Free All Rise for the Honorable Perry T. Cook by Leslie Connor

of her head just before she backed away from him. Or maybe it was just a brief chin-plant caused by their height difference. Whichever, it meant he understood how she was feeling.
    Jessica stood in front of him, arms dangling at her sides. She sighed and said, “Thanks, Halsey.”

chapter twenty-two
WIN-WIN
    A s the new intake at the VanLeer house, I do what new ones at Blue River do. I find someone who has been here a while, and I follow her. When Zoey’s mom asks her to set the VanLeer table, I’m on her heels.
    â€œNapkins on the left, fork on top,” she says.
    Easy enough.
    While we work, I remember my sunny, dusty dream. Win-Win. That’s Big Ed’s other motto for being a successful resident. The first “win” means you count all small good things that happen to you every day. It takes me a second. Then I think of Miss Maya making the phone call home for me, and Miss Jenrik with her “baloney code.” There was Zoey with the cocoa, and Mrs. Samuels showing up at the closet door with that camp mat. So, a call, a code, a cocoa, and a camp mat. Four pretty good things.
    The second “win” means you do things that bringvictories to others. I’ve heard Big Ed say it at least a hundred times. “No matter where you live, you have a community of some kind. And you can be a contributor.”
    New intakes sometimes roll their eyes at all of this. But the ones that try to follow his advice, well, it just goes better for them. I’ve seen it a hundred times.
    I decide that setting the VanLeer table with Zoey is a start at contributing. There is a fork, a knife, and a spoon at every place on this table. Zoey shows me how each piece goes. Tomorrow night, I still won’t be home where I want to be; I’ll be here. But at least I will already know that the blade of the knife is supposed to face the plate.
    At dinner I keep practicing the mottos. I listen. I try to understand what the VanLeers like to talk about at suppertime. I listen to how they spend their days. There is steamy golden stew in the bowls that sit on top of our plates. Fat pieces of chicken, carrots, and potatoes float there. I wonder why I have the plate, and I wonder why I have the knife and fork. I look around the table. All anyone is using is the spoon.
    I listen. I learn that Mr. VanLeer goes to the courthouse in David City every day, and he has an office across the street from it. Neither is far from the new middle school, and the library is in between. I learn that he had a pastrami and provolone sandwich on an Italian roll at lunch.
    That sounds fancy. Eggy-Mon wouldn’t be able to get that. He calls our sandwiches “meat and cheese on white—allright.” Or “PB and jelly—sticking to your belly.” He does the best he can with the Blue River kitchen budget. People miss the meals they used to eat on the outside. So he runs contests. Residents can make up food poetry. If Eggy-Mon likes your poem, and if he can get the ingredients, he’ll put it on the menu. Some rezzes try for something too fancy. Like Mr. Krensky, who always seems like he’s trying to stick it to people anyway. Once he asked for “tilapia fill-aze in honey-mustard glaze.”
    Eggy-Mon flapped a spatula at him and said, “Nice poem. Big ask. Too big.”
    Then Mr. Krensky crabbed at him in that voice that nobody really likes to hear. “Question is . . . are you up to making it happen?” He stuck his pointed chin at Eggy-Mon.
    Eggy-Mon drew his bread knife through a bun. He held the bun up in both hands and made it talk like a puppet. “How about a day-old roll for the Blue River troll,” the bun said. Eggy-Mon thumped it onto Mr. Krensky’s tray.
    Eggy-Mon probably can’t get tilapia—whatever that is. But when Mom came up with “Curds on wheat, with a fresh-fried tweet,” we got the best toasted egg and cheese sandwiches ever.
    Oops. I’m not