El Doesn't Understand Her Friends Sometimes.

El doesn't understand her friends sometimes.

It's to be expected she supposes, growing up in a lab there's sure to be things you don't understand about the real world.

There's things like the war of the stars and the ghost catching car that are stories her friends like. There's things like mouth breathers and bullies and jocks she thinks are a lot like papa. There's things like maths class and school projects and all the things her friends understand so easily.

Her friends are never mean about it, they show her the movies she's missed, they stand up for her against bullies and they explain their maths homework like it's fun and easy which makes her smile.

The biggest thing she doesn't understand is why her friends are mean to Steve about the same things. Steve called the funny little green man Yoba and Lucas laughed at him for two weeks. Steve was watching the sport game on tv and Mike called him a dumb jock, but Steve is nothing like papa. Steve gave Dustin the wrong change and yelled at Steve for not knowing how to count.

El doesn't understand her friends. Don't they know it was hard for Steve too. He didn't grow up in a lab but at least El had siblings growing up, Steve was all alone in that big house he has. Steve didn't have a Papa but once Steve's dad came home and they weren't allowed to see him for a week, El checked on him, Steve's dad yells a lot. Steve got to go to school, but El knows he has trouble reading the big books sometimes.

El tries to tell her friends this, but they say it's different for Steve, and that Steve doesn't mind them teasing him. El doesn't like the word teasing, Angela would tell her teachers the same word. So El helps Steve. She brings Steve over to the cabin to watch the war of the stars together, they giggle at the teddy bears. El asks Steve to teach her how to throw a basketball, she thinks jocks can be nice. El asks Steve for help with her homework, Steve's really good at dioramas. They read the big books together, el shows him how she learnt to sound out the big words, Steve smiles.

El doesn't always understand her friends, but she now she understands Steve a lot more.