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year older than everybody, because he stayed back a year. Dude was as dumb as dirt, and that wouldn’t have been so bad if he was at least cool, buthe wasn’t. Plus he was taller than most of us, so he treated everybody like chumps. Especially me.
    Just made it to the cafeteria (11:44 a.m.). Got in line. Brandon came in after me, bumped me, and then, seeing that I ignored him, decided to step in front of me.
    â€œShack,” he said. Shack was what he called me as his lame way of making fun of the fact that my name is Castle. “You don’t mind me butting in front of you, right? I mean, it’s not like you haven’t had cafeteria food before. You probably had some last night, right?” He shrugged and hit me with another one. “Right?” The only reason Brandon even knew about my mother is back when we were in the fourth grade—yes, I’ve known him that long—my mother thought it would be a good idea to come speak at Career Day. And Brandon has used it as fuel ever since. He grinned, then looked around to make sure other people had heard him, which was always the most important part of his jerkness. Then a few more. “Right? Right?”
    I sat at the table (11:50 a.m.). The same table I sat at every day with my two friends Dre Anderson and Red Griffin. I met Dre this year, and we hit it off because he’s a ballplayer too. Plays for the Boys and Girls Club, and he told me I should’ve played, but I missed the tryouts.On purpose. Thing is, Boys and Girls Clubs don’t ever really cut nobody. Everybody can just sign up and play, but who wants to be on a team with a bunch of pity-players? I didn’t wanna bust Dre’s bubble because that ain’t cool. But for me, I’m too good to play on a team like that. I mean, I didn’t really know that, but . . . I knew that, y’know?
    And Red, well, I’ve known him for a long time. We’ve been cool since fifth grade, mainly because even though we’ve never really talked about nothing bad, we both kinda knew something bad had happened to us. Like, for me, the best way to describe it is, I got a lot of scream inside. And I could tell Red did too. He was a white boy with red hair who everybody was friends with mainly because people were scared that he was crazy and it’s better to be on crazy’s good side. Jessica Grant said her mother said the only reason people have red hair is because they’re red on the inside. Red like violent. But I got black hair, so does that mean I’m black on the inside? Anyway, Brandon came and sat next to Red at the table. He usually sat farther down by the other gas-mouths, but not today. Today he sat right next to Red, and right across from me and Dre.
    â€œYo, Red, you ever been to Glass Manor?” Brandon asked while chomping on a chicken drummy.
    â€œNope,” Red said, dry, just before taking a sip of his juice. He wasn’t paying Brandon no mind.
    â€œOh man, you should go. It’s something to see,” Brandon said, now looking right at me. We caught eyes for a second, but then I darted mine to my french fries and ketchup. Dip, then bite. Dip, then bite. Don’t look up. Don’t pay him no attention. Dip. Then. Bite. Brandon continued, “You really get to see where they got the name Glass Manor from, because dude, everybody who lives around there is freakin’ shattered.”
    Dre let out a big sigh, like a here we go again sigh, and Red glanced at me because he knew I lived there. Everybody knew I lived there, and even though I wasn’t the only kid at school from that neighborhood, it seemed like I caught the most mess about it. At least from Brandon. Red looked back at Brandon, disgusted, then went on eating. What a dumb joke.
    Brandon was talking to Monique, who sat next to him (12:02 p.m.). Really he was snatching food off her plate and teasing her about her acne. But the thing was, everybody knew he