Mom watched all of this, especially the oral hygiene. "This isn't another practice date, is it?"

I tried to play it cool, but then grinned. "This one has potential."

"He's not the crush?"

I made a face. "God, no! I'm well away from that jock. Joe hasn't got that disease."

"Joe isn't a jock?" Mom said.

I shook my head. "Not like Brett. Joe's a skateboarder and an A student. And he's got the most adorable big honking nose."

Mom looked alarmed. "I see." She licked her lips and then crossed over to the ceramic box on my dresser and tapped it.

I felt my face go bright red and shook my head vigorously. "Way too soon." She frowned and I said, "But I know where they are! And I can get to them in a millisecond."

She blushed and hugged me, then jumped away.

She'd given me the box the day we "moved" into New Prospect.

I'm not saying go ahead and do this. But don't be stupid. Be safe. Make your own decisions.

I opened it, looked at the condoms inside, and then shut it again, quickly.

Way too soon.

"It's my brother's," Joe explained.

It was an old-school Volkswagen bug, air cooled, older than both of us combined. The starter barely turned the engine over, and Joe looked worried, but then the motor caught and ran smoothly enough.

"Where do you want to go? A movie? Dancing?"

The heater in the car was pathetic. "Pie," I said. "Hot pie."

He took me to Luncheon Junction, a restaurant in a converted train station. It had been decades since there was passenger service in town, but freight trains still rolled through the adjoining rail yard several times a day.

"Pie is kind of their thing," Joe said.

He had the blueberry-apple. I had the cherry pie a la mode. We shared bites with each other.

Pie was definitely their thing.

Joe had two sisters in middle school and an older brother who went to college in the East-it was his VW Joe was driving. His dad was a welder and his mom taught composition at the community college. His most serious relationship had ended the year before when his ex, Emily, dropped him for a senior with a car.

He was a reluctant reader.

By this I don't mean he read reluctantly. He read voraciously. What he was reluctant about was admitting it.

"Really? I thought you didn't care what other people thought?"

He squirmed a bit and shrugged. "Skateboarders."

"You're pathetic," I said.

It took some more work to find out what he liked to read. I had to swear not to reveal his dark secret.

I could've kissed him on the spot.

"She only wrote the six books," I said.

"There are her letters," he said, "and the juvenilia are really very funny and the novella Lady Susan-wait, you knew she only wrote six books?"

"Sure. But I've only read Northanger Abbey once. Catherine is an idiot, even more so than Emma. But Emma, the book that is, has so many other things going for it, and Emma learns better in a more convincing way."

He frowned. "So you've only read Northanger Abbey and Emma?"

"Don't be silly! I've read the rest of them several times. Northanger Abbey only once."

He smiled warmly and I felt the nape of my neck tingle.

"Well," he said. "It's not my favorite, but really, I don't think you're being fair to Catherine. She did eventually get over the gothic novel thing."

"Ha! Persuasion blows it out of the water. I'll take Anne Elliot over Catherine Morland any day."

He nodded judiciously. "Not really fair. She wrote Northanger Abbey before any of the others, even if it wasn't published until after her death. She wrote Persuasion last, at the height of her powers."

"I'm not talking about fair," I said. "I'm talking about best."

He held up his hands. "Okay. Completely agree. Persuasion happens to be my favorite, too."

I thought about taking him home to pore over my bookshelves, but the stuff I'd moved to the New Prospect bedroom was anime and manga and my nonfiction reference books. Everything else was still in the Yukon. How would I explain that?

"How late is the library open?"

The Volkswagen starter tried to turn over once and failed.

"Can you drive a shift?" he asked.

I shook my head. "I don't drive at all."

"We can push start it. I just thought I'd push while you popped the clutch."

I laughed at him. "Get in the car."

We were on flat ground and it rolled easily. He pushed with the door open, ready to jump in. I pushed from the rear bumper. As soon as he jumped in, I hopped on the rear bumper and jumped in place, adding velocity to the car. I nearly sprained my wrists but the car sped up abruptly. I stepped off and jumped again, just before I touched the pavement, to kill my forward velocity.

The car started easily when he put the clutch in, but he was now far enough away that he had to U-turn and come back for me.

When I climbed in, he said, "Huh. I guess this stretch is more downhill than I thought." Despite funding cutbacks, the county library was open until ten on Fridays. We browsed the adult and YA shelves, pointing out favorites to each other. Sometimes it was "yes," a shared favorite, sometimes it was a shrug, having never read it. Several times we were reminded of other books that weren't at the library. Rarely it was a "no," we had read it, but it wasn't that high on our list.

