The summer I was thirteen, my life changed forever because of Miss Wanda Rose. In fact, our whole neighborhood changed because of her. I met her by accident, but I know in my heart it was meant to happen.

My friends and I spent a lot of time on the streets skateboarding and hanging out. It seemed like we were always in trouble or running from it, the three of us. No one really wanted kids around, especially kids on skateboards.

We spent a lot of time competing with each other or learning new tricks. Sometimes we dared each other to do stupid stuff because we were bored. Someone would make a dare, and the other two would jump in to see who was the bravest. A dare led me to Miss Wanda Rose.

Terence was the oldest, on his second year of tenth grade. He was tall and skinny with smooth brown skin and sad eyes. He always wore a black beret and headphones. That was his style. He liked to talk loud and be the center of attention. His way of intimidating people was to stand really close to them so they had to look up at him. It worked for the other kids, but for Lark and me, we just laughed and pushed him back. We were a street family.

Lark was a true tomboy. She liked anything that was a challenge or got her dirty. She was almost as good on a skateboard as me, but she learned the tricks before I could.

She wasn't afraid to fall off her board or get a scrape, but after she learned a trick, she usually got bored and moved on to something else. She was taller than me and never without her pink snapback hat turned to the back. Sometimes she wore her hair in a ponytail, but most of the time it just spilled out from under her cap, wild curls flying everywhere. Lark liked pink, but she would put her fist in your face if you called her a girly girl.

And then there was me. I was the shortest of the three of us. I didn't really have a style like Terence and Lark.

My mom didn't make much money, and my dad wouldn't help us, so jeans and a t-shirt were about all I had. I was always wearing holes into the sides and toes of my shoes from doing skateboard tricks.

The three of us were always a team, always together. After school, we stayed out till dark and sometimes later. Our parents worked and never seemed to have any time for us, so we learned how to be a family together. Terence's mom worked two jobs: one cleaning buildings and one at a grocery store. Lark's dad sold some kind of machine parts. My mom was a hair stylist.

We didn't need adults. We had each other. Well, at least, that's what we thought. Adults seemed to nag us about anything we did. Our clothes weren't right. Our hair wasn't right. The skateboarding was too annoying or too loud. Why did we spend so much time together? Didn't we have anything else to do? There were always endless questions and harsh looks from adults.

I loved to skateboard. It was a challenge to learn new tricks: an Ollie, a Kick Flip, a Pop Shuvit, a Nose Manual. We didn't have a skateboard park near us, so we used whatever we could find to do tricks on.

A curb, a staircase, a railing: they were spots to learn new tricks. If some adult came out of their house and yelled at us, we moved on to another place.

We skated through the neighborhood, playing a game called SKATE, where one person does a trick and the others have to copy it. If you miss the trick, you get an S, then a K, and so on. Lark showed off her Ollie, popping the board high in the air as she skated up onto the curb. I followed her, sticking it. Terence did the same.

Next, she did a Kick Flip. She pushed her back foot down on the back edge of the board with her front foot in the center of the board. Her front foot kicked backwards in an attempt to get the board to flip over long ways and land back in place. She missed it, and the board landed upside down, and she stumbled backwards, almost falling.

I tried the Kick Flip and almost stuck it, but my foot slipped off the back of the board when I landed. Terence, who was really better than we were at skateboarding, stuck the trick.

Terence gave us a break and did a Pop Shuvit.

He pushed his back foot, making the board pop up in the air and spin 180 degrees around, landing back on the board. Lark barely managed to stick it, falling off the board after the three-second rule. If we could stay on the board for three seconds after a trick, it was considered good. I also made it, even though I came really close to the curb and had to turn quickly to avoid crashing into it.

It was my turn next, and I did a Nose Manual. It was my favorite trick. My front foot was on the front edge of the board. As I skated by, I pushed my foot down and skated on the two front wheels.

We all counted out loud, "One-two-three-four-five!" I made it five seconds before I went down on all four wheels. It was a record for me.

"Yes!" I shouted, pumping my fists in the air.

"Dude, that was sick!" said Lark.

Terence was even impressed and gave me a high five.

We finished the game and skated around on the street. Then Lark dared me to Ollie higher than her. She did an Ollie, her skateboard going up about a foot in the air.

Then it was my turn. I got in position and popped my foot as hard as I could, not wanting to lose. My skateboard jumped high in the air, and I could see Terence open his mouth wide with surprise as I flew by him. When I landed heavily in the middle of my board, I heard a sharp snap. I could feel the board cave in under my feet, and I fell hard on my right arm. I was scraped from my elbow to my wrist. It really hurt, but I wouldn't let anyone know how bad it felt.

