You Go First

Charlotte gets up before her mom and leaves a note saying she went to school with Bridget early. She walks to the train station to catch the train to Philadelphia and worries someone is going to bust her for skipping school. However, nobody seems to notice her. She gets on the train and pays the conductor for her ticket. She keeps thinking her mom will appear behind her, but she doesn’t.

Ben is extremely nervous before his speech and retreats into the school bathroom to prepare. He gives himself a pep talk in the mirror and reminds himself that even if he doesn’t win the election, he can still give a good speech and inspire positive change in both himself and the school. Some boys come in and make fun of his suit, so he leaves.

Charlotte gets off the train and catches a cab to the museum. Like the people on the train, the cab driver doesn’t treat her with suspicion or call the police on her for skipping school. Charlotte imagines she is Lottie Lock, the type of person who skips school and takes cabs to museums, but she knows this is false and Charlotte Lockard doesn’t belong in this “picture.”

Ben doesn’t get to give his speech. That morning, he noticed some of his campaign posters were ripped in half, but that didn’t discourage him. Now, he’s discouraged because he’s in the attendance office with his suit in a plastic bag, wearing some oversized gym clothes from the lost and found bin. Ben’s mom is coming to pick him up. Mrs. Carlile asks if Ben needs anything but he ignores her because he just wants to disappear, which is a strange feeling he hasn’t experienced before. Ben’s mom arrives, and Mrs. Carlile leads her and Ben to the principal’s office.

Charlotte’s dad always says art is supposed to make people feel things. However, when Charlotte looks at the Gaugin and Van Gogh paintings, they just look like paintings and don’t make her feel anything. She wishes she paid more attention to her dad’s art talks. She also wishes they played Scrabble more and that she visited him in his hospital room.

Theo, a kid named Derrick from Ben’s English class, and a kid named David threw firecrackers at Ben right as he was starting his speech in front of the school. This scared a lot of kids because the firecrackers sounded like gunshots. A teacher noticed Ben was wetting his pants, so she tried to block him from everyone else’s view and announced that the speeches were canceled. The principal says that most likely, nobody noticed Ben wet his pants. Ben thinks this isn’t true, but he doesn’t want to speak, so he thinks about other topics like what type of wood the principal’s desk might be made from.

Ben’s phone, which is in the plastic bag with his pants, buzzes. Mrs. Carlile finds it and says it’s a phone number from Pennsylvania. Ben worries he’ll get in trouble because kids aren’t supposed to bring cell phones to school, and if they do bring them, they’re supposed to turn them off. Ben never turns his off because nobody ever calls him during school. A text message says there’s an emergency. Ben’s mom asks if Ben knows anybody from Pennsylvania, and he confirms that he does, then answers the phone call.

Charlotte circles the museum to look at famous artworks by Gaugin, Degas, and Van Gogh, but she keeps returning to Van Gogh’s sunflower paintings, hoping to feel something. She steps too close to a painting and gets lectured by a security guard. He notes that she keeps returning to these paintings, and she says she’s trying to see what the big deal is but they just look like sunflowers to her. The guard says some people simply see things the way they are, but that’s okay.

Charlotte’s mom suddenly appears in the gallery, walking very fast and crying. Charlotte assumes her dad is dead, but he’s not; he’s been moved out of the ICU into a regular hospital room. Charlotte’s mom went to her school to try to pick her up to visit her dad, but she wasn’t there. Charlotte’s mom looked at her phone records and found Ben’s number, who told her that she planned to visit the art museum. Charlotte and her mom leave to visit her dad.

At home, Ben wakes up from a nap. His dad comes to talk to him and shares a Robert Frost quote: “In three words I can sum up everything I know about life: It goes on” (264). Ben’s dad explains that sometimes, bad things happen to good people because of other people’s actions. It’s not fair, but it’s part of life. Resilience and intelligence are qualities that will help Ben despite the unfairness of life’s setbacks. Ben doesn’t want to talk; he just wants to go back to sleep or become somebody else. His dad asks who Charlotte is, and he says she’s the one he’ll call if he wins the lottery.

Charlotte’s father’s room is quiet and smells like flowers because his friends and former coworkers sent them. This surprises Charlotte. Her dad is sleeping, but he doesn’t look sick. He wakes up, and she shows him a cool leaf she found; he says it’s Eastern hemlock, and she worries because hemlock is what killed Socrates. However, Eastern hemlock is not poisonous because it’s different from the type Socrates used. Charlotte’s dad asks how the starfish dissection went, and she confesses that she skipped school to go to the art museum instead. Her dad thinks this is hilarious. She confesses that she didn’t get what the big deal was with the paintings, and he says she reminds him of her mom.

Ben helps his dad move into the new apartment. He’s excited to have a second bedroom, even though his parents are getting divorced. He looks forward to getting a new mattress and decorating his new room in a different way from his room at his mom’s house. He’s also excited about the apartment complex’s swimming pool.

Ben looks out the window and sees Wyatt walking outside. Wyatt lives in this apartment complex, and Ben tells him that he lives here on the weekends with his dad. Wyatt apologizes to Ben about Theo and the others ruining his speech. At least the other boys got in huge trouble, so there’s some justice. Wyatt and Ben trade some logical questions, and then Wyatt says he’s going to Sonic to get food. Ben has never been to Sonic, and Wyatt invites him to come along. Ben gets some money from his dad and joins Wyatt outside.

Charlotte is in her backyard when Bridget calls to ask how her dad is; she says he’s getting better and will come home soon. Bridget is going to a movie with Sophie and invites Charlotte to come along, but Charlotte declines. Magda comes outside, and Charlotte apologizes for bailing as her lab partner. Magda doesn’t mind because she got paired with another girl who didn’t want to make any cuts, so Magda got to do the whole thing herself.

Magda gives Charlotte something that she found in her yard and thinks she may like: Sphinx, Charlotte’s lucky piece of Egyptian quartz. Charlotte thanks Magda for returning it. She invites Magda inside to play Scrabble, and she accepts. Charlotte feels better and lets Magda go first.