“That just shows how much you know.” Sicilee strides on, hair swinging, heels clicking against the pavement. “It just so happens that I am not a liar, Baraberra. I leave that kind of thing to people like you.”

Maya’s laugh pops like a blister. “Oh, please. Spare me the self-righteous crap. I bet you don’t even know what a vegan is.”

“Of course I do.” Sicilee doesn’t. She thinks that vegan is short for vegetarian. She slows down so that Maya can catch up with her and see the scornful edge to her smile. “Just because I don’t go around drooling cool the way you do, Baraberra – shaking your stupid badges in everybody’s face and thinking you’re so great because you wear somebody else’s old clothes – doesn’t mean that I don’t know what’s going on in the big picture. I know what’s going on.”

Maya sneers. Yeah, sure you do. “Sicilee,” says Maya with exaggerated sweetness, “we’re alone now – you don’t have to pretend. You don’t have a clue what’s going on in ‘the big picture’. Gott im Himmel, you think you’re the big picture. If you can’t wear it, drive it, watch it, listen to it, or eat it, it doesn’t exist.”

“What? Unlike you, Miss Sacrifice-and-self-denial? Like you’ve dedicated your life to protecting chipmunks and drawing on the walls of the cave you live in?” Sicilee’s laughter splutters like machine-gun fire. “You are such a total phoney. You know, you don’t look like you’re doing without much to me. Your parents have two cars, just like everybody else. And you have all the stuff everybody else has.” Sicilee’s smile shrinks contemptuously. “Your cell phone does everything but fly.”

They aren’t walking any more. They’ve stopped a little way down the drive, where they are squaring off like boxers.

“Sicilee,” says Maya, “the point isn’t whether or not I and ten billion other people have a cell phone. The point is that besides everything else you aren’t – you know, like human – you are so definitely not the animal-rights type.”

“And when did I say I was?” Sicilee has seen animal-rights types on the news. They’re usually screaming, wearing balaclavas and throwing paint on people wearing totally gorgeous mink coats. “Those people are nothing but terrorists.”

“Oh, spare me.” Maya purses her lips in that smug and irksome way she has. “To an animal, you’re the one who’s the terrorist, with your fur coat and those boots you wear that make you look like you’ve got dogs wrapped around your feet. Which is why you can’t be a vegan. Vegans are animal-rights types, Barbie-brain.”

“I know about fur and everything.” Sicilee’s smile shines like highly polished steel. “But for your information, I only just started being a vegan. I can’t completely change my whole wardrobe overnight.”

“I know you just started being a vegan.” Maya grins. “About forty-five minutes ago.”

“Oh, right. At about the same time that you started riding a bike everywhere.” Sicilee’s arm sweeps across the empty bike rack outside the library. “Just where is your bike, Your Greenness? Or is its invisibility part of it being environmentally friendly?”

“It has a flat. You probably don’t know this, but you can’t ride a bike with a flat tyre.” Maya starts walking again. “And anyway, I’m a hell of a lot Greener than you’ll ever be. Gott im Himmel, you are like a walking advertisement for the consumer society. You won’t last an hour being Green.” Maya looks over with a serene smile. “You won’t even last ten minutes.”

“Oh, really?” sneers Sicilee.

“Yeah, really,” says Maya. “You’re about as Green as strip mining. You probably leave the lights on when you’re sleeping, so you’ll be able to see yourself in the mirror if you wake up during the night.”

“And I suppose you’re Greener than a tree, Madame I-ride-my-bike-in-blizzards!” The many people who know only Sicilee’s dazzling smile would be surprised at how good she is at contorting her mouth into an expression of revulsion and disgust. “You are so false, Baraberra. I bet you’ve never even been on a bike.”

“Well, you lose, Kewe. Because not only have I been on a bike about a trillion times, but as soon as I get the flat fixed, you’ll be seeing me on it every day.”

Neither of these statements is much truer than Sicilee’s claim to be a concerned environmentalist and vegan. The truth is that Maya has been on a bicycle only a dozen times, the last being over four years ago when she skidded on something in the road, ran into a hedge and decided it was easier to get rides from her mother than risk her life.

“And you’ll be seeing me eating nothing but vegetables,” counters Sicilee (who has never thought of vegetables as more than a garnish).

