PrincessCesca: Justin acts like king of the school

PrincessCesca: he’s an a$$

LostPhoebe: not sorry to miss that! -

GranolaGrrl: ’night

PrincessCesca: good night

LostPhoebe: bye

I sign off, sad to be so far away from my friends when I need them the most.

I am lying in my bed, almost ready to drift into blissful sleep when I remember Coach Lenny’s exercises. He’ll kill me if I don’t do them. Jumping out of bed, I dig the note card out of my backpack and start counting sit-ups.

“One, two, three . . .”

Who knew it could take an hour to do one hundred sit-ups, sixty push-ups, and two hundred jumping jacks. By the time I collapse back in bed I’m exhausted. I fall asleep the second my head hits the pillow.

When my alarm goes off I feel like I’ve slept all of five minutes.

It’s going to be a rough day.

“You look like Hades,” Troy says as he sets his lunch tray next to mine.

Through some great miracle of adrenaline or alpha waves, I am still awake despite a pop quiz in Algebra and a documentary on the Ancient Egyptian practice of mummification. But it’s a near thing.

“Thanks,” I mumble, struggling to keep my head from dropping onto my plate of hummus-smothered meat loaf. And I thought there was no way to make meat loaf worse.

Food is the last thing on my mind, though. We are doing pendulums in Physics today and I just know the swinging and circling is going to trigger my motion sickness. I’m trying not to consume anything I don’t want to see again.

“I had a late night,” I explain. “And early morning practice.”

“I thought practices were after school?” he asks.

“They are,” I say. “But I have to practice extra.”

“Why?” Nicole prods her meat loaf like she’s afraid it might get up and walk off the plate. “You made the team.”

“Only if I finish top three in the first meet.”

Nicole lets out a low whistle. I’ve always wanted to be able to do that. I can’t whistle at all, despite years of secret training and even a hands-on lesson from Justin that I’d rather forget.

“I have faith in you,” Troy says. “I’ll help any way I can.”

I smile at him. He’s so sweet and looks really cute with that goofy grin on his face. And that golden blond hair spiking off in every direction doesn’t hurt his star quality good looks. And he seems to like me. Maybe Troy could be more than a friend, after all.

“Thanks.” I blush even though I know he can’t read my thoughts.

His grin deepens.

Oh yeah, he’s part god. . . . maybe he can. Which leads me to wondering . . .

“I have a question,” I say to both of them.

“Shoot,” Nicole says.

I think about it for a few seconds, trying to get the words right. Trying to figure out how to ask what I really want to know.

“Are your powers unlimited?” I finally ask. “I mean, can you do pretty much anything you want?”

“Yes and no,” Nicole says.

“Great.” I venture a tiny bite of blue Jell-O. “That clears it up.”

Troy swallows a giant forkful of meat loaf before saying, “It’s not a simple question. In one sense, there are no limitations on what we can do. But—and this is a big but—just because we have the poten

tial to do something doesn’t mean we have the ability.”

“I’m working on no sleep,” I plead. “Can you please elaborate?”

“Our powers don’t come easy,” Nicole explains. “When we’re born we can’t really tap into them. They’re there, but it takes years—a lifetime, really—of training to learn how to use them.”

“There are exceptions, of course.” Troy sets down his fork to chug a pint of milk. “The closer you are to the god on your family tree, the stronger your powers are from the start. Most of us are pretty far down the branch.”

“How do you train?” I ask. It’s not like I’ve seen classes out in the courtyard working on moving things with their minds.

“That’s complicated.” Nicole pushes her untouched meat loaf to the side. “Part of it is learning how to focus your energies—how to channel the powers into what you are trying to do. But a big part of it has to do with self-knowledge. You have to know yourself, understand yourself so you can sense the extent of your powers. The better you know yourself the more focused your powers get.”

“Wow,” I say. “That sounds so . . .”

“Vague?” Nicole suggests. “It is.”

“I was going to say dangerous. What if someone suddenly reaches a new level of self-knowledge and, like, accidentally blows someone to pieces.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Troy says cheerfully, “there are controls.”

“Controls?”

“Yeah,” Nicole adds. “Since we’re not fully gods, the Mt.Olympus twelve placed a protective order over our powers.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means we can’t kill anyone—either accidentally or on purpose—using our powers.” Nicole stares at the table, like she’s lost in thought. Her voice sounds far away. “Only the gods can act irreversibly.”

Silence falls on our table. Nicole sits lost in thought. I feel like I’m missing something important. Gesturing with my eyebrows, I try to silently ask Troy what’s going on. He just shakes his head and goes back to shoveling down his tray of food.