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asked me about it,” she answered, putting the lightsaber back. “I was going to wait until this afternoon to tell you.”
    “Why? I’m not a baby, Lisa,” I answered. “I mean, sure, I love Daisy, but it’s not like she was my dog. It’s not like I see her anymore.”
    “I thought you’d be really upset,” she answered.
    “I am!” I said. “I’m just not, like, going to start crying or anything.”
    “Okay,” she answered, nodding and looking at me.
    “What?” I said impatiently.
    “Nothing,” she answered. “You’re right, you’re not a baby.” She looked at the plastic star that was still stuck on her thumb and then, without saying anything else, leaned down and stuck it on my forehead. “You should call Auggie this afternoon, by the way.”
    “Why?” I asked.
    “Why?” She raised her eyebrows. “To tell him how sorry you are about Daisy. To pay your condolences. Because he’s your best friend.”
    “Oh, right,” I mumbled, nodding.
    “Oh, right,” she repeated.
    “Okay, Lisa. I get it!” I said.
    “Grumpity grump grump,” she said on her way out. “You have three minutes, Chris. Then you’ve got to get up. I’ll turn on the shower for you.”
    “Close the door behind you!” I called out after her.
    “Please!” she yelled from the hallway.
    “Close the door behind you, PLEASE!” I groaned.
    She slammed the door shut.
    She could be so annoying sometimes!
    I picked the star off my forehead and looked at it. Mom had put those stars on the ceiling when we first moved in. That was back when she was trying to do everything she could to get me to like our new house in Bridgeport. She had even promised that we would get a dog after we got settled in. But we never got a dog. We got a hamster. But that’s hardly a dog. That’s not even one quarter of a dog. A hamster is basically just a warm potato with fur. I mean, it moves and it’s cute and all, but don’t let anyone try to fool you that it’s the same as a dog. I called my hamster Luke. But she’s no Daisy.
    Poor Daisy! It was hard to believe she was gone.
    But I didn’t want to think about her now.
    I started thinking of all the things I had to do this afternoon. Band practice right after school. Study for the math test tomorrow. Start my book report for Friday. Play some
Halo.
Maybe catch up on
The Amazing Race
tonight.
    I flicked the plastic star in the air and watched it spin across the room. It landed on the edge of my rug by the door.
    Lots of stuff to do. It was going to be a long day.
    But even as I was ticking off all the things I had to do today, I knew calling Auggie wasn’t going to be one of them.

Friendships
    I don’t remember exactly when Zack and Alex stopped hanging out with me and Auggie. I think it was about the time we started kindergarten.
    Before that, we all used to see each other almost every day. Our moms would usually bring us over to Auggie’s house, since there were a lot of times when he couldn’t go out because he was sick. Not a contagious kind of sick or anything, but the kind where he couldn’t go outside. But we liked going to his house. His parents had turned their basement into a giant playroom. So, basically, it was like a toy store down there. Board games, train sets, air hockey and foosball tables, even a mini trampoline in the back. Zack and Alex and Auggie and I would literally spend hours running around down there, having all-day lightsaber duels and hop ball races. We would have balloon wars. We would pile cardboard bricks into giant mountains and play avalanche. Our moms called us the Four Musketeers, since we did everything together. And even after all the moms—except Isabel—went back to work, our babysitters got us together every day. They would take us on day trips to the Bronx Zoo, or to see the pirate ships at the South Street Seaport. We’d have picnics in the park. We even went all the way down to Coney Island a few times.
    But once we started kindergarten, Zack