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time. “Feel any different?”
    â€œNo,” I replied, working to catch my breath after sprinting full speed. Full, normal, boring speed.
    â€œHow about now, Ledge?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œNow?”
    â€œNo!”
    â€œWhat about now?”
    â€œNO!” I yelled at Fe, rounding the block again, my frustration and temper the only things gaining momentum. On my tenth lap, Fe hit the stopwatch and I stumbled—my toe catching on a lip of sidewalk forced up by tree roots, as if my own family tree were reaching up to trip me. Thrown off balance, I fell, skinning my knees, my elbows, and my pride, while a limb-tingling sensation crawled beneath my skin like I’d landed on an anthill.
    â€œ You okay, Le—? Whoa!” I barely registered Dad’s voice. Before he could finish his question, the stopwatch in Fedora’s hand blew apart— whiz-bang! —the main-spring zinging me in the backside, the rest of the parts flying like shrapnel. Dad ducked and Fedora leaped back with a merry shriek. I covered my head to avoid getting razor-thin gears lodged in my brainpan.
    Dad’s stopwatch was my first savvy casualty. Fedora dashed home, shouting, “Mom! Mom! Wait till you see what Ledge can do! He ran around the block ten times and zippo . Then— bang-zoom!— something savvy happened, and now he can bust things up!” Helmet bobbing, my sister pummeled the air in a comical three-punch combination, repeating “Bust! Things! Up!” as she shadowboxed around the house.
    â€œDo it again, Ledge!” she demanded. “Break something bigger this time! Go on . . . show Mom! Try!”
    I didn’t try. One look at my knees and Mom went to get the Band-Aids, while I watched Dad sort through the mishmash of pieces he’d picked up off the sidewalk. The stopwatch’s metal casing hung over his index finger, stretched out and bent. Looking at it made me queasy. I knew Dad would’ve liked to believe that the watch broke because I was too fast for it. He would’ve been proud if my cuts and scrapes were trophies won through a triumph of sudden super-speed, rather than tokens of my everyday clumsiness. But there had been no evidence that I’d become a single inch- or meter-or mile-per-hour faster.
    When nothing else happened on my birthday but cake and presents and lights-out at ten, nobody knew what to think. Mom and Dad debated whether I’d gotten a savvy at all.
    â€œDad . . . I—I,” I stammered as he came to say good night. I’d already climbed into bed and pulled the sheets over my head, hiding from the last hours of my lousy, bungled birthday.
    â€œDon’t sweat it, Ledge.” Dad’s quick reply surprised me. “So, it turns out you’re an everyday Kale man like your dad. So what? It’s not like you’re defective. We can still run our half marathon the way we planned. Only, now you won’t have to slow down to let your old man catch up.” He winked, then glanced around my room, his gaze moving across long-forgotten art projects and model cars. Then he turned off the overhead light and wished me one last “happy birthday” before pulling the door closed behind him.
    Fedora had been wrong, I told myself. I didn’t break stuff. That kind of savvy would be bad news a dozen ways to Sunday. It would ruin my plans to hit the new Wild, Wild Water Coaster with Josh, Ryan, and Brody. I tried to imagine what would happen if I broke the longest water coaster in the world. The thought sent a prickling shiver down my spine. My bed frame shivered with me.
    I reached to switch off my bedside lamp, but it rocked and shuddered into a battery of brass and sockets before I even touched it. The painting my aunt Jenny had sent me for my birthday fell from my bedroom wall with a thwump in the sudden darkness. But I didn’t need light to remember what it looked like. Aunt Jenny had painted a boat on a