Wonder  -  by R.J. Palacio 

 

Back from Winter Break

Despite what Tushman said, there was no “clean slate” when I went back to school in January. In fact, things were totally weird from the second I got to my locker in the morning. I’m next to Amos, who’s always been a pretty straight-up kid, and I was like, “Yo, what up?” and he basically just nodded a half hello and closed his locker door and left. I was like, okay, that was bizarre. And then I said: “Hey, what up?” to Henry, who didn’t even bother half-smiling but just looked away.

Okay, so something’s up. Dissed by two people in less than five minutes. Not that anyone’s counting. I thought I’d try one more time, with Tristan, and boom, same thing. He actually looked nervous, like he was afraid of talking to me.

I’ve got a form of the Plague now, is what I thought. This is Julian’s payback.

And that’s pretty much how it went all morning. Nobody talked to me. Not true: the girls were totally normal with me. And August talked to me, of course. And, actually, I have to say both Maxes said hello, which made me feel kind of bad for never, ever hanging out with them in the five years I’ve been in their class.

I hoped lunch would be better, but it wasn’t. I sat down at my usual table with Luca and Isaiah. I guess I thought since they weren’t in the super-popular group but were kind of middle-of-the-road jock kids that I’d be safe with them. But they barely nodded when I said hello. Then, when our table was called, they got their lunches and never came back. I saw them find a table way over at the other end of the cafeteria. They weren’t at Julian’s table, but they were near him, like on the fringe of popularity. So anyway, I’d been ditched. I knew table switching was something that happened in the fifth grade, but I never thought it would happen to me.

It felt really awful being at the table by myself. I felt like everyone was watching me. It also made me feel like I had no friends. I decided to skip lunch and go read in the library.

 

 

The War

It was Charlotte who had the inside scoop on why everyone was dissing me. I found a note inside my locker at the end of the day.

Meet me in room 301 right after school. Come by yourself! Charlotte.

 

She was already inside the room when I walked in. “Sup,” I said.

“Hey,” she said. She went over to the door, looked left and right, and then closed the door and locked it from the inside. Then she turned to face me and started biting her nail as she talked. “Look, I feel bad about what’s going on and I just wanted to tell you what I know. Promise you won’t tell anyone I talked to you?”

“Promise.”

“So Julian had this huge holiday party over winter break,” she said. “I mean, huge. My sister’s friend had had her sweet sixteen at the same place last year. There were like two hundred people there, so I mean it’s a huge place.”

“Yeah, and?”

“Yeah, and … well, pretty much everybody in the whole grade was there.”

“Not everybody,” I joked.

“Right, not everybody. Duh. But like even parents were there, you know. Like my parents were there. You know Julian’s mom is the vice president of the school board, right? So she knows a lot of people. Anyway, so basically what happened at the party was that Julian went around telling everyone that you punched him because you had emotional problems.…”

“What?!”

“And that you would have gotten expelled, but his parents begged the school not to expel you …”

“What?!”

“And that none of it would have happened in the first place if Tushman hadn’t forced you to be friends with Auggie. He said his mom thinks that you, quote unquote, snapped under the pressure.…”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “No one bought into that, right?” I said.

She shrugged. “That’s not even the point. The point is he’s really popular. And, you know, my mom heard that his mom is actually pushing the school to review Auggie’s application to Beecher.”

“Can she do that?”

“It’s about Beecher not being an inclusion school. That’s a type of school that mixes normal kids with kids with special needs.”

“That’s just stupid. Auggie doesn’t have special needs.”

“Yeah, but she’s saying that if the school is changing the way they usually do things in some ways …”

“But they’re not changing anything!”

“Yeah, they did. Didn’t you notice they changed the theme of the New Year Art Show? In past years fifth graders painted self-portraits, but this year they made us do those ridiculous self-portraits as animals, remember?”

“So big freakin’ deal.”

“I know! I’m not saying I agree, I’m just saying that’s what she’s saying.”

“I know, I know. This is just so messed up.…”

“I know. Anyway, Julian said that he thinks being friends with Auggie is bringing you down, and that for your own good you need to stop hanging out with him so much. And if you start losing all your old friends, it’ll be like a big wake-up call. So basically, for your own good, he’s going to stop being your friend completely.”

