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I just wished we got to hang out more often. Like Raffi said, they were super busy people.
    Even so, I felt lucky. None of my friends had “normal” homes. Ryan’s dad had passed away from cancer less than a year ago, and he lived with just his mom. Hú Dié’s mom was in an assisted-living facility because she had ALS—Lou Gehrig’s disease—so it was just Hú Dié and her dad at home. Both of Phoenix’s parents had died in a car wreck when he was a baby, and he lived with his grandfather. If there was one thing I couldn’t complain about, it was two solid parents.
    My folks knew most of what had happened in San Francisco, but I never told them about dragon bone. It wasn’t so much because of the bad guys involved, but the good guys—like Ryan, a wise old Chinese woman named Hok who lived in San Francisco’s Chinatown, and even Phoenix’s grandfather. I knew how careful my parents were about legal issues, and I’m positive they’d never let me hang out with
any
of my friends again if they knew what I knew. More than that, if my parents ever found out that I’d withheld important information from investigators, they’d kill me.
    I’d talked with my mom for, like, an hour before our flight took off, and it was nice to hear her voice. As usual, she did most of the talking, motor-mouthing about the weather and other nonsense, but that’s exactly what I needed back in my life—a major dose of normal. I did tell her about Ling and Mr. Chang’s offer for me to be China’s “poster boy” for cycling, and she actually went quiet for a full ten seconds. Then she rambled on about how she thought it would be a great idea for me to take them up on the offer to try for a week. She said that she and my father were going to be swamped for the next month anyway, and that I might aswell be off doing something exciting with my friends instead of sitting around the house, bored. I told her the same thing I’d told Ling, that I’d think about it.
    My mom said that while she couldn’t pick me up from the Indianapolis airport when we landed—at 7:30 a.m., because of the time change—she’d be home when Ryan’s mom dropped me off around 8:30 a.m. My dad was going to be home, too. Best of all, my mom was going to make her famous huevos rancheros for breakfast. I couldn’t remember the last time the three of us had eaten a meal together. I was pumped.
    I thought I heard people arguing softly in the row across from me, and I opened my eyes just a hair. It turned out to be Phoenix and Hú Dié, who were sitting beside one another. I doubted I’d ever figure those two out. Sometimes they acted like best friends. Other times they fought like brother and sister, complete with fists flying. I didn’t have any brothers or sisters, which was why my friends meant so much to me. Phoenix had been my best friend until this summer vacation began. Now he, Ryan, and Hú Dié were pretty equal in the best-friend department, and I liked it that way. I hoped that whatever I decided about China didn’t screw that up.
    It was obvious that the three of them were ready to move to China immediately and start racing for Mr. Chang. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do yet. At least, that’s what I told them and myself. Deep down, though, I knew the truth. There was no way I was going to a foreign country to race bikes, even for a week. I wasn’t even sure that I wanted to race bikes in the good old USA anymore. Riding Raffi’sdirt trail reminded me that bikes were supposed to be fun. Racing was too much work.
    Ryan and his mom both began to snore, and I couldn’t help grinning. At least they had their priorities right. I couldn’t do anything about any of the stuff on my mind while I was thirty thousand feet in the air, so I might as well get some sleep. I closed my eyes again and tried to follow Ryan’s mom’s lead. If everything went well, I’d be home before I knew it.

“Hi!” I shouted . “I’m home!”
    “We’re in the