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her that was so secret even Russian torturers wouldn’t have been able to beat it out of me. Just being near her made me nervous and tongue-tied. The thought of going over there to apologize was unbearable.
    â€œHow about you just spank me?” I begged.
    Dad’s mouth fell open. “Are . . . you serious?”
    I nodded. A spanking would hurt more, but once it was over, you forgot about it. But I saw Linda every day in school. If I did what Dad wanted me to do, I was doomed to a lifetime of embarrassment.

Dad takes a radio from the shelf and sits down with Sparky and me. He turns the dials. Between gaps of nothing come static and noises like sound bending. He goes back to the static and fiddles around, but all he gets is crackling, scratchy noise.
    â€œWhat about the Civil Defense channel?” Mr. McGovern asks.
    â€œTried it.” Dad turns the dial. There’s nothing. How can this be a war? No explosions. No shots being fired. Not a sound from above.
    After he snaps the radio off, it’s silent except for Paula’s sniffs. It feels like a long time has passed, but it can’t be more than an hour or two since Dad picked up Sparky and carried him down the hall to the playroom. Sparky yawns and rubs his eyes. I can’t believe he’s actually sleepy. Maybe he’s too young to really understand what’s happened.
    So far Ronnie and I have avoided looking at each other. Last night, just a few hours before Dad shook me awake, Ronnie and I had the first fistfight of our lives. It happened on the way back from having birthday cake at Why Can’t You Be Like Johnny?’s house, and now I don’t know whether to still be angry at him or just try to forget. It seems crazy to be mad at each other now that World War III has started, but I can’t help feeling a little sore at him, and I wonder if Ronnie feels sore at me, too.
    Sitting with his parents just a few feet away, Ronnie shakes his head as if he’s trying to fight drowsiness. Like me, he’s probably afraid that something bad may happen while he’s asleep.
    Sparky yawns again, then lays his head down on Dad’s lap. His yawn makes me want to yawn, too, but I cover my mouth and try to fight it.
    â€œMaybe you should get some sleep, Scott,” Dad says.
    â€œI don’t want to.”
    â€œI think you do. It’s okay. You need to rest.”
    Dad slides his arms under Sparky and lifts him to the bunk above Mom’s. Then he turns to me. “There’s room for both of you.”
    I climb the bunk ladder, and when my face is level with Dad’s, I whisper, “You sure you’ll be all right?”
    Dad smiles weakly. “Yes.”
    When I’m on the bunk bed with Sparky, Dad covers us with the scratchy army blanket. He kisses me on the forehead, then tells Ronnie he can use the other upper bunk if he wants and Paula can have the one below it. But Paula doesn’t want to leave her dad. Ronnie climbs up to the bunk catty-corner to the one Sparky and I are on. Our eyes meet when he lies down. His mom covers him with a blanket.
    The bunk has a small pillow, and I lay my head on it and close my eyes but only pretend to sleep. After a while, I open one eye a tiny bit. Dad must have covered the flashlight with something because it’s dimmer in the shelter but not completely dark. The Shaws and McGoverns are sitting on the floor with their backs to the wall. Janet sits by herself.
    In the shadows, Dad stands in the middle of the shelter with his ear close to the water tank and taps lightly with his knuckles. A faint, hollow echo comes from inside. Then he lowers his head and looks down . . . I think toward Mom. He kneels and disappears from view.
    Quietly I inch to the edge of the bunk and look over. Dad is sitting beside Mom, holding her limp hand in one of his. His other hand covers his eyes. His shoulders tremble, and I know he’s hiding tears.

Like a prisoner, I was