As days passed, Leo avoided Stargirl. He was not only avoiding her, he was avoiding deciding whether she was more important to him than the other students were. One day she confronted him with the question of whether they were breaking up. He told her that something had to change. He asked if it bothered her that people didn't talk to her. She answered with a listing of everyone who did talk to her. She would not come straight out and tell him what he wanted to know. Leo told her how he felt. He said that what other people thought did matter to him. He mentioned Kovac, the basketball player with the broken ankle. He desperately wanted to know why she did what she did when it wasn't necessary. They both had trouble stating their side in a way that the other understood. The conversation ended when they hugged and walked home together.
Over the next days Leo tried to explain people to Stargirl. It was difficult.
Every answer prompted a question. Leo talked about them to keep the
discussions off of himself. He did not want her to know how important
to him it was that they be accepted and that the shunning stop.
Stargirl acted on instinct at the Sun Valley basketball game. She reacted
to what she felt. She felt Kovac's pain and wanted to ease it.
Stargirl reinvented herself. The first day that the new Stargirl went to school Leo did not recognize her, not even when he looked right at her. When finally he recognized her, he called her by name and she told him that her name was Susan. Leo was thrilled with the change. She now resembled all the other girls at Mica Area High School.
They were like everyone else. It was perfect.
When Stargirl, now using the name Susan, ordered anchovies on her half of a pizza, Leo teased that nobody liked anchovies. She removed the anchovies because she did not want to be like nobody.
Susan invented a fictitious person who she called Evelyn Everybody. She quizzed Leo on what he thought Evelyn would do or say in particular situations.
At first Leo did not notice that the shunning continued. One day Susan mentioned that the others still did not like her. It made her sad. Leo discovered that there were just two stones in the happy wagon in her room.
One day, Leo saw Susan sitting on a bench with a back scratcher in one hand and a sign hanging from her neck that said Talk to me and I will scratch your back. He managed to get away unnoticed. Later that day, when he saw her the sign was gone. Neither of them mentioned it.
After going to her enchanted place, Susan felt better. She had visualized
winning the oratorical contest thereby bringing honor to her school, and
returning to school a hero. She was so sure that winning would bring an
end to the shunning that Leo believed it too.
Dressing like everyone else was like wearing a costume. Acting like everyone
else was like playing a part. This was not the real Stargirl.
Clapsaddle, Diane. "TheBestNotes on A Long Way Gone".
TheBestNotes.com.
>.