“Sure I will.” Maya takes a step towards Sicilee. An innocent bystander might wonder if she’s planning to hug Sicilee or give her a shove, but all she does is smile – albeit in a slightly spine-chilling way. “You may think everybody’s got the wool pulled over their eyes, you know? So let me be the one to tell you that they don’t. It is pathetically obvious that you only came today because you have the hots for Cody Lightfoot.”

“And that isn’t why you came?” Sicilee smiles back. “You are such a scammer, Baraberra. You are so transparent I could watch TV through you.”

“At least I have real Green credentials,” snaps Maya. “Unlike some people I could mention.”

“Oh, please.” Sicilee’s hair swings, scythe-like, with scorn. “You may be able to convince some people that you showed up because you can’t sleep for worrying about the whales, but not everyone’s that gullible, Baraberra. Sweet Mary! If you’d sat any closer to Cody at the meeting, you would’ve been on my lap.”

“You don’t stand a chance with him.” Maya’s voice is so reasonable and calm you’d think she’d started talking about something else entirely (socks, perhaps, or how to bake a potato). “Cody’s not one of your preppy puppets who’s only interested in what a girl looks like.”

“Oh, really?” Sicilee makes a face. “Then you’d better hope he’s not interested in brains or character either, because those are two more qualities you don’t have.”

Maya pretends to laugh. “But the joke’s going to be on you, you know. Because I’m going to win.”

“We’ll see about that.” Sicilee’s smile stretches so that it almost seems to wrap itself around her head. “I wouldn’t get his name tattooed on my butt just yet, if I were you.”

Chapter Eighteen

The times are a-changin’ – whether Clemens likes it or not

Waneeda may have scoffed at Joy Marie’s belief that the Clifton Springs High School Environmental Club could still be saved, but Waneeda, it seems, was wrong. Something was ventured and something was gained. It was very, very dark, but now here’s the dawn – all bright and golden and full of promise. In the space of just one afternoon, Cody Lightfoot has turned everything around. Room III buzzed with energy the way wild meadows once buzzed with bees. The geeky, whining image of the club vanished in knowing laughter. From now on, they’re going to have fun. From now on, instead of laying guilt trips on their fellow students, they’re going to show them the way. As Cody put it with that smile that causes everyone to smile back, “Make them aware and they will care.”

Cody believes that they can inform people of the problems facing the planet and let them know what can be done about them in a laid-back, entertaining way. No pain, but plenty of gain. Cody Lightfoot is the sunny, hope-filled day to Clemens Reis’ moonless, gloomy night. Where Clemens has been known to bray about “Kamikaze Consumers” and the “Shopocalypse” to come, Cody talks mildly about “The Not Yet Awares” and what a big difference it would make if everyone bought a little less now and then. If Cody and Clemens were policemen and not teenage boys, Cody would be the nice, easy-going cop who asks you if you want a coffee, and Clemens would be the one who slams his fist down on the desk and tells you that you’ll never see daylight again.

“We have to get the communal qui flowing here,” said Cody. “Involve people. Make them feel like they’re really doing something. Let them know that we’re all in this together.”

To do this, this year they’re going to have a major celebration for Earth Day that will involve not just Clifton Springs High but the entire town. This is what they did at Cody’s school last year and it was an incredible success that got them widespread media coverage and national attention. If it can work in California, the birthplace of photochemical smog, says Cody, there’s no reason it won’t work here. There will be stalls and competitions, exhibits and information, swap shops and a recycling centre, music and food. Everyone will be encouraged to join in. There will be something for everyone, and something everyone can do. They’ll need plenty of volunteers to run the stalls. They’ll need people with special interests to run workshops. They’ll need tons of donations of clothes, books and household items. Everyone is excited. Even Ms Kimodo. Ms Kimodo thinks they’ll have less trouble getting Dr Firestone on board than they would have trying to fall off an ice-covered mountain. “The Earth Day celebration’s just the kind of upbeat thing he loves,” said Ms Kimodo. Which is true. Nothing pleases Dr Firestone more than a smiling photo of himself on page one of the Clifton Springs Observer.

The meeting ended in high spirits. The gleeful gaggles of girls departed, bubbling with energy and eagerness, and Ms Kimodo and Cody left together talking about how best to approach Dr Firestone, leaving Clemens, Waneeda and Joy Marie to put the room back in order.