“News flash: I stopped being his friend completely first!”

“Yeah, but he’s convinced all the boys to stop being your friend—for your own good. That’s why nobody’s talking to you.”

“You’re talking to me.”

“Yeah, well, this is more of a boy thing,” she explained. “The girls are staying neutral. Except Savanna’s group, because they’re going out with Julian’s group. But to everybody else this is really a boy war.”

I nodded. She tilted her head to one side and pouted like she felt sorry for me.

“Is it okay that I told you all this?” she said.

“Yeah! Of course! I don’t care who talks to me or not,” I lied. “This is all just so dumb.”

She nodded.

“Hey, does Auggie know any of this?”

“Of course not. At least, not from me.”

“And Summer?”

“I don’t think so. Look, I better go. Just so you know, my mom thinks Julian’s mom is a total idiot. She said she thinks people like her are more concerned about what their kids’ class pictures look like than doing the right thing. You heard about the Photoshopping, right?”

“Yeah, that was just sick.”

“Totally,” she answered, nodding. “Anyway, I better go. I just wanted you to know what was up and stuff.”

“Thanks, Charlotte.”

“I’ll let you know if I hear anything else,” she said. Before she went out, she looked left and right outside the door to make sure no one saw her leaving. I guess even though she was neutral, she didn’t want to be seen with me.

 

 

Switching Tables

The next day at lunch, stupid me, I sat down at a table with Tristan, Nino, and Pablo. I thought maybe they were safe because they weren’t really considered popular, but they weren’t out there playing D&D at recess, either. They were sort of in-betweeners. And, at first, I thought I scored because they were basically too nice to not acknowledge my presence when I walked over to the table. They all said “Hey,” though I could tell they looked at each other. But then the same thing happened that happened yesterday: our lunch table was called, they got their food, and then headed toward a new table on the other side of the cafeteria.

Unfortunately, Mrs. G, who was the lunch teacher that day, saw what happened and chased after them.

“That’s not allowed, boys!” she scolded them loudly. “This is not that kind of school. You get right back to your table.”

Oh great, like that was going to help. Before they could be forced to sit back down at the table, I got up with my tray and walked away really fast. I could hear Mrs. G call my name, but I pretended not to hear and just kept walking to the other side of the cafeteria, behind the lunch counter.

“Sit with us, Jack.”

It was Summer. She and August were sitting at their table, and they were both waving me over.

 

 

Why I Didn’t Sit with August

the First Day of School

Okay, I’m a total hypocrite. I know. That very first day of school I remember seeing August in the cafeteria. Everybody was looking at him. Talking about him. Back then, no one was used to his face or even knew that he was coming to Beecher, so it was a total shocker for a lot of people to see him there on the first day of school. Most kids were even afraid to get near him.

So when I saw him going into the cafeteria ahead of me, I knew he’d have no one to sit with, but I just couldn’t bring myself to sit with him. I had been hanging out with him all morning long because we had so many classes together, and I guess I was just kind of wanting a little normal time to chill with other kids. So when I saw him move to a table on the other side of the lunch counter, I purposely found a table as far away from there as I could find. I sat down with Isaiah and Luca even though I’d never met them before, and we talked about baseball the whole time, and I played basketball with them at recess. They became my lunch table from then on.

I heard Summer had sat down with August, which surprised me because I knew for a fact she wasn’t one of the kids that Tushman had talked to about being friends with Auggie. So I knew she was doing it just to be nice, and that was pretty brave, I thought.

So now here I was sitting with Summer and August, and they were being totally nice to me as always. I filled them in about everything Charlotte had told me, except for the whole big part about my having “snapped” under the pressure of being Auggie’s friend, or the part about Julian’s mom saying that Auggie had special needs, or the part about the school board. I guess all I really told them about was how Julian had had a holiday party and managed to turn the whole grade against me.

“It just feels so weird,” I said, “to not have people talking to you, pretending you don’t even exist.”

Auggie started smiling.

“Ya think?” he said sarcastically. “Welcome to my world!”

 

 

Sides

“So here are the official sides,” said Summer at lunch the next day. She pulled out a folded piece of loose-leaf paper and opened it. It had three columns of names.