That night, I asked my mom for money for a new skateboard.

"You shouldn't have been so foolish with your skateboard, Luke," she fussed, as she wiped my arm with a wet cloth. There were pieces of dirt and pavement still in my arm, and she scrubbed to get them out. "You're lucky you didn't break your neck!"

She ran her hands through my blonde hair, trying to make it part off to the side. But when she took her hand away, I shook my head and let it fall back in my eyes.

"We never have any money," I said. "I've had that skateboard for two years, and you promised to get me new one at Christmas, but you didn't." I was angry. I couldn't help it. My next words probably should have stayed in my mouth, but they tumbled out before I could think. "You are never around, and all I have is my friends. You are never here for me, and you are so selfish to not even get me a new board. Now I'll have nothing to do all summer!"

My mother was not a screamer like some parents. When she was mad, she got really quiet. She straightened up from cleaning my arm and walked out of the room. I knew I'd hurt her. I knew that things were really hard because my dad never gave us any money. But all I could think of was how much I needed a new board.

Lark had an old skateboard she said I could borrow, but it was narrow, and I couldn't seem to do anything on it but go forward.

The trucks were worn out, and it hardly moved when I shifted my weight to turn. I gave up trying to skate on it. Terence and Lark decided to take a day off from skateboarding to walk around with me. Lark said it was because she was bored with skating, but I knew they felt bad for me.

"Hey, Luke, my mom gave me five bucks," Terence said. "Want to walk to the gas station and get a hot dog?"

"Walk all that way? It must be like five miles or something," I said. I was still angry over breaking my skateboard and embarrassed that my friends were walking because I had no wheels.

"Dont be a baby," said Lark. "I'm starving!"

We walked to the store and got three hot dogs and a two-liter bottle of soda. As we walked back towards our neighborhood, we stopped in front of an abandoned house. It was a white two-story building with a sagging roof and a couple of busted-out windows.

We sat down on the steps that led up to the house. Lark and I sat sideways on the steps so we could share the soda and look at the old house. Terence stood on the sidewalk, bored.

"That's a creepy old house," said Lark, pretending to shiver and rubbing her arms.

"Bet you wouldn't go inside," I teased her. "Probably get eaten by a giant rat or a starving homeless guy." I held my arms up and made my hands into claws, bared my teeth and growled.

She threw her hot dog wrapper at me and pretended to be mad.

Terence laughed at us and challenged me next. "Why don't you throw a rock and bust out a window?"

My stomach knotted. I liked a challenge, but this was someone's house, even if it was abandoned. But I couldn't go back on a dare. Of course, he hadn't actually said the word dare yet.

Lark chimed in, "That's a great idea. I dare you!"

Well, now it was for real. I didn't have much in my life. I wasn't rich, popular, or handsome. One of my eyes was a little lazy, and sometimes people stared at me funny. I kept my hair long to hang over that eye in case anyone was looking too close. In school, I barely got passing grades. My mother and the teachers just never took much time to explain things that were hard for me to get, so I gave up and guessed a lot. But at least I had my honor. I couldn't turn down a dare.

Well, I also didn't have a juvenile record, which I could end up with if I got caught busting out windows.

"I'm not going to throw rocks at some stupid, old house," I said, taking a drink of the soda and wiping my mouth. I tried to look as cool as I could. "Besides, my mom said I had to be home early today to clean my room. She's really mad about my busted skateboard," I lied. I sat back against the stairs to see if it was going to work.

"I think you're a big chicken," laughed Terence. "A real mama's boy." He leaned over me and took the bottle from me as if to tell me he was now in control.

"Well, I have to hurry up because I gotta get home, but I'll throw one rock." I looked around in the grass for the smallest stone I could find.

Before I could find anything, Lark spoke up. "Here's a nice one, mama's boy!" She handed me what looked like a boulder. I took it from her hand. I threw the rock at the house and it hit the wall to the left of a second story window.

"Way to go, Jeter," Terence said. "Try it again." This time the rock was even larger.

"Could you have found something a little bigger?" I rolled my eyes at him as I took the rock. This time, I chucked the rock as hard as I could, so I could get it over with and get out of there fast. I was ready to run as soon as I heard the broken glass. The rock felt so heavy in my hand, and my heart was pounding.