Most days, Ash went back to Ms. Cooper’s room when language arts was over, but today Mr. Lopez kept his crew for some extra planning, since they were starting to make decisions about their Island Projects. The Island Project was another fifth-grade rite of passage, like the trip to Funtown. It had been a Quigley tradition before Quigley was even in this new building, and the GT kids were taking part just like everybody else.

  The Island Project was supposed to teach fifth graders how to break down a long-term assignment before they got to the big time: junior high. The basic assignment was to design an imaginary island that showed off certain geography concepts. Every island needed a theme, and certain elements like latitude and longitude were required, but otherwise the students had a lot of freedom. Some people were doing maps of their islands, some were doing 3D models, and some were still figuring it out.

  Ellie was doing Ice Cream Island, Ash knew, and Caden was doing Fortnite Island. As for her own project? Well, at this point Ash wasn’t even sure what she was doing. She and Jane usually teamed up for things if they could, but Jane had a way of taking over. And who was Ash to question her right now?

  “So I found the best website last night,” Jane told Ash, motioning to the seat next to her and opening a laptop. “Check out these pictures!”

  Ash squinted to see tiny pinpricks of light on the laptop’s dark screen.

  “They’re moons!” Jane exclaimed. She zoomed in on one of them so Ash could see its colors and patterns, plus their swirling reflection in Jane’s glasses. The sight made Ash feel unsettled.

  Jane was the sort of person who got obsessed with one thing and thought about only that thing until she moved on to something else. Last year it was dystopian novels, and the year before that it was knitting. Now it was space, and if Ash wanted Jane as a partner, she would have to go along with it. The way she always had to go along with Jane as her friend.

  Just then, Jane made her announcement. “So I’m thinking we’ll do Moon Island,” she said, “featuring all the moons of the solar system. Did you know that Saturn might have up to eighty-two of them?”

  Back when she was younger, Ash had dreamed of doing an island that would draw crowds at Island Night, when all the parents came to see the fifth graders’ work, but now that seemed a little risky. What if she aimed for something awesome, all on her own, and it fell flat? Ash couldn’t afford that right now. Jane’s moons were safer, for sure.

  “Cool!” she said. That was all she could manage.

  “Great!” said Jane, and the decision was made. “So, Mercury and Venus don’t have any moons, but Earth has one, of course, and Mars has two…”

  Politely, Ash swallowed a yawn. Her mind drifted to black holes and deep space, way more mysterious and fascinating. Jane opened several tabs on the laptop and started a page of notes. “How about you watch this video?” she suggested. Or maybe ordered.

  Ash was relieved when it was time for art with Ms. Cooper’s class. Then—finally!—lunch! The morning was over.

  Now that their parents left for work so early, she and Gracie were supposed to make their own breakfast. Ash had skipped it today, though, and her stomach was growling. She was at the head of the line as Ms. Cooper’s class made its way downstairs.

  The cafeteria was filled with bright light and the dull roar of the fifth grade before feeding time. Some kids were tearing into lunches they’d brought from home, while Ash grabbed a tray and headed for the hot-lunch line, scanning the room for Jane. Somehow Ellie got ahead of her, waving a chocolate-milk carton in the air. “Ash!” she called out. “We’ll be in the corner.”

  Sometimes Ash sat with Ellie, but today she had a “working lunch,” as Jane called it, which was really some last-minute cramming for the Quiz Bowl. It took Ash a second to realize that “we” was Ellie and the new girl, Tilly. She was still in her XL sweatshirt and holding up the line as she learned the routine. “Hurry up!” someone grumbled. “We don’t have all day!”

  Ellie and Tilly were settling at their table by the time Ash had her turkey burger. Ash stopped to say hi, and Tilly caught Ash’s eye as she unwrapped a grilled cheese. Tilly nodded, but she didn’t smile. Ash could hardly blame her. The first day in a new school couldn’t be much fun. She hoped Tilly had a new desk, at least.

  Ellie was telling Tilly everything she needed to know about the cafeteria. “Eating is the easy part,” she explained. “But when you throw away the trash, there are like six different buckets for different kinds of recycling. Better not mix them up, or you’ll be in big trouble.”