Jack’s side Julian’s side Neutrals

Jack Miles Malik

August Henry Remo

Reid Amos Jose

Max G Simon Leif

Max W Tristan Ram

Pablo Ivan

Nino Russell

Isaiah

Luca

Jake

Toland

Roman

Ben

Emmanuel

Zeke

Tomaso

“Where did you get this?” said Auggie, looking over my shoulder as I read the list.

“Charlotte made it,” Summer answered quickly. “She gave it to me last period. She said she thought you should know who was on your side, Jack.”

“Yeah, not many people, that’s for sure,” I said.

“Reid is,” she said. “And the two Maxes.”

“Great. The nerds are on my side.”

“Don’t be mean,” said Summer. “I think Charlotte likes you, by the way.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Are you going to ask her out?”

“Are you kidding? I can’t, now that everybody’s acting like I have the Plague.”

The second I said it, I realized I shouldn’t have said it. There was this awkward moment of silence. I looked at Auggie.

“It’s okay,” he said. “I knew about that.”

“Sorry, dude,” I said.

“I didn’t know they called it the Plague, though,” he said. “I figured it was more like the Cheese Touch or something.”

“Oh, yeah, like in Diary of a Wimpy Kid.” I nodded.

“The Plague actually sounds cooler,” he joked. “Like someone could catch the ‘black death of ugliness.’ ” As he said this, he made air quotes.

“I think it’s awful,” said Summer, but Auggie shrugged while taking a big sip from his juice box.

“Anyway, I’m not asking Charlotte out,” I said.

“My mom thinks we’re all too young to be dating anyway,” she answered.

“What if Reid asked you out?” I said. “Would you go?”

I could tell she was surprised. “No!” she said.

“I’m just asking,” I laughed.

She shook her head and smiled. “Why? What do you know?”

“Nothing! I’m just asking!” I said.

“I actually agree with my mom,” she said. “I do think we’re too young to be dating. I mean, I just don’t see what the rush is.”

“Yeah, I agree,” said August. “Which is kind of a shame, you know, what with all those babes who keep throwing themselves at me and stuff?”

He said this in such a funny way that the milk I was drinking came out my nose when I laughed, which made us all totally crack up.

 

 

August’s House

It was already the middle of January, and we still hadn’t even chosen what science-fair project we were going to work on. I guess I kept putting it off because I just didn’t want to do it. Finally, August was like, “Dude, we have to do this.” So we went to his house after school.

I was really nervous because I didn’t know if August had ever told his parents about what we now called the Halloween Incident. Turns out the dad wasn’t even home and the mom was out running errands. I’m pretty sure from the two seconds I’d spent talking to her that Auggie had never mentioned a thing about it. She was super cool and friendly toward me.

When I first walked into Auggie’s room, I was like, “Whoa, Auggie, you have got a serious Star Wars addiction.”

He had ledges full of Star Wars miniatures, and a huge The Empire Strikes Back poster on his wall.

“I know, right?” he laughed.

He sat down on a rolling chair next to his desk and I plopped down on a beanbag chair in the corner. That’s when his dog waddled into the room right up to me.

“He was on your holiday card!” I said, letting the dog sniff my hand.

“She,” he corrected me. “Daisy. You can pet her. She doesn’t bite.”

When I started petting her, she basically just rolled over onto her back.

“She wants you to rub her tummy,” said August.

“Okay, this is the cutest dog I’ve ever seen,” I said, rubbing her stomach.

“I know, right? She’s the best dog in the world. Aren’t you, girlie?”

As soon as she heard Auggie’s voice say that, the dog started wagging her tail and went over to him.

“Who’s my little girlie? Who’s my little girlie?” Auggie was saying as she licked him all over the face.

“I wish I had a dog,” I said. “My parents think our apartment’s too small.” I started looking around at the stuff in his room while he turned on the computer. “Hey, you’ve got an Xbox 360? Can we play?”

“Dude, we’re here to work on the science-fair project.”

“Do you have Halo?”

“Of course I have Halo.”

“Please can we play?”

He had logged on to the Beecher website and was now scrolling down Ms. Rubin’s teacher page through the list of science-fair projects. “Can you see from there?” he said.

I sighed and went to sit on a little stool that was right next to him.

“Cool iMac,” I said.

