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animals—in fact, the Mackenzies’ cats and I pretty much avoided each other—but it’s cool to read a book by someone who Mrs. Mac says is just like me. And she is.
    Even though I started talking at a much earlier age than Temple Grandin did, she also got into fights at school and cried when people were mean to her. When she was going into ninth grade, her parents sent her to a special boarding school for emotionally disturbed children where she learned to talk to animals, like horses that had been mistreated. When I read that part, my stomach tightens up, and I can’t eat anymore. I don’t want to have to go to a special school. And I want friends who are people. Not horses. Anyway, Dad can’t afford a horse.
    I keep going because I know that if Temple Grandin wrote a book, she must have turned out all right. Dad doesn’t tell me not to read at the dinner table. Mami would have, but she’s not here. She hasn’t even phoned us, even though Tuesday evening at six thirty is when she usually calls. After the plates are cleared—I’m too busy reading to see who does it—Dad says he’s driving Mrs. Mac back to her new place with some of her boxes. “Go ahead and finish your homework,” he says. “Ms. Latimer comes early on Wednesdays.”
    I fold a napkin in half to mark my place in the book. “Can you leave your phone?” I ask. “In case Mami calls.”
    He shakes his head. “She already called. When you were out.”
    â€œShe called early?”
Unfair.
    â€œShe has a rehearsal tonight. They’re extending the tour.”
    â€œWhich means she’s not coming home next month?” My heart kicks against my rib cage. I squeeze the book, ready to throw it across the room. But what would Mrs. Mac say if I had a meltdown and destroyed the present she gave me?
    â€œNo, she isn’t. She’s touring all next month and then working at the studio through the summer.” Dad rubs his eyes, then flattens his hair with his palms of his hands. “I don’t like it any more than you do. But with your brothers in college and you going one day, we need the money.” Glancing around the kitchen, I see that Mrs. Mac has left. Dad and I are by ourselves, and if he didn’t have to take Mrs. Mac home, he’d go back into his pantry and play his songs the way he did when I got home this evening. The way he does every time Mami calls. Doesn’t she realize how much we need
her
?
    And I missed her call. Because I met Chad in the park, and we saw Mrs. Mac ram the back of his parents’ van. He might be my friend now, but I have to do the right things so he won’t go away like Melanie Prince-Parker and all the other New Kids.
    I don’t have Mami to tell me what the right things are.
    But I do have Mr. Internet. And when I go upstairs to ask him how kids with Asperger’s syndrome can find friends, he has 255,000 answers for me.

CHAPTER 5
    TEN MINUTES BEFORE ELEVEN, MS. LATIMER LEAVES. AND because it’s another warm, sunny day, I go to the concrete platform in the park to read. Mrs. Mac’s car is gone—last night I listened to the tow truck haul it away. The Elliotts’ van, with its bashed-up back end, is still in the driveway.
    The kindergarten bus pulls up between the park and the Elliotts’ house just as I’m finishing the second chapter of
Animals in Translation.
Its brakes screech, driving a pair of robins from the bare branch overhead. A skinny boy with blond hair and a blue backpack jumps to the pavement. I recognize Chad’s little brother from when they moved in three days ago.
    â€œHi, weird girl,” he says when I wave. His grin reveals missing teeth on top.
    I slam the book facedown on the platform. It has a torn cover, so it’s already ruined. But now two pages are bent as well. “Is that what Chad calls me?”
    The little boy skips up to me. “Yeah. He