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hear her desperate screams. There was no land in sight, no boat in the distance, not so much as a gull wheeling overhead. And then, as the icy fingers of the sea were pulling her under for the last time, Cody Lightfoot (in his pinstriped suit and black T-shirt) suddenly dove in beside her. His arms were strong and warm around her. “It’s all right,” he murmured. “Don’t worry, dear Waneeda. Everything’s going to be all right.” She woke up tangled in the blankets, a pillow clutched against her.
    Even now, so many hours later, as she and Joy Marie walk home together on Friday afternoon, last night’s dream keeps replaying itself in her mind, making Joy Marie’s chatter no more than background noise. Until Joy Marie says something that makes Waneeda almost choke on the candy she just put in her mouth.
    “What?” asks Waneeda. “What did you say?”
    “God, Waneeda…” Joy Marie makes her why-don’t-you-ever-listen-to-me? face. “I said that Clemens says that Cody Lightfoot seems pretty solid. You know, interesting and intelligent and kind of a mensch.”
    “Clemens,” repeats Waneeda. “Are you saying Cody Lightfoot talks to Clemens?”
    Clemens Reis is the geek’s geek. Waneeda, who lives behind Clemens, has known him since they were in diapers, and so can attest that he was always a peculiar child (in the video of her earliest birthday parties, Clemens is the scowling one who refused to wear a party hat or sing), but puberty has made him even more peculiar. He has an eccentric nature and an independent, argumentative mind. Physically, he is thin and gawky, with hair that is long not as a statement of cool or rebellion but because he never remembers to get it cut. His glasses are held together by a paper clip. Clemens is the kind of boy who can tell you how many helium balloons you’d need to make a cat fly (depending on its weight, of course) and who will tell you (whether you ask or not) what percentage of global greenhouse-gas emissions is caused by cows. He wears a hat knitted by his grandmother and saddle shoes. It is miracle enough that two such different examples of a carbon-based life form as Cody and Clemens should inhabit the same planet, let alone speak to each other.
    “He talks to Clemens all the time,” says Joy Marie. “At least he isn’t a snob like everybody else in this school.”
    “I guess that’s true.” Waneeda has, in fact, seen him talk to people even she wouldn’t talk to.
    Waneeda chews on a cherry-flavoured ball of corn syrup and sugar in the way of someone considering the possible origins of life. No one expects less of Waneeda than Waneeda herself. Indeed, you could say that one of her strengths is that her lack of ambition is comfortably matched by her lack of expectation. But now something shifts ever so slightly, and she starts to consider the possibility that, maybe, there might be a chance that – someday, somehow – Cody Lightfoot will talk to her somewhere that isn’t in her dreams.

Chapter Eight

Sicilee doesn’t understand it when things don’t go the way she wants
    Since the social hierarchy of Clifton Springs High is slightly more rigid than that of feudal Europe, every group has its own table in the cafeteria.
    Sicilee’s group sits in the centre of the room, which is both symbolic (she and her friends, after all, are at the centre of the school’s social life) and practical (so they can both see and be seen).
    Today, Ash, Loretta and Kristin are discussing the weekend’s trip to the mall.
    “I have to take back that dress I got,” Loretta is saying. “I mean, it looked great in the store, but ohmigod when I tried it on at home? I looked enormous . You should’ve seen my butt!”
    Ash nods knowingly. “It’s the mirrors. They have special mirrors that make you look skinnier than you are.”
    Kristin doesn’t think it’s the mirrors. She thinks the fault lies with mass production. The clothes are made to fit everybody, so they fit no