"Wonder" by R.J. Palacio, Part One

Next week I start fifth grade. Since I’ve never been to a real school before, I am pretty much totally and completely petrified.

They told Mom and Dad I had a cleft palate and some other stuff going on.

They told Mom and Dad I had a cleft palate and some other stuff going on.

They told Mom and Dad I had a cleft palate and some other stuff going on. They called it “small anomalies.”

They were practically fighting, because Mom was hysterical and the farting nurse was yelling at her to stay calm, and then they both started screaming for the doctor.

“But you’re right, Auggie, we should’ve told you when we found out last month that you got in,” said Dad.
“In hindsight,” sighed Mom, “yes, I guess.”

“But you don’t have to take the theater-arts elective if you don’t want to,” Charlotte said, shrugging. “There’s dance or chorus or band. There’s leadership.”

“It’ll be a bit of a schlep, though. The A train down to Eighty-Sixth, then the crosstown bus all the way to the East Side. Takes an hour that way but it’s just a fifteen-minute drive.”

Basically, a precept is anything that helps guide us when making decisions about really important things.

And even though I had jaw-alignment surgery a few years ago, I have to chew food in the front of my mouth.

They would take the longest way around me to avoid bumping into me in any way, like I had some germ they could catch, like my face was contagious.

In the hallways, which were always crowded, my face would always surprise some unsuspecting kid who maybe hadn’t heard about me.

The teachers assigned seats in every class, and I ended up sitting next to Jack in every single class, so I figured either the teachers were told to put me and Jack together, or it was a totally incredible coincidence.

The things we do outlast our mortality.

I stopped letting anyone take pictures of me a while ago. I guess you could call it a phobia. No, actually, it’s not a phobia. It’s an “aversion,” which is a word I just learned in Mr. Browne’s class. I have an aversion to having my picture taken.