Lucy could feel him watching her. She bit her lower lip and concentrated on the sentence she had now copied three times from the book: "French fur trappers often relied on the Chippewa for survival in the harsh climate. French fur trappers often relied on the Chippewa for survival in the harsh climate. French fur trappers . . ."

  "For my part," he said, "I'm sorry."

  Finally Lucy cleared her throat. She didn't look at him.

  "I can't get caught in the middle. I am in the middle. I'm the kid. I'm half you and half her. And she didn't say anything about not wanting to be a 'wife.' She said 'mom.' She said she couldn't be a 'mom' this Christmas."

  Lucy realized she was nearly yelling, so she decided to concentrate on the attributes of her purple pen. She made circles on her paper. Yes, a nice thin line that never glopped. Dependable, true, honest. She ran a finger across a recently written line—huh, dried fast, too.

  The bed creaked as her dad stood up. She saw him move toward her. No hug, she thought. No. He took a step backward as if he could read her mind, and then the door closed and her dad was gone.

  But his words were not gone. They somehow shimmied in the air all around her, like canned fruit in a Jell-O casserole. The words seemed to soak up her thoughts, energy, everything about her. She needed to get out of this room. Lucy put on her winter clothes and told her dad she was going snowshoeing.

  As soon as the frozen air touched the skin on her face, Lucy felt better. She started running on her snowshoes straight up the hill into Lookout Park.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  On Monday, January 5th, school resumed. But it was hardly school as usual. It began with a phone call to one student's parent, and then to the next parent, and then another, and another. The secretary spent the entire day on the phone—she called over thirty parents—and later had to go to a chiropractor for the kink in her neck. She said the same thing to each parent: would they come to the principal's office on such-and-such a date? Not a request—the police needed to ask their child some questions. It had to do with Wiggins Hill. Then the secretary checked the name off the list and called the next parent.

  For the students, opening the principal's door and seeing a police uniform, their father in a suit and tie, their mother in the dress she wore to church, and Principal Adams's cowboy boots crossed on his desk, caused spasms of breath, a spinning sensation, and a desire to sprint. They saw the slight twinkle in Principal Adams's eyes (yeah, he was amused), and they saw his outstretched hand containing mail. They recognized the mail immediately. The postcards said Free Wiggins Hill!

  Then Principal Adams added, as if it were necessary, "These look familiar?"

  What were they supposed to say? No? Anyone could see the signature at the bottom of the postcard. Some of the kids said "Yeah," others shrugged, and yet others stared blankly, thinking about more important issues, like breath and how to get it, since they'd obviously forgotten. The jokers said, "Is there a law against postcards?"

  Then the Turtle Rock police officer stepped forward. He asked each kid their whereabouts on Christmas night at about three in the morning. The police officer tried to be nice, but none of the kids trusted him, mostly because people in Turtle Rock, Minnesota, had cable TV. They had seen those police television shows, and knew that behind every nice police officer stood the mean one. (It didn't matter that only one police officer stood in the principal's office. They were sure that a second one lurked somewhere.)

  While the police officer spoke, most of the kids' minds began to whirl, trying to figure out who had gotten them into trouble for sending a postcard, of all things!

  Lucy Moon. It was as clear as that. They thought about her standing with clenched fists and furrowed brow in the hallway: "Sign this petition!" "Stop murdering the deer!" Those braids nearly hit her knees, and that green-and-yellow hat never came off. She was a brown-eyed nutcase. Hadn't they heard that her mom still hadn't come home from that picture-taking trip? That said something.

  Not all the kids felt this way, but a big chunk of them did. They remembered their friends—the ones who'd taken the postcards and signed "Lucy Moon" as a prank. If they had thought to sign those cards with her name, they would have been brilliant, but instead they'd gotten all wrapped up in the drama of it, like a baby. Sledding was for babies. They'd been duped.

  It was around this point in the interview (maybe after a glance at a glowering parent) that kids began to realize that maybe they didn't want to leave the principal's office. Every kid was sure that as soon as they left, their parents would start talking about "appropriate" punishment. And then one of the parents would say something like: "No more socializing, mixing, or hanging out with that girl Lucy Moon." Well, their parents could save their breath— they'd already decided that they wanted absolutely nothing to do with her.

