Dad had picked up an ekiben for me from an all-night bento stall at the Tokyo train station. I'd taken it out of the disposable box it had come in and repacked it in a traditional lacquer lunch box.

"Told you, I was going to bring my own lunch."

Jade said, "You win at lunch. Your prize? You get to give me one of those breaded shrimp."

I used the chopsticks to drop it next to her cafeteria mystery meat. "Lucky me."

Tara licked her lips. "Can I have a taste of that salmon roe? Where did you even get ikura around here?"

I smiled mysteriously and borrowed her spoon to get a generous heap of sushi rice topped with salmon eggs. "Here ya go."

She tasted it and her eyes rolled back in her head. "I had this once in San Diego," she said in a reverent hush.

They both looked at their cafeteria lunch and then back at mine.

"I think I'm going to start bringing my lunch, too," said Jade.

We did drills in basketball, first passing, then guarded jump shots, with the tallest girls in the class doing the blocking. It was frustrating because they casually batted away nearly all the shots. No matter how high I leaped, they were taller. Pogo girls.

I wanted to jump, to teleport up into the air, higher than them. But that would be pretty unmistakable-pretty dumb. But I wished I could leap higher. My thigh muscles weren't flabby. Snowboarding wasn't exactly effortless.

What if I could add some velocity to my leap?

And what if you add enough velocity to smash through the roof?

I did get one ball past the guard, feinting a leap so that she was coming back down while I went up, but I still missed the basket.

To add to the humiliation, Coach had us switch, to guard the basket against the tall girls who constantly scored against us.

"What do you expect?" said Paula, seeing my face twist in frustration. "It's really their practice." She tilted her head at the taller girls. "They've got a game tonight."

"Oh," I said. "Didn't realize they were on the basketball team. But why'd they have to be so tall?"

"Pity them," said Paula. "They're last in the division."

I saw Brett's girlfriend, Donna, before art class, leaning against him. She was my height, but older. I'd seen her before, outside, with the smokers, and in the cafeteria where she sat with Caffeine.

Perfect.

Caffeine was still milking her wrist injury for maximum sloth, though I knew she was scheduled to resume PE the following week. In art class she told Mrs. Begay, "I can't really draw left-handed." Her right hand was still in a Velcro-secured wrist brace.

Mrs. Begay looked skeptical but she let Caffeine read instead. Reading for Caffeine consisted of opening her notebook and using it to conceal her cell phone while she texted.

It didn't take a genius to notice the pages never turned, and I could tell Mrs. Begay knew what was going on.

After class, Caffeine lingered by the door, ostensibly looking at her phone, but I saw her glance my way as I put away my sketchbook. The rest of the students filed out and Mrs. Begay went to the supply closet in the back, putting away the still-life models we'd used in class.

Instead of leaving, I went to Mrs. Begay and said, "Do you need any help with that?"

Caffeine shook her head sharply and I heard her mutter "Kissass." She left the room.

Mrs. Begay shook her head. "That's sweet, Cent, but I've got them organized just so. It would take me longer to describe my system than it would to just put them away myself."

I said goodbye and halfway to the door, while Mrs. Begay was still turned away, I jumped outside, behind the evergreen bushes at the end of the wing. Three steps took me to the glass doors at the end of the hallway.

Caffeine was waiting outside the door of the art classroom.

Let her wait.

I crunched though packed snow to the west door and ducked in to get my coat and snowshoes.

For the first time (outside our living room) I used the new phone to check in with Mom before walking to Krakatoa with Jade and Tara. This took a lot longer than usual because, even though the streets and sidewalks were mostly plowed, both of them wanted to try the snowshoes. We had to hopscotch around to find snow deep enough, first using the school's front lawn, then moving to a series of empty lots that only vaguely led toward the coffee shop.

I'd already done most of my schoolwork. Half of my teachers put the assignment on the board at the beginning of class and, if you're caught up on the reading, which I usually was, the lecture actually gave you the answers. But I was even more obsessive than usual about it, since it kept me from thinking about Brett.

Which is why I was surprised when he walked up to our table up on the balcony.

"'Sup?" he said.

I stared at him blankly.

He looked uncomfortable.

"Uh ... hi?" I finally said.

This apparently didn't help much, but then I saw someone standing behind him.

It was Joe, the friend who'd driven Brett home after his fall. He pushed forward. "Hey."

I looked at Tara and Jade, mystified. They were looking at Joe.

"Hey, yourself," said Tara.

Joe turned back to me. "You're Cent, right? I'm Joe Trujeque." His voice was deep for someone so skinny. Resonant.

I nodded. "Hello."

"Saw you boarding on the hill."

I'd seen him, too, but hadn't been looking that closely. Once I'd seen Brett's smile, I'd only had eyes for him. "Yeah," I said. I was still confused. Was he coming on to me?

The silence stretched and Brett broke in, saying in a rush, "We need more girls on the snowboarding team."

Joe turned his hands over, indicating both Jade and me. "Because of Title IX, the school won't spring for transportation to practice and events without at least one-third girls on the team, and we're down two members. One messed up her knee and is out for the winter. The other one didn't qualify this semester."