  “What kind of trouble?” Tilly asked.

  “Nothing too bad,” Ash reassured the new girl. “You might have to wipe down the tables or something.”

  Tilly scooted over to make room for Ash just as Jane, at the next table, pointed to her smartwatch.

  “Oh, no, that’s okay,” Ash told Tilly. “My friend Jane is actually waiting for me. We have to … go over something.” Ash wasn’t sure why it was so hard to explain that they were going to test each other with trivia questions. It seemed a little too serious and also a little too … trivial.

  Tilly did that thing again, where she kind of shrank down into a smaller size. Her voice was hard when she said, “Oh, I forgot. You’re too good for the rest of us.”

  Maybe people thought that, but no one actually said that to Ash, ever. People just treated her like she was important. Now she could feel her ears burning red and her grip on the lunch tray shaking as she turned around. She could also feel Tilly’s gaze burning into her back. Ash hoped that Ellie would change the subject quickly.

  “What took so long?” Jane asked as soon as Ash’s tray hit the table. “It’s grind time!”

  “Sorry!” Ash said. She dropped her voice to a whisper, adding, “That’s the new girl I gave the tour to.” She didn’t dare to look, but she shook her head in the right direction.

  Jane took a quick peek at Tilly and said, “Her sweatshirt is bigger than she is!” But Jane was laser-focused on the Quiz Bowl, so she didn’t dwell on Tilly for long. “I think we should practice the geography questions. We’re pretty good on the other categories, don’t you think?”

  Ash took a bite of her burger as Jane popped the first question. She didn’t know the answer, but at least it blocked out what Tilly had said. Ash didn’t think she was too good for anyone. If anything, she thought she wasn’t good enough!

  “What country has the world’s longest coastline?” Jane asked.

  “Um … Australia,” Ash guessed.

  “Nope,” said Jane. “Canada.”

  She flipped another card over. “What’s the capital of Chile?”

  “Caracas!” said Ash. “Oh, wait … no … that might be Venezuela…”

  “Santiago,” Jane replied.

  Ash tried not to panic. Two wrong in a row. If this happened Friday night, she’d be out of the Quiz Bowl.

  At least it was her turn to ask now, and she was pretty sure Jane wouldn’t know this one. “What’s the largest desert in the world?” she said.

  Jane didn’t miss a beat. “Antarctica,” she replied.

  For the hundredth time, Ash wished that Jane wasn’t her chief competition at the Quiz Bowl.

  The next question flew at Ash before she could finish that thought. “Okay … how many US states are landlocked?” asked Jane.

  Ash was trying to imagine the map and count the states in her mind, when Tilly piped up from behind them.

  “Knowing all that stuff doesn’t make you smart,” she announced. “Even a robot could memorize all those answers. Robots can win against people at poker, you know.”

  Jane hadn’t even met Tilly yet! Ash bristled on her friend’s behalf. But Jane just offered up what Ash knew was a fake smile, along with a fake invitation.

  “We’re getting ready for the Quiz Bowl on Friday night,” Jane said coolly. “It’s not too late for you to sign up!” She didn’t say the rest of her sentence out loud, but she didn’t need to: Then we’ll see who’s really smart here.

  As if Ash wasn’t nervous enough already.

  “Let’s move on to the pop-culture questions,” Jane said. It was as if they had never been interrupted. Jane’s lunch was untouched, but she had an endless appetite for trivia. “Your turn.”

  Ash moved on to the next category. “Okay,” she said. “Who starred in the 2012 film Pitch Perfect?” Jane paused, and Ash took a deep breath. At least she knew that one.

  Her eyes wandered back to Tilly. I’ll show her, Ash thought.

  Soon the first bell rang, and the first wave of kids washed toward the six categories of trash. Sure enough, Tilly put a glass bottle in a bucket clearly marked PLASTIC. Jane saw it, too, and commented as they headed out for recess. “Doesn’t seem like the sharpest crayon in the box, does she?” It sounded like something Jane’s mom would say. For a second, Ash felt almost sorry for the new girl.