“What kind of computer do you have?”

“Dude, I don’t even have my own room, much less my own computer. My parents have this ancient Dell that’s practically dead.”

“Okay, how about this one?” he said, turning the screen in my direction so I would look. I made a quick scan of the screen and my eyes literally started blurring.

“Making a sun clock,” he said. “That sounds kind of cool.”

I leaned back. “Can’t we just make a volcano?”

“Everyone makes volcanoes.”

“Duh, because it’s easy,” I said, petting Daisy again.

“What about: How to make crystal spikes out of Epsom salt?”

“Sounds boring,” I answered. “So why’d you call her Daisy?”

He didn’t look up from the screen. “My sister named her. I wanted to call her Darth. Actually, technically speaking, her full name is Darth Daisy, but we never really called her that.”

“Darth Daisy! That’s funny! Hi, Darth Daisy!” I said to the dog, who rolled onto her back again for me to rub her tummy.

“Okay, this one is the one,” said August, pointing to a picture on the screen of a bunch of potatoes with wires poking out of them. “How to build an organic battery made of potatoes. Now, that’s cool. It says here you could power a lamp with it. We could call it the Spud Lamp or something. What do you think?”

“Dude, that sounds way too hard. You know I suck at science.”

“Shut up, you do not.”

“Yeah I do! I got a fifty-four on my last test. I suck at science!”

“No you don’t! And that was only because we were still fighting and I wasn’t helping you. I can help you now. This is a good project, Jack. We’ve got to do it.”

“Fine, whatever.” I shrugged.

Just then there was a knock on the door. A teenage girl with long dark wavy hair poked her head inside the door. She wasn’t expecting to see me.

“Oh, hey,” she said to both of us.

“Hey, Via,” said August, looking back at the computer screen. “Via, this is Jack. Jack, that’s Via.”

“Hey,” I said, nodding hello.

“Hey,” she said, looking at me carefully. I knew the second Auggie said my name that he had told her about the stuff I had said about him. I could tell from the way she looked at me. In fact, the way she looked at me made me think she remembered me from that day at Carvel on Amesfort Avenue all those years ago.

“Auggie, I have a friend I want you to meet, okay?” she said. “He’s coming over in a few minutes.”

“Is he your new boyfriend?” August teased.

Via kicked the bottom of his chair. “Just be nice,” she said, and left the room.

“Dude, your sister’s hot,” I said.

“I know.”

“She hates me, right? You told her about the Halloween Incident?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, she hates me or yeah, you told her about Halloween?”

“Both.”

 

 

The Boyfriend

Two minutes later the sister came back with this guy named Justin. Seemed like a cool enough dude. Longish hair. Little round glasses. He was carrying a big long shiny silver case that ended in a sharp point on one end.

“Justin, this is my little brother, August,” said Via. “And that’s Jack.”

“Hey, guys,” said Justin, shaking our hands. He seemed a little nervous. I guess maybe it was because he was meeting August for the first time. Sometimes I forget what a shock it is the first time you meet him. “Cool room.”

“Are you Via’s boyfriend?” Auggie asked mischievously, and his sister pulled his cap down over his face.

“What’s in your case?” I said. “A machine gun?”

“Ha!” answered the boyfriend. “That’s funny. No, it’s a, uh … fiddle.”

“Justin’s a fiddler,” said Via. “He’s in a zydeco band.”

“What the heck is a zydeco band?” said Auggie, looking at me.

“It’s a type of music,” said Justin. “Like Creole music.”

“What’s Creole?” I said.

“You should tell people that’s a machine gun,” said Auggie. “Nobody would ever mess with you.”

“Ha, I guess you’re right,” Justin said, nodding and tucking his hair behind his ears. “Creole’s the kind of music they play in Louisiana,” he said to me.

“Are you from Louisiana?” I asked.

“No, um,” he answered, pushing up his glasses. “I’m from Brooklyn.”

I don’t know why this made me want to laugh.

“Come on, Justin,” said Via, pulling him by the hand. “Let’s go hang out in my room.”

“Okay, see you guys later. Bye,” he said.

“Bye!”

“Bye!”

As soon as they left the room, Auggie looked at me, smiling.

“I’m from Brooklyn,” I said, and we both started laughing hysterically.