My mom’s best friend, April, lives in West Hills. They’ve known each other since kindergarten, and April’s known me since before I was born. She has a daughter, Emma, who’s just a year younger than I am. Of course, Mom and April had dreamed that Emma and I would be BFFs, just like they are, but that didn’t exactly pan out. Don’t get me wrong. I like Emma, and whenever we all get together, we have fun hanging out. It’s just that she’s very . . . West Hills. Again, I don’t mean that in a bad way. It’s just that Emma and her friends are into different kinds of things than my friends and I are into. Like horses . . . and saddles . . . and riding competitions . . . and riding outfits . . . and, well, you get my point. Anyway, I really do like Emma, and she was my best chance of getting a West Hills source, so when I got home from school I sent her an e-mail asking what the kids at West Hills were saying about the cougar incident. I had a pile of homework to do, so I shut off the computer and opened my math book.