  As usual, Ash and Jane spent recess on top of the Pyramid, a huge climbing structure on Quigley’s playground. They did a few flips on the bars, and Ash hung upside down for a while, but mostly they continued to quiz each other while the rest of the fifth grade ran wild. In many ways, Ash and Jane were above it all. When the bell rang they scattered in different directions, as they had to line up with their separate classes, and Ash called out, “See you after school!”

  That was definitely the plan. But by the end of the day, Ash was right in the middle of a project with Ms. Cooper’s class. They had gathered in the gym to paint a banner for the Quiz Bowl, and Ash didn’t know how to leave without being rude. “Friday is gonna be your night!” Caden kept saying, and Ash really wished there was a way Caden could make that happen. In the meantime, she had to protect the art supplies from him at all costs. He was not a kid you could trust around glitter.

  Ash outlined each letter on the banner with marker; then Ellie filled it in with paint. Ms. Cooper added some sparkle, and the two girls dabbed the glitter up carefully so it didn’t spread across the gym. Then Tilly—of all people—drew the school mascot beneath the letters. Ash had to admit it looked exactly like a real snowy owl, with bright eyes and speckled feathers. Even Caden noticed. “Have you ever drawn an owl before?” he demanded to know. “Was it also the mascot at your old school? Or are you just a great artist?” Tilly shrugged and gave him a shy, snaggletoothed smile.

  While the banner dried, Ms. Cooper let her kids play a little freeze tag, and soon the gym was filled with the squeak of sneakers on the shiny floor. When Ash got tagged, she stood under the basketball net, catching her breath and waving frantically for Ellie to free her. By now, Ash knew, Jane would be in Mr. Lopez’s room, watching old episodes of Jeopardy! with Lane and shouting out the answers, but Ash didn’t feel like joining them quite yet. Most of her classmates had stayed for the late bus, and she wanted to be there to hang the banner above the stage. Plus … freeze tag was super fun!

  Ms. Cooper stood on a ladder holding one end of the banner, and Ellie was waiting with the other side, when Ms. Cooper realized she’d left her masking tape upstairs. Once again, Ash was chosen. “Would you mind running upstairs to get it?” her teacher asked. “It’s right in my top desk drawer.”

  Ash tiptoed past Mr. Lopez’s room and sprinted to Ms. Cooper’s, feeling freer than she’d felt all day. Inside the classroom, Ash inspected her desk. Thankfully, there was no sign of Caden’s pencil shavings. There was a new desk in the hallway, actually—it had to be for Tilly—and the folder from Tilly’s old school was still on top of Ms. Cooper’s desk.

  Ash gulped before she opened the drawer. It was a big deal to go into a teacher’s desk, even for her. Ash felt proud that teachers thought she was trustworthy as well as smart.

  But her honesty was put to the test as soon as she reached for the masking tape. Because beneath the tape there was another folder, and this one was clearly labeled.

  The label said: CONFIDENTIAL. FIFTH-GRADE QUIZ BOWL QUESTIONS/ANSWERS.

  Chapter Four

  Ash snapped into action. For once in her life, she didn’t even think.

  She knew that what she was about to do was not okay, but she also knew that she was going to do it. No question about it. She had to.

  Most fifth graders didn’t have phones, and most people didn’t know that she did. Ash’s phone was an ancient model with a feeble battery, and Ash barely used it, just moved it out of yesterday’s pocket every morning. But now that her parents were so busy, they’d insisted that she carry it. Only for emergencies, they’d said.

  Was there any emergency bigger than this one?

  Ash knew she couldn’t linger. She glanced at the door to make sure no one was watching from the hallway. She fumbled with the phone’s password. Then, quickly, she took a photo of each paper in the folder. It took only a minute, Ash guessed, though it felt more like time stood still. When she was finished, she stacked the papers up neatly, returned the folder to the drawer, and moved some pencils on top of it. That way Ms. Cooper would never guess what she’d seen.