"Didn't qualify? She wasn't a good enough boarder?" I carefully didn't look at Jade when I said that. Jade was okay, but I didn't picture her as a competitive snowboarder. I didn't picture myself as a competitive snowboarder.

"Academically. She was on probation but she didn't pull up her grades. Now she's off." He turned to Jade. "I know your grades are good enough." Then he nodded at me. "You're new so you're a blank slate. You could make straight F's this semester and you'd still be eligible until spring grades come out, which is after the season is over, see?"

F's? I was speechless. Who do you think I am? Who do you think you are?

Jade looked surprised. "You guys must really be desperate to ask me."

Joe spread his hands. "A little. But you can board. You have your own equipment."

Tara laughed. "Ha. It's more about the transport than anything. You could probably be crippled, blind, and deaf and they'd take you, just so the boys' team can get to the meets."

Joe glared back. "It's not just the boys' team. Lany has a real shot at state in the half-pipe and Carita is doing really good in the slopestyle. Lany has a better chance than any of us boys at placing." He looked back at me. "What do you say?"

I was still pissed. F's? I took a deep breath and exhaled. "Joe, is it? What I say is: please excuse us for a moment."

He stood there, puzzled.

I rephrased. "Go away while I talk to my ... colleagues."

His eyebrows went up. "Oh. Right." He backed up and, when Brett didn't move, grabbed Brett's arm. "We'll go downstairs and get a drink, then check back, okay?"

He threaded his way back to the stairs, glancing back over his shoulder a couple of times.

Tara laughed when they finally dropped out of sight down the stairs. "Well, you've got them by the short hairs." She looked at Jade. "What do you think? You wanna be a jock?"

"A jock? This isn't being a jock. This is more like chess club. They're not a real team-just a club in the state league." She looked like she was thinking it over. "What do you think?" At first I thought she was talking to me but she was looking at Tara.

Tara shrugged. "Up to you. It's six more weeks, right? They practice every Saturday at Durango and I think there's three more general meets. Sundays, I think. Doubt if you have to worry about the state meet but you might have to go along to cheer Lany on."

Jade blinked. "Lany's all right, but isn't Caffeine on the team?"

My stomach clenched. "Caffeine? No thanks!"

Tara shook her head. "Lany and Carita are still on the team, so, if I'm not mistaken, Caffeine is the one who got bumped for academics. She certainly doesn't have the bad knee. That was Dulcey Cardenas."

"Oh," I said. "Won't that piss her off, though? For me to go on the team?"

Jade tilted her head to one side. "So what's your point?"

I snorted. "She's already laying for me. Can't see how this can make things worse. Will your parents go for it?"

"Probably. They think I spend too much time lying around watching anime. Yours?"

"Don't know." I looked over the rail down to the main floor. Joe and Brett were still in line at the counter. "I'll call and ask."

I got Mom who, after asking a few questions, said, "Yes, if you want to. If it's something you'd really enjoy."

"Yes, please."

"Right."

I'd let her sell it to Dad. They tended not to contradict each other so if one of them had already said "yes" it usually meant "yes." If one of them said "no," ditto-which was why I'd asked Mom first.

Jade had touched base with her dad while I was on the phone with Mom.

Brett and Joe came back with espresso drinks and Jade said. "Where's ours?"

Brett blinked. "Yours, uh, yours? I thought you already had some?"

Jade said, "You're trying to get us to say yes to this insanity? And you didn't bring us anything?"

Joe held his coffee out and said, deadpan, "You can have my mocha. But I spit in it."

I couldn't help myself. I giggled.

Joe said, "So, did you guys decide?"

I could see Jade was set to give him more trash so I quickly said, "Yeah. We'll do it."

He raised his eyebrows. "Really? And you think your parents will let you?"

I raised my cell phone. "Permission already acquired. Oh brave new world that has such technology in it. You should know, though, that Caffeine, for some reason, hates my guts. Does that matter to you guys?"

Brett shrugged. "Knew it." He shrugged again, spreading his hands.

Joe, though, widened his eyes. "Oh. Are you the girl from PE? I pictured someone bigger. You fight a lot? That could get you kicked off the team, too."

"I don't fight at all! Caffeine slipped and fell. Didn't touch her."

He digested this. "Okay-not a problem for me. She won't be riding to events with us anyway, but she might show up at practice. She still has her season pass." He dug in his backpack for a binder from which he removed several sheets of paper. "Permission slips for participation and for transportation, liability waiver, supplementary insurance for both the events and the transportation, and the registration form for a student season pass at Durango. It's halfway through the season so it will be reduced."

He was organized, I'll give him that.

"The van leaves from school for practice at 7:30 AM Saturday. We don't have a meet this Sunday but there's one the Sunday after."

"Do I have to ride in the van?"

"You can't drive yourself, but your parents can."

I hadn't been thinking about driving.

"So with us, there's four girls on the team now. So, eight boys?"

He looked surprised. "You heard?"

"It's called math. You said you needed at least a third girls and you were down two."