Made me nervous, though, when I put my finger on the spine of a book by Garth Nix, the one about the Second Assistant Librarian and the Disreputable Dog.

Joe leaned closer, to read the title, and then he kissed me.

So I guess that was a "yes."

I was out of breath by the time I got inside the house. Mom raised her eyebrows.

I held my thumb up. I wanted to throw the door back open and chase the boy down as he climbed back into the VW. We'd kissed in the library, on the library steps, in the car, and on the porch.

My lips were puffy.

"How was your evening?" I asked.

I had trouble sleeping but let me tell you, this was so much better than the night I'd spent crying about Brett.

The next morning I called Joe's cell phone fifteen minutes before the van was supposed to leave.

"Did you change your mind? Do you want me to tell them to wait?"

Four hours in the van next to Joe was looking better but I said, "No."

"Darn."

"Look, I know Brett is a good friend, but can you not tell him about us?"

"What? Why not? You said you weren't dating anybody else!"

"Shut up. Drink more coffee. It's not about dating. Until this Caffeine thing is resolved, it's about her guys hassling me. I'd rather they didn't have one more target."

"Oh," he said. "Donna. Brett to Donna. Donna to Caffeine, right?"

"That's it."

"I'm not scared of them. I've got my peeps, too."

"I believe you. But I really don't want to be scared for you. Do it for me, okay?"

"Those guys are assholes. It may never be resolved."

Not if I have anything to say about it. "Well, then, two more weeks. Until the snowboard season is over. Whatever happens, even if it's all-out war, then you can tell anybody. If we're still dating."

He sounded alarmed. "Are you having doubts? Was I pushing things?"

I laughed. "Are you having doubts?"

His voice got husky. "No. I hardly slept last night."

"Me, too. Good thing I'm not in the van. You can sleep."

"I can't tell anybody? It's just that it's nice-I want to share that. I can't even tell Lany?"

"You do and I'll tell everyone you think Northanger Abbey is the best book Austen ever wrote."

"Ohhhhhhh. That's low."

"See you on the mountain."

I gave my jacket to Joe at the very last minute and came in second in the women's slalom. The reduced drag put me across the line chilled, but two tenths of a second ahead of the third-place finisher. Also, I got to rub against Joe as he held the coat for me at the bottom of the run.

"Stop that," he said, "unless you're ready for a very public display of affection."

Mom videotaped the runs and cheered me on, her scarf pulled up high even though it wasn't cold. I only glimpsed Dad once, buried in the crowd.

Jade finished out of the running in slope style, but she didn't fall once and felt really good about her performance, especially since Lany came in first. Lany was also third in the half-pipe.

I got to kiss Joe once, in the woods, between the slalom course and the half-pipe, but Donna and Brett almost caught us, so we cooled it for the rest of the day.

Caffeine, to my relief, was not at the meet.

As soon as my events were done, Mom said, "I'm going to go check on Grandmother." She gave me a hug and said, "Joe does have potential."

I hung out with the rest of the team until it was time for the van to leave.

"Tonight?" Joe said. "We're back in town about 7:30." We were standing close together, watching as the others loaded their gear.

I scratched my nose and, while my mouth was covered, said, "Come to my house. We'll shoot pool."

I waved goodbye to the team at large, including Joe, and then, out of sight, jumped to the Yukon for a good soak in the hot tub.

This beat the crap out of four hours in the van, but I got to thinking about spending some of that time with Joe in the hot tub.

I had to get out of the tub, flushed and overheated. Joe wouldn't be back in New Prospect for three more hours. I moved another bookshelf from the cabin to the house, and started stocking it with some of my favorites. When I was finished, it was still two hours until the team van would get back.

What the hell.

I looked over the broken walls and saw three cars parked alongside the garage/clubhouse. One of them was Caffeine's tricked-out Honda with the crumpled right fender. Another was a Toyota with a lowered suspension. I didn't recognize the make of the last one. It was an old Datsun, whatever that is.

I jumped to the alley side of the garage roof and crouched, scanning for more cars, but it was just the three. I'd expected the black Hummer. I returned to the skylight. The sky was dark enough that I didn't think I'd be silhouetted.

None of the figures below looked happy. They were hunched in on themselves and Caffeine was gesturing sharply. I wished I could hear what they were saying.