  Ash rushed downstairs with the masking tape. When she got back to the gym, she felt for the phone, suddenly afraid it would tumble out of her pocket. Had she closed the camera app? How long before it reverted to the lock screen? It felt like years since she’d been playing freeze tag with her classmates. In just a moment, everything had changed. Now Ash knew she could win the Quiz Bowl. Her place in the school would be safe. So why did she feel unsteady, as if she’d just climbed out of the car after a long ride?

  Okay, she hadn’t looked at the questions yet. There was still a chance for her to be the good kid everyone thought she was. But who was she kidding? The surest way to keep being a “good” kid was to do this bad thing. To cheat. In her shoes, would anybody choose what was “right”? Ash wondered.

  Ms. Cooper’s bright voice broke through Ash’s dark thoughts. “Let’s get this banner up before the late bus gets here!” she said. She climbed up on the ladder, and Ellie moved back into her spot on the other end. Ash helped them center it over the stage, and Ms. Cooper taped it into place. She strode into the middle of the gym to see how it looked. “Excellent!” she said with satisfaction. “Let the Quiz Bowl begin!” In seventy-two hours, it would be happening right here.

  Other kids were starting to pick up their backpacks, filing out of the gym and through the atrium toward the bus circle. At this time of day, there weren’t bus lines, so Tilly just kind of vanished into the group. Caden gave Ash a fist bump on his way out, putting on an evil-villain voice and cackling, “The Quiz Bowl shall be yours!”

  What does he know? Ash wondered nervously. Was there any way he’d seen her with the answers?

  Ash left through the back door—where walkers were supposed to exit—and made her way home alone. The morning’s rain had given way to a dazzling afternoon, and she had to shield her eyes as she walked through the parking lot. It was still cold, but Ash could imagine spring now. Maybe soon she could walk to school without her coat. She took her time, stopping to pet a neighbor’s dog and appreciating a moment by herself. Ash was one person at school and a slightly different person at home. Between places, though, she was also different. Was this her real self? she wondered. The person she was when no one was expecting anything from her? She wondered if this Ash was a cheater.

  As soon as Ash got home, she remembered something important. It was soccer night. Gracie had been begging for months to join a travel soccer team, and the first practice was today, after dinner. One of their parents would drive Gracie to the next town over to practice at the Dome, a dingy bubble that covered an indoor soccer field. Neither of the McNulty girls had ever been on a team, and their parents were not crazy about the idea. It had taken a while for Gracie to convince their dad that twice-a-week practices wouldn’t interfere with her homework. “I’m only in fourth grade!” Gracie had pointed out. She’d complained until she finally got her way.

  Ash’s mom was on her laptop in the kitchen. “Aisling!” she called out. “Can I make you a cup of tea?”

  She was pretty much the only person who used Ash’s real name anymore. It had a weird spelling, but Aisling was pronounced just like Ashley, only with an -ing. It was an Irish name, meaning not just from Ireland but in the ancient Irish language, which had complicated vowels. Ash had given up trying to explain that to people, though. Just like she had given up explaining why she, at eleven years old, drank tea all the time. It was another Irish thing.

  Ash left her backpack in the hallway and sat down across from her mother. There was already a mug of tea waiting for her, amber-colored and steaming. Ash poured a glug of milk into it, along with two heaping spoonfuls of sugar. “How was your day?” her mom asked, still eyeing her screen.

  “Great,” said Ash, though it was anything but. It was like she was reading lines from a script. “How about yours?”

  Her mom sighed and rubbed her eyes. “We’re getting there,” she said.

  The McNultys had run an Irish pub in town ever since Ash was a baby, but they were trying something new with it now. The way her dad had put it was, “We want The Gate to be a place people think of for something more than just green beer on Saint Patrick’s Day.” The Gate was a new name—the place used to be called St. James’s Gate, after a place in Dublin, the capital of Ireland. Now it served lunch and dinner, not just bar snacks in the evenings. The food was local, organic, sustainably grown, and inspired by Ireland. It was starting to have a following, which was great—there had even been a story about it in a Boston newspaper. The part that was not so great was that Ash’s parents were always working now, basically around the clock, and Ash was pretty tired of trying out new items for the menu.