  The afternoon of the inquisition, Lucy Moon had sat in Ms. Kortum's classroom, feeling taut and edgy. She bet all the students felt the same way. When this many parents came through the front doors of the junior high, gusts of tension were sure to blow in with them. Lucy couldn't understand why they did the interviews at school. Now everyone suffered. All day long, one student after another interrupted classes and told the teacher that Principal Adams would like to see so-and-so now. Any moment the next victim could be called. Eyes flicked to the door.

  For Lucy, this tension had been particularly unwelcome. After all that had happened over winter break, Lucy felt like a side of beef dragged over rocks. She kept hearing her mom's words—"I couldn't be a mom . . ."—over and over and over. If it weren't for Zoë insisting that she get out and do things, Lucy probably would have stayed in her room doing homework. But Lucy knew she had to pull it together for school. She needed to figure out a way to get her mom out of her mind.

  At least at school the phone didn't ring. Still, it would help a lot if the first days back had been normal!

  Ms. Kortum stood at the front of the classroom writing notes on the board, like she always did as class began. This was a relief. It seemed like some of Lucy's other teachers had given up and turned their class into study hall. One teacher made them sit quietly and study maps for an hour. As if anyone could concentrate on the topography of Australia! Lucy found comfort in the sounds of Ms. Kortum's chalk on the blackboard, the fuzzy green cardigan she always wore, and the gray hair knotted untidily in a bun at the back of her head (a few strands drifting free, like feathers).

  Another plus was that this was Lucy's one class with both Zoë and Sam. Lucy wrote a note to Zoë: Who do you think is in the principal's office now? She tossed it onto Zoë's desk. Zoë flattened it out, read it, and bobbed her head in the direction of an empty desk.

  "Are you sure?" whispered Lucy.

  Two rows away, Sam leaned over and put a finger to his lips. "Sssssshhhhhhh."

  Lucy grinned at him.

  "Students," Ms. Kortum said, her back to them. "I'd like you to copy this information into your notebooks quietly. I think you know me well enough to know that anything appearing on the blackboard also appears on my tests."

  Lucy sighed, opened her notebook, and started copying the heading: "Minnesota History." For the rest of the winter and into spring, they were going to study Minnesota history. Why? That was the question. History was el finito, done, kaput. Life happened in the "here and now," not the "way back when." Also, history meant textbooks with names, places, and dates in bold lettering—memorization and more memorization. Who cared if there was a story behind Congress taking four months to approve Minnesota's application for statehood? There wasn't time for a story. No! Memorize: May 11, 1858—Minnesota becomes a state. That was history.

  Still, because she had needed to keep her mind on something other than her mom, and because she liked Ms. Kortum, Lucy had read every sentence, paragraph, and punctuation mark in the winter break assigned reading. It had nearly killed her to focus on it, but she did it.

  "So, can anyone tell me what put Turtle Rock, Minnesota, on the map?" Ms. Kortum put the chalk on the ledge of the blackboard. "This wasn't in your books. I want you to make a guess. The first person who gets it right gets an automatic A on Friday's quiz."

  Hands shot into the air. Lucy shot her hand up, too. Ms. Kortum didn't mind guesses of any kind: freestyle, stab-in-the-dark, roundabout, or informed and educated. "At least guess," she'd urge.

  Ms. Kortum's eyes sparkled (like her gold eye shadow) at all the hands.

  "Zoë?"

  "Logging?"

  "Good guess, because logging was an important part of Turtle Rock history. But I'm thinking about something earlier. . . . Lucy?"

  "The fur trade?"The fur trade was the least boring part of the reading, so that's why Lucy guessed it.

  "That's right," said Ms. Kortum slowly. She appeared to consider something. "But before I give you the automatic A, I want to know which fur trading company was part of our history here in Turtle Rock. I'll even give you some help. Was it the American Fur Company, the North West Company, or the Hudson's Bay Company? Get this right and you'll be skipping Friday's quiz with an A in my book. What do you think, Lucy?"

  Lucy glanced at Zoë. Zoë shrugged.

  "No help," said Ms. Kortum.

