Chapter 1 CHAPTER 1
“Did you hear what happened to Travis Lopez?”

A tingle ripples up and down my spine. I stare at my friend Emma. “No! What? What happened to him?” I ask.

“You’ll never believe it,” Emma replies, lowering her voice to a whisper. Then she glances at someone over my shoulder. “Oh! Look! Erica got her hair cut!”

I turn, trying not to show my frustration, and smile and wave at Erica, who is just stepping off the bus to join the throngs of kids milling around and socializing on the first day of school. I turn back to Emma, trying to keep my voice even and not sound too anxious. “What happened to Travis?”

“Oh! Right. Travis. Well, I heard from Nicole, who heard from Jenny that he—”

“Move along, girls. The bell’s going to ring any minute,” says Mr. Rivera, the teacher on morning bus duty. He is herding middle schoolers in the direction of the main school entrance. Sure enough, the bell rings a moment later.

“See you in a few minutes!” calls Emma, hustling up the steps, her new purple backpack bouncing between her shoulders.

My thoughts are swirling as I make my way quickly to my locker. I know just where it is—I had the same one last year, my first year of middle school. I spin the dial for my combination and wonder if anyone managed to fix the sticky locker door over the summer. One yank tells me that no one did. Sigh. Another year with a sticking locker door.

Twang! The locker finally decides to open. I shove a few things into it and slam it closed again, eager to get to homeroom to find out what happened to Travis.

Travis is my best friend. We were babies together. Actually, our friendship is even older than that. Our moms met in pregnant-lady-exercise class!

How can I not know what major catastrophe happened to my best friend? True, we haven’t seen each other since June. I went off to visit my cousins in Houston for a week, and when I got back, he was already gone—first to baseball camp, then soccer camp, then some other kind of sports camp way out in the wilds of Oregon, near where his dad lives. And when he finally returned, I was gone again, first to music camp, and then with my family to drive my older brother to college to help him move in.

Maybe Travis broke his leg or something! I think. Maybe whatever happened to him is the reason he didn’t return my texts last night. I texted him twice, once to tell him we are in the same homeroom, and then again to ask him if he’d heard the rumor that Mr. Paulson assigned homework to his homeroom students. And he hasn’t responded. Is he in the hospital? In traction? No, he would be able to text if he were in traction. Maybe both his hands are bandaged with second-degree burns or something? I swallow uneasily. What a way to start seventh grade!

I walk into Mr. Paulson’s homeroom. The second bell has not yet rung, so kids are wandering around, chatting, hugging long-lost friends, and complimenting haircuts and new sneakers. I look around the room quickly, trying to spot Travis. He isn’t here. Maybe something truly terrible has happened to him!

I spot Emma, who waves me over toward the desks near the window. I also see some really tall new guy who is surrounded by other kids. He tries to catch my eye, but I look away quickly. I can feel the worry creeping over me.

“Did you see Travis?” a voice whispers from my right side.

I turn. It’s my friend Erica.

“No!” I say. “Where is he?”

Erica points quickly with her finger.

I follow her gaze. What is Erica talking about? She seems to be pointing toward that new kid. He is a head taller than all the other kids in the room. He looks tall enough to be in high school! Is he standing in front of Travis? I crane my neck to get a better look. The new kid has really dark hair and broad, muscular shoulders. And then he turns around. He…

… IS Travis!