The Things We Miss

Recommended by Laure

JP is having a tough year: she misses her dead dad, girls at school make fun of her weight, and Pop Pop's cancer is back. When JP discovers a portal in the backyard treehouse that allows her to skip forward three days in time, she does it...again, and again, and again. A version of JP has to live those days, but she doesn't have the memory of it. But JP's friend Kevin becomes resentful that JP doesn't remember their conversations and jokes and homework, and after "skipping" some big events she wished she hadn't, JP finally decides to stop using the treehouse, apologize to Kevin, and come clean with possible new friend Jessi as well.

Seventh grade is no one's best year, but living through it, as Calvin's dad would show more say, builds character.

Quotes

"Everyone has to learn how to do everything at some point. You don't get extra points for learning early." (Pop Pop to JP, 56)

"It's like...an escape hatch." (JP to Kevin, 66)

I was eating my cereal and thinking about how cancer was just like termites - it hid and ate at your foundations, and you could only hope you found it before the entire house collapsed... (83)

The treehouse door was magic. I mean, of course it was magic; it was a time machine. But this was magic too, this ability to just skip the pain. (91)

"The little things are important. If you ignore too many little things, they pile up and suddenly you've got one big mess and--Never mind." (Kevin to JP, 143)

I didn't realize you could overstay your welcome in a friendship. (148)

Those were memories I desperately wanted, and I'd skipped them. (162)

"Half of friendship is just being there. And you're not there." (Kevin to JP, 165)

"We only change when people, or life, force us to change." (Jessi to JP, 191)

I wanted it to stop. I wanted it to be over. I wanted to pull on my escape hatch as many times as it took to be past this. (215)

It would be so unspeakably unfair to skip this pain. (215)

There's magic in creating a memory with another person. We take these shared moments and we split them in half for safekeeping - one half to me, one half to you. And there's magic in fitting those halves back together, in reliving the moment together... (224)

...I believe...that the true miracle and beauty in life comes from living it....I'll tell you the secret: no one has it figured out. The joy comes from figuring it out. (230)

"All relationships are a choice. You have to choose to be someone's friend. Not once, but over and over and over again." (Mrs. Takagi, 236) show less