  Lucy closed her eyes, balling and unballing one of her braids in her hand. She knew she could ferret out the answer if she concentrated. The book mostly talked about the North West Company, which was French, but that was probably the obvious answer. There was hardly any information on the American Company, so maybe that company didn't last very long. . . . Hudson's Bay Company was English. Lucy didn't think there were a lot of French speakers in Turtle Rock, so that would eliminate North West. . . .

  "Hudson's Bay Company?" She wrinkled her nose.

  "Correct! Congratulations, Lucy."

  "Yes!" Lucy raised a fist in the air.

  Everyone groaned.

  "Lucky," whispered Zoë.

  Ms. Kortum continued: "Hudson's Bay Company established the Turtle Rock Fort on Turtle Rock Lake in 1835. After the fort was abandoned, one of the Hudson's Bay Company men, a man named Amos Zebulon, stayed in the area."

  Ms. Kortum smiled at Lucy. "Good work, Lucy," she said. "Or should I say, good guess?"

  Then Ms. Kortum turned to the rest of the students. "No need to worry! I've got more questions that will get you out of Friday's quiz, if you did your reading and you make some guesses like Lucy did."

  Hands popped into the air, including Zoë's.

  "Don't you want to wait for the question?" said Ms. Kortum, laughing.

  The hands stayed in the air. Zoë stuck her hand up farther. Lucy chuckled.

  But then the missing student appeared in the doorway. The hands came down and everyone stared. He looked pale. He said something to Ms. Kortum and then handed her a note.

  "Lucy," said Ms. Kortum softly. "You need to go to the principal's office."

  Lucy felt her heart hit her boots. She got up, grabbed her social studies book, her pen and notebook, and left the classroom. She heard chairs creak, and she knew that everyone was watching her go.

  Lucy walked down the stairs into an empty hallway leading to the principal's office. What could Principal Adams want with her? The police already interviewed her! This couldn't be good. Was her dad down there? Had the police found information linking her to the fence cutting? She didn't do it! She didn't do it!

  Principal Adams's secretary looked up when Lucy pushed open the door. Lucy glanced around. No one else—not her dad, not a police officer—was there.

  "Lucy Moon," the secretary said, sighing. She began massaging her right shoulder while she ran one finger down a list. "Oh, yeah," she mumbled. "Says here you're supposed to report to the school counselor, Mrs. Dee Reams, as soon as you get down here. And if you don't, I'm supposed to say that disciplinary action will begin immediately. Got it?"

  Disciplinary action? What? But Lucy didn't have a chance to ask, because now the secretary's right arm was outstretched. "Go out into the hallway and make the first right. That's Mrs. Dee Reams's office. It says 'counselor' on the door. And afterward, don't you forget to stop back and get your pass for class."

  Everyone called Mrs. Dee Reams "Mrs. Dreams," which was appropriate, because in seventh grade, kids got her "Dreams and Aspirations" talk, and took the career test, which had actually instructed one girl to become a clown and join the circus. Or that's what Lucy had heard. But dreams and aspirations couldn't be why Mrs. Dreams wanted to see Lucy. Not today.

  In general, Lucy wasn't sure she trusted Mrs. Dreams, anyway. Lucy had seen her standing sturdily out in the hallway chatting with Principal Adams, and under thick black glasses, Mrs. Dreams smiled, which was fine, except that Mrs. Dreams smiled all the time. The smile sat there like a sculpture, as though Michelangelo had chiseled it there hundreds of years ago. It simply wasn't possible to always be smiling, especially if a person was the school counselor. (My grandma died. Smile, smile, smile? I hit my brother over the head with the vacuum-cleaner extension. Smile, smile, smile?) And also, Lucy had this thing about people who didn't have a definite hair color. Mrs. Dreams's hair was black with highlights that changed from blue to green and green to red. Mood hair.

  Lucy pushed open the door. No one was there.

  So she looked around. Lucy couldn't help but notice how strange Mrs. Dreams's office looked, especially for a public school office. Instead of fluorescent lights, lamps illuminated the room. The walls were painted milk-chocolate brown. A blue lava lamp sat on a table in the corner, blobbing away, sending bulging shadows up one wall. And Lucy heard the sound of an ocean, wave after wave after wave, crashing in the middle of a northern Minnesota winter. Lucy found the CD on top of the stereo: "The Say Yes to Life Series: Sigh Goes the Ocean."

