The Losers Club: Chapters 1–12

From across the art room, Alec had looked like he was hunched over his paper, hard at work. But when Ms. Boden got closer, she had discovered that Alec was hunched over a book, reading—something that had happened many, many times in past years.

Kent was also in Alec’s first-period art class, so him showing up like this? It wasn’t a coincidence.

“Good. I have told all your teachers to watch you closely, and if they see you reading in class or not paying attention, they are to send you directly to me. I’m also sending a registered letter to your parents, explaining how serious this has become. And after we see your behavior report and your grades for the first term, we’ll take any further steps that are needed.”

In math, Mrs. Seward had given a speech about “the Future”—about how mathematics was the foundation for so many different careers.

The food lines seemed longer and slower, and he barely had time to gobble a plate of spaghetti and guzzle some milk before the bell rang.

Then he had to check his schedule and rush to the far end of the building for social studies—he’d heard that Mrs. Henley was super strict about tardiness.

But by the time he got back to his homeroom at the end of the day, all the excitement had drained away. Alec felt frazzled and dazed, and he knew what he needed.

Operating on full autopilot, Alec heaved his book bag onto one shoulder and lurched along through the halls and out the front doors, all the way to his regular spot in the bus lines.

For a nerdy third grader, Luke was getting pretty good at sarcasm.

A dangly bracelet hung from the wrist of the same hand that had rings on it, and Alec couldn’t help noticing that her fingers were long and thin, finished off with bright red nail polish—which immediately made him remember the warden in the book Holes, the lady who ran a boys’ prison camp out in the desert.

His mom craned her neck until she could see Luke and Alec in the rearview mirror.

They had all the small action figures, at least two of each; X-wing fighters in all different sizes; two each of all the Star Wars Lego sets, one for playing with and one unopened; six different lightsabers; seven or eight board games; the huge Death Star space station; an Imperial starship; the Millennium Falcon—the stuff went on and on.

They even had a restored Star Wars arcade game from the 1980s wedged into a corner of the family room.

He imagined Kent’s mocking voice again: Bookworm!

It was like Kent had just given him the answer to his problem—because he didn’t need to convince some so-called friend to help him start this new club.

“Nope, I’m doing origami. I joined something the first day to get it over with.”
“Okay,” he said slowly, “but have you met Mrs. Case? She’s all about the rules, and very soon she’s going to notice that you’re not folding any paper, and she’s not going to let you sit there..."

She looked at him scornfully.

Mr. Willner was walking from table to table, placing each sign where it belonged. The placards looked good—Alec had noticed how clear the lettering was on the very first day, and he wondered if Mr. Willner had taken a class to learn how to write that way.

The resentment Alec had felt about being called a bookworm for the five hundredth time?

Plus, Kent was entitled to his own likes and dislikes, right?

His hands were cold and clammy.

“I wasn’t sure they’d really let us start a club with that name,” she said, nodding at the sign, “on account of how it sounds.”

It was Kent, smirking.

Again, Alec felt like he could probably score some points against Kent, could probably make Nina think that the guy wasn’t much of a reader, talk about how he mostly obsessed about sports, maybe even tell her what he’d said about joining the club....

Alec’s first thought was Oh, great—someone who can't even fold paper, a genuine loser, here to join my club!