"Mockingbird" by Kathryn Erskine, Chapters 1–13

It’s cold and hard and stiff on the outside and cavernous on the inside. My Dictionary says CAVernous means filled with cavities or hollow areas. That’s what’s on the inside of Devon’s chest.

Another says, Wasn’t it a beautiful memorial service?

Mrs. Brook knows how I’m feeling so you can find out from her. I would be superfluous. My Dictionary says suPERfluous means exceeding what is sufficient or necessary.

SuPERfluous also means marked by wastefulness.

No parts of his body are left because he was cremated. That means burned up into ashes.

Where do you go when you get burned up and turn into smoke in the air? Maybe you get sucked into furnace systems and blown out through the vents.

I don’t want that yucky spaghetti casserole again.

You shouldn’t walk into someone else’s Personal Space. Especially not William H.’s. William H. is autistic.

You’re like a dog! Slobbering all over your sleeve!

Josh practically falls into me so I step away and Josh lands on the ground.

A gunshot wound to the Heart is almost always fatal.

I don’t like very outgoing. Or efFUSive. Or EXtroverted. Or greGARious. Or any of those words that mean their loudness fills up my ears and hurts and their face and waving arms invade my Personal Space and their constant talking sucks all the air out of the room until I think I’m going to choke.

I don’t like very outgoing. Or efFUSive. Or EXtroverted. Or greGARious. Or any of those words that mean their loudness fills up my ears and hurts and their face and waving arms invade my Personal Space and their constant talking sucks all the air out of the room until I think I’m going to choke.

I don’t like very outgoing. Or efFUSive. Or EXtroverted. Or greGARious. Or any of those words that mean their loudness fills up my ears and hurts and their face and waving arms invade my Personal Space and their constant talking sucks all the air out of the room until I think I’m going to choke.

I look back at the Bambi video and put it back on the shelf because it’s giving me a recess feeling in my stomach and I don’t know why.

You don’t need to stare at my feet, she says. And you don’t need to match my exact stride or use your left foot when I use mine.

I stop sucking my sleeve but I’ll go back to it later when she forgets because I’m persistent.

He was sitting hunched over on a pew just the way he’s sitting hunched over on a bench right now.

There are rays of light coming in through the blinds and the dust swirls around in the beams and hits the chest and I wonder if any of the dust particles are Devon and if I can feel him.

After we came home from the hospital that night—with no Devon—Dad was yelling and kicking the furniture and the walls and he started pounding the chest with his fists and shouting, Why? Why? WHY? and he threw the woodworking books and Scout manual into Devon’s room and slammed the door and said, No no no no no, until I screamed at him to STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT!

My arms are atria and my legs are ventricles and I pump the blood all around the right way because there has to be something I can do.

First I pump the blood to the lungs to pick up the oxygen then to the left atrium and ventricle then to the aorta to go all around his body like it should.

First I pump the blood to the lungs to pick up the oxygen then to the left atrium and ventricle then to the aorta to go all around his body like it should.

All my valves are working so the blood flow is right and I can feel the beat and I rock with it because rocking makes me feel alive and I want his chest to be alive.

I’m at the courthouse where the remaining killer from the Virginia Dare Middle School shooting has just had his preliminary hearing.

That horrific shooting was a devastating blow to this small community—oh!

I look up CLOsure and it says: the state of experiencing an emotional conclusion to a difficult life event such as the death of loved one.

Excuse me, she says, and runs into the kitchen but I can hear her blowing her nose and now I can hear Dad crying in the shower so I put my purple fleece over my head and close my eyes and plug my ears and with my elbows I squeeze my Dictionary tight against my chest.

Church might be helpful. Or seeing a counselor.

It’s wrong to shoot someone who is innocent and was never going to hurt you in the first place.