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in danger, that someone I love is in danger, that now is the time to panic, to flee. I am happy, because it is just so good to know that it can give a whispered message, a simple, quiet knowing, and that it can be right.
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CHAPTER THREE
    Animals have anxiety. Primates will pluck their hairs or injure themselves in times of stress.
    Dogs are also very vulnerable. They are pack animals, and rely on the others in their pack for a feeling of safety. Separation and death are innately intertwined. When they are left alone, without their human "pack" some dogs become anxious that their owner may never return. They bark, chew, urinate, or try to escape by scratching. If left alone frequently or for long periods, some become ill, in a form of depression . . .
    --Dr. Jerome R. Clade, The Fundamentals of Animal Behavior
    Jenna's the only one of my friends with her own car, so she's the designated driver to take us to Starbucks for lunch. As seniors, we can go off campus to eat, and so we all leave, because no one wants to sit in the cafeteria that smells like gravy and tuna fish and cut apples turning brown when you don't have to. Plus, that's when Mom and the other "concerned parents" (read: bored PTA mothers) roam around and see which kids were raised badly so they have something to talk to each other about. I know how mean this makes me sound, and I'll probably be either unable to have children of my own or end up roaming the cafeteria myself one day for saying so, but you'll notice that none of the parents of the kids who really need spying on are ever part of these things.
    The first time I drove with one of my friends, my chest got
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    so tight and my palms so sweaty that I thought for sure I was going to have an attack. I had to crack the window and ride like one of those dogs with his nose stuck out, even though it was January and freezing. It was nuts at first, because I kept thinking of all those teen driving accidents you see on the news, where there's this really handsome guy in his football uniform and crying girls interviewed by news reporters saying how he was the nicest person. I had to increase my exposure to the whole situation bit by bit, like Abe, my psychologist, has said, and that worked for the most part. I had to remember to breathe from my diaphragm and not my chest (hyperventilation causes a lot of the symptoms of anxiety), and I had to tell myself (a zillion times) that what I was feeling was not dangerous, just a nuisance. A problem I was making, not a real one. Restructure my thoughts. I still bring my cough drops along on the ride, because I find that if I've got a really strong flavor in my mouth, it helps me keep both my front-stage and my backstage mind off of plotting any ambush. I don't know why it works, but it does. Plus, it keeps my breath fresh.
    Anyway, I don't mind driving with Jenna too much because she's a careful driver, and she's also got this cross hanging from her rearview mirror. I'm not a hugely religious person--the members of my family are Christmas Eve Catholics--but the cross does make you think that maybe this gives you a few safety points. Probably like if you saw a sweet old lady reading a Bible on an airplane you're on, you'd feel a tiny bit better about flying--that kind of thing. God couldn't kill her off, right? They say religion is about love, but you wonder how much of it really is about fear.
    "Do you realize how many calories are in those butter
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    scotch bars?" Hannah asks me. I've got a small brown bag in one hand, a cup of chai tea in the other. We settle into a table surrounded by coffee mugs and espresso machines for sale. Today it's me, Michael, Jenna, Hannah, and Akello, this friend of Michael's from Uganda who hangs out with us sometimes.
    "Frappuccinos have more calories than a Big Mac," I say as Hannah sips hers. I don't particularly care how many calories it has, anyway. I love those butterscotch things, and besides, I'm too skinny. My mom says it's nervous