Excerpt from Those Pink Mountain Nights by Jen Ferguson, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

The group fell silent. They ate, attempting not to make a mess. After all, they could lose this privilege. And skipping lunch weekly so they had time to meet around class schedules and after-school obligations was not fun.

Even if Berlin wasn't hungry these days, she knew that.

SarahLynn's older sister, Tashie, who exclusively wore the color black and was their unofficial leader, cleared her throat. "Vincent is right, yo. We're sticking with Indian tacos. We have too much to get done to have this thing up and running before March break to get stuck all up in here."

The school needed to assign a president, VP, and treasurer to every student group. And while FNMISA was a mouthful, it, too, was what the school insisted upon. To meet Canadian standards. They didn't have an Inuk member yet, but Tashie was ever hopeful.

"Okay, so like ten bucks for a taco. And a toonie for pop," SarahLynn suggested.

Vincent finally cracked open his Coke. "We should up it a bit." This was where having a treasurer would help. Someone to figure the monies. That had been Kiki's role.

Even after the Royal Canadian Mounted Police had stopped looking, after the missing posters were torn down, the school hadn't pressured them to fill the treasurer spot. Everything was on pause, as if waiting for Kiki Cheyanne Sound to show up and for life to start again around her. At school, it was obvious. Where she was missing. At community events too.

As VP, Berlin could do both jobs. At least the tracking-expenses part, she could do that.

Vincent continued, talking slow: "Say we add in dessert. Go full-on combo. If Berlin can get a donation of supplies, flour and sugar and shit, from Alpine Natural Foods & Chinese Grocery again, I'll make butter tarts—with raisins. I say we aim to get everyone to spend fifteen."

If ...

It would be a challenge. Berlin nodded her consent anyhow. They needed her to do this, no matter how complicated it would be. She'd figure things, like she always did. If they wanted to ask the art club to design a poster, they needed to sort the details out fast. Mr. MacDonald's countdown at the top corner of his dry-erase board made her anxious: 20 weeks left! Including March break! A weird sketch of a yellow-haired man with visible abdominals wore nothing but swim shorts and held a surfboard.

While the FNMISA assembled a detailed grocery list, Berlin continued half-heartedly tracing that famous pipe on her desk, as if by doing so, she'd understand it. Solve for x. Find the lost piece of the puzzle. Remember how to cry, or laugh, or even feel hunger.


Hours later, the heavy exit door by the gym clicked shut and Berlin's glasses fogged up. She placed one mukluk on the iced sidewalk, refusing to glance backward. She'd never cut classes before.

Not once.

Not that escaping a few minutes early was technically cutting. And she only cared in a faint cerebral way that she was breaking the rules. A girl had to do what a girl had to do. More often than not. In this ever-spinning world.

It was something Quinta, her best friend since kindergarten, said all the time. Only, these days, she wasn't saying it to Berlin. Red mittens rubbed against the wool of her coat, cutting into the careful quiet. It wasn't 100 percent silent. The silence was a metaphor. It was lush velvet, and the people, the birds, the predators, all that noise, they were beads stitched onto its surface.

Before the silence, there had been music. At least Berlin thought there had been something else.

It was hard to remember.

She sighed.

She hated sighing. It sounded too much like giving up.

Now, almost to the stoplight, she'd successfully avoided another awkward run-in at the lockers. School would be out soon. And like Berlin had done since the first day of winter break, when her very best friend had "asked for space," she remembered every little thing about them, searching for the moment where she'd effed up enough to crush a lifelong friendship. Even before Quinta got her driver's permit and the Jeep, it had been routine: they went everywhere together. Before winter break, they'd worked the same shifts at Pink Mountain Pizza too. Quinta was Bee's ride. Literally and figuratively.

Excerpted from Those Pink Mountain Nights by Niall Ferguson. Copyright © 2023 by Niall Ferguson. Excerpted by permission of Heartdrum. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.