  Lucy thought it was all very suspicious. Everything seemed placed for maximum psychological impact. "Hmm, what have we here?" Lucy imagined Mrs. Dreams saying as she propped open the lid on Lucy's head and poked Lucy's gray jelly brains with a fork. Well, Lucy was not going to let that happen!

  Still, with disciplinary action promised, Lucy wasn't going anywhere yet. She sat on the edge of the couch.

  Mrs. Dreams poked her head into the room. "Oh, good," she said, and then she called out to someone in the hallway. "Yes, Lucy Moon is here!"

  The next thing Lucy knew, Mrs. Dreams had swiveled her chair away from her desk and was facing Lucy on the couch with a notebook on her lap. Mrs. Dreams beamed at her.

  For a moment, Lucy became like a deer in headlights under the power of that smile. Lucy thought maybe she'd won a scholarship (or at least an all-expenses-paid canoe trip in the Boundary Waters). Without thinking, Lucy smiled back and then realized what she was doing. Don't give in, she thought. She pressed her lips into a line.

  Now Lucy noticed that Mrs. Dreams's thick, black glasses enlarged her blue eyes, reminding Lucy of two enormous blue fish swimming in bowls. When Mrs. Dreams blinked, it startled Lucy—blink, blink, blink. Lucy clasped her arms and concentrated. She set her face on "blank" and looked Mrs. Dreams square in the fish-bowls.

  "Why am I here?" Lucy demanded.

  "Good," said Mrs. Dreams (blink, blink, blink). "Let's start with that! I've been asked by Principal Adams to interview you and give him a recommendation. And the sooner we start, the sooner we end. So let's get going. How do you feel about junior high?"

  "Fine."

  "No trouble with school?"

  "No."

  "The other kids don't make fun of you?"

  "Not too much," Lucy said slowly.

  "What about friends?"

  "Fine."

  Mrs. Dreams wrote something in her notebook, and then her head bobbed back up. She blinked. "'Fine' you have friends? Or 'fine' you're comfortable with very few friends?"

  "I have friends!"

  Did the administration think she had no friends? Lucy grabbed hold of the armrest. She watched Mrs. Dreams scribble in her notebook with a slight smile on her face. What was so amusing about this?

  Lucy noticed that screeching gulls were mixing with the sound of the waves on the CD. She hated this CD. Lucy suddenly wished for Principal Adams's wagging finger. At least he got to the point, thought Lucy. Because this whole thing had to be about the postcards or the fence cutting or something.

  But Mrs. Dreams seemed to be getting there, too. Her tone got softer and she leaned forward over her knees, her eyes becoming the biggest focal point in the room. (Blink): "Why do you think you stir things up, Lucy? You have quite a reputation. It must be . . ." Mrs. Dreams paused, her eyes searching the ceiling tiles as if the right word was stuck up there like a spitball, "... tumultuous for you."

  "I'm not living in great agitation, confusion, or excitement," said Lucy. She had just studied "tumultuous" as a vocabulary word and proudly fed the definition back to Mrs. Dreams. "I feel fine."

  "So why do you organize protests?"

  "Because something is wrong and it needs to be corrected. You know, justice."

  "But why you, Lucy?" Mrs. Dreams said. And now the smile seemed almost flirty. "Why not someone else?"

  "You're the counselor. You know why."

  Mrs. Dreams didn't say anything. The two blue fish stared at Lucy.

  Oh, give me a break, thought Lucy. "Okay, sometimes other people don't even see an issue. But other times, people see it, but won't do anything about it; maybe it's because they're afraid of saying things, or maybe because they think they don't have time, or maybe because it's easier not to do anything than to do something."

  "Really?" said Mrs. Dreams (blink, blink). She was smiling and shaking her head as if she knew better. "Are you sure about that?"

  "What, then? What do you think it is?" Lucy would have liked to hear another explanation—this was the truth— but instead, Mrs. Dreams scribbled in her notebook, and Lucy imagined her making happy faces for periods and hearts over her i's. Lucy sighed with the whales creaking and moaning to one another in the background, and noticed that the ivy plant on Mrs. Dreams's desk was a fake.