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lose a charm.” She folded her hands and looked very pleased with herself.
    â€œWhat are the lessons?” The hot sun was making me woozy. Maybe she was crazy.
    With a smile, she tilted her head. “You won’t know until you’ve learned it.”
    She stared at me and I stared back. Then I let out my breath. “When are the classes?”
    She shrugged. “Come when you like. School ends when you’ve lost all your charms.”
    I shivered, feeling the cold metal against my skin.
    â€œGo on,” she said, shooing me with her hands. “Join the other girls.”
    I angled my body toward them, but I couldn’t move. I looked over my shoulder at her. “Are you sure?”
    â€œIf you are,” she said, with a note in her voice like one of her wind chimes.
    Not one bit of this made any sense. But I lifted my foot like it had been stuck in mud for a year and walked over to the two girls.

chapter four
    I SHUFFLED ALONG THE PATH, FINGERING MY CHARMS. I tried not to think of Billy rolling on the ground like a beetle on its back, laughing at me wearing a fancy gold bracelet out in the woods. If he were here, we’d be lifting rocks looking for newts and bugs. My fingers twitched to get in the dirt. To pick a few plants and examine the leaves. To look for moss and forgotten nests. Back home Billy and I had planted corn from seeds in the spring, and the stalks were two feet high by the time I left. We were having a contest to see whose would be the tallest. He and I would be busy in this woodsy garden for weeks. Daddy would’ve loved it too. I swallowed a big lump in my throat. When I reached the two girls planting seedlings in a patch of red dirt, I faked a cough.
    They stopped talking and stared at me. I waved. My bracelet jangled and I grabbed it with my other hand to quiet it.
    A chubby, brown-haired girl about my age squinted at me and rubbed the back of her hand under her nose. It looked like a slug had slunk across her skin, leaving a trail of slime. “What’s on your face?” she asked.
    I touched the red birthmark on my cheek but said nothing. The two girls checked me out as I stood there.
    â€œWhat’s your name?” asked a black girl. She looked older than me, and her skin was the color of Mama’s coffee after she adds her double creams. Her long legs were tucked beneath her like a grasshopper ready to pounce. Big yellow eyes stared at me from under a high Afro. Her hair could have been a dandelion with reddish-brown fuzzy seeds set to fly. I’d never seen anyone like her, and whatever words I was going to say tumbled back down my throat.
    â€œCan’t you talk?” she asked, looking me up and down.
    I swallowed hard. “It’s Chip. My name’s Chip.”
    â€œLike a boy?” the chubby girl asked with a snort. The snot glistened on her hand.
    â€œIt’s my daddy’s nickname for me.”
    â€œYour daddy sure is funny.” She rubbed her nose again, leaving a streak of dirt on her face.
    Words clunked along my tongue, and I tried not to spit them out. “My daddy’s dead.”
    The black girl shrugged. “So’s my mama. I think.”
    I wanted to ask how she died, but the girl turned back to her seedlings.
    The chubby girl held out her hand. The one with the snot. “I’m Karen.”
    I shook the tips of her fingers and sat next to her, looking around at their work. “What have you guys been learning?”
    Karen sighed. “Not much. I still have all my charms.” She held up her bracelet. She had the same four charms dangling from her wrist.
    I looked over at the black girl, but she didn’t look back. “Does she have the same charms too?”
    I’d never had a black friend. We just had one black student at our school—Michael—and he moved away a few months ago. The only time I even saw any black people was when we drove into the city for the