, it struck me that we were having dinner with a group of strangers. We’d lived across the street for years, but I didn’t know these people at all. Lynetta did know how to smile. Mr. Loski was clean and smooth on the outside, but there was a distinct whiff of something rotten buried just beneath the surface. And the ever-efficient Mrs. Loski seemed flustered, almost hyper. Was it having us over that was making her nervous?

Then there was Bryce—the most disturbing of all because I had to admit that I didn’t really know him, either. And based on what I’d discovered lately, I didn’t care to know any more. Looking across the table at him, all I got was a strange, detached, neutral feeling. No fireworks, no leftover anger or resurging flutters.

Nothing.

After we’d had dessert and it was time to go, I went up to Bryce and told him I was sorry for having been so fierce when we’d first come in. “I should’ve let you apologize, and really, it was very nice of your family to have us over. I know it was a lot of work and, well, I think my mom had a really good time and that’s what matters to me.” We were looking right at each other, but it was almost as though he didn’t hear me. “Bryce? I said I’m sorry.”

He nodded, and then our families were waving good-bye and saying good night.

I walked behind my mother, who was holding hands with my father, and beside my brothers, who were carrying home what was left of our pies. We all wound up in the kitchen, and Matt poured himself a glass of milk and said to Mike, “That Mr. Loski was sniffing us out pretty good tonight, wasn’t he?”

“No kidding. Maybe he thinks we’re hot for his daughter.”

“Not me, dude! You?”

Mike got himself a glass of milk, too. “That’s Skyler’s gig. No way I’d go there.” He grinned. “But she was really cool tonight. Did she come down on papa bear or what?”

My dad took a paper plate out of the cupboard and cut a slice of pie. “You boys showed a lot of restraint tonight. I don’t know if I could’ve kept my cool that way.”

“Aw, he’s just, you know… entrenched,” Matt said. “Gotta adjust to the perspective and deal from there.” Then he added, “Not that I’d want him as my dad….”

Mike practically sprayed his milk. “Dude! Can you imagine?” Then Matt gave my dad a slap on the back and said, “No way. I’m sticking with my main man here.” My mom grinned from across the kitchen and said, “Me too.”

I’d never seen my father cry. And he didn’t exactly sit there bawling, but there were definitely tears welling up in his eyes. He blinked them back the best he could and said, “Don’t you boys want some pie to go with that milk?”

“Dude,” said Matt as he straddled a chair. “I was just thinking that.”

“Yeah,” Mike added. “I’m starved.”

“Get me a plate, too!” I called as Mike dug through the cupboard.

“But we just ate,” my mother cried.

“Come on, Trina, have some pie. It’s delicious.”

I went to bed that night feeling very full and very happy. And as I lay there in the dark, I wondered at how much emotion can go into any given day, and thought how nice it was to feel this way at the end of it.

And as I nestled in and drifted off to sleep, my heart felt wonderfully… free.

The next morning I still felt good. I went outside and sprinkled the yard, enjoying the splish and patter of water on soil, wondering when, when, that first little blade of grass would spring up into the sunshine.

Then I went out back, cleaned the coop, raked the yard, and dug up some of the bigger weeds growing along the edges.

Mrs. Stueby leaned over the side fence as I was shoveling my rakings and weeds into a trash can and said, “How’s it going, Julianna? Making neat for a rooster?”

“A rooster?”

“Why, certainly. Those hens need some motivation to start laying more!”

It was true. Bonnie and Clydette and the others were only laying about half the eggs that they used to, but a rooster? “I don’t think the neighborhood would appreciate my getting a rooster, Mrs. Stueby. Besides, we’d get chicks and I don’t think we can handle any more poultry back here.”

“Nonsense. You’ve spoiled these birds, giving them the whole yard. They can share the space. Easily! How else are you going to maintain your business? Soon those birds won’t be laying anything a-tall!”

“They won’t?”

“Well, very little.”

I shook my head, then said, “They were just my chicks that grew into chickens and started laying eggs. I never really thought of it as a business.”

“Well, my runnin’ a tab has probably contributed to that, and I’m sorry. I’ll be sure and get you the whole sum this week, but consider buying yourself a rooster with some of it. I’ve got a friend down on Newcomb Street who is positively green over my deviled eggs. I gave her my recipe, but she says hers just don’t taste the same.” She winked at me. “I’m certain she’d pay handsomely for a supply of my secret ingredient if it became available.” She turned to go, then said, “By-the-by, Julianna, you have done a mighty fine job on that front yard. Most impressive!”

“Thanks, Mrs. Stueby,” I called as she slid open her patio door. “Thanks very much.”

I finished scooping up the piles I’d made and thought about what Mrs. Stueby had said. Should I really get a rooster? I’d heard that having one around made chickens lay more, whether they were in contact with each other or not. I could even breed my chickens and get a whole new set of layers. But did I really want to go through all of that again?

Not really. I didn’t want to be the neighborhood rancher. If my girls quit laying altogether, that would be just fine with me.

I put away the rake and shovel, clucked a kiss on each of the hens, and went inside. It felt good to take charge of my own destiny! I felt strong and right and certain.

Little did I know how a few days back at school would change all of that.

Bryce: Flipped

After the dinner Juli was nice to me at school. Which I hated. Mad was better than nice. Gaga was better than… nice. It was like I was a stranger to her, and man, it bugged me. Bugged me big-time.

Then the auction happened, and I found myself with even bigger problems.

The auction is this bogus way the Booster Club raises money for the school. They insist it’s an honor to be chosen, but bull-stinkin’-loney to that! Bottom line is, twenty guys get shanghaied. They have to come up with fancy picnic lunches and then be humiliated in front of the whole school while girls bid to have lunch with them.

Guess who made this year’s top twenty.

You’d think mothers would say, Hey, there’s no way you’re going to auction my son off to the highest bidder, but no. Instead, they’re all flattered that their son’s been elected a basket boy.

Yes, my friend, that’s what they call you. Over the P.A. you hear stuff like, “There will be an organizational meeting of the newly elected basket boys in the MPR at lunch today. All basket boys must attend.”

Pretty soon you’ve completely lost your name. You and nineteen other saps are known simply as Basket Boy.

My mom, of course, was into it, coming up with all sorts of stuff to put in my basket so I’d get the highest bid. I tried to explain that I didn’t want to be in Mayfield Junior High’s Basket Boy Hall of Fame, and that really, what was in the basket didn’t matter. It wasn’t like girls were bidding on the basket. When you got right down to it, this was a meat market.

“You eat lunch on campus and that’s the end of it. It is hardly a meat market, Bryce. It’s an honor! Besides, maybe someone really nice will bid on you and you’ll make a new friend!”

Mothers can be in such denial.