A Genius with a Problem
Every morning as they walked to the bus stop, Sophie Simon and her parents had the same conversation.
âHave fun at school today, lamb chop,â her mother would say, straightening out Sophieâs blouse.
And Sophie would wrinkle her cute button nose at her mother and tell her, âSchool is not for fun. Itâs for learning.â
But that Friday morning, instead of simply patting Sophie on the head and nodding, Sophieâs parents did something that surprised her.
âSnickerdoodle,â Sophieâs father replied, âyour mother and I have been thinking. Perhaps today you might try to make some friends.â
Sophie tugged at the straps of her backpack. âNo, thank you,â she said. âI donât need friends.â
âBut, walnut,â Sophieâs mother said, taking hold of her hand as they crossed the street. âDonât you even want one or two friends? All of the other children seem to have them.â
âThatâs true,â said Sophieâs father.
Sophie scowled at her parents.
She was not like other children.
Sophie Simon was a genius .
By the time Sophie Simon was two, she could recite the alphabet backwards and forwards. The Russian alphabet.
By the time she was four, Sophie had dismantled her parentsâ broken toaster and turned it into a working radio.
And at the age of seven, Sophie had successfully performed open-heart surgery on an earthworm in the front yard.
Since earthworms have five hearts each, this was a pretty difficult task.
You would think that having a genius for a daughter would have made Sophieâs parents delighted.
It did not.
Aileen and Maxwell Simon worried that their daughter wasnât âwell-adjusted.â
They were always quoting the famed child expert Doctor Wanda, who told parents on her TV show that the worst thing they could do was push their children to grow up too quickly.
To Sophieâs parents, growing up too quickly meant doing anything Sophie found interesting.
If Sophie crafted a working robot out of toothpicks and rubber bands, her parents sighed and told her that well-adjusted children made birdhouses.
If Sophie taught herself to speak Japanese from a textbook, her parents shook their heads and said that well-adjusted children spoke pig Latin.
And if Sophie composed her own concerto on the neighborâs grand piano, her parents rubbed their temples and complained that well-adjusted children played the kazoo.
Sometimes Sophie wondered if maybe her parents werenât really her parents. Maybe, Sophie thought, she had been switched with another baby in the hospital. A well-adjusted baby. Maybe her real parents were out in the world somewhere right now, wondering why their daughter wanted to play with dolls instead of encyclopedias.
But really, Sophie knew that the people who walked her to the bus stop every morning were her real parents. Because Sophie had her motherâs wavy hair, blond like straw. And she had her fatherâs blue eyes, and the same curvy earlobes. So she most definitely had not been switched at birth.
Too bad.
âGumdrop,â Sophieâs father said as they reached the bus stop. They were the first ones there, as usual. âIsnât that nice boy from your class having a birthday party this Sunday?â
âWhy, yes,â Sophieâs mother said. âThat charming little boy we met at parentsâ night. Owen Luu. The one who was afraid of paste. He seemed extremely well-adjusted.â
Sophie rolled her eyes.
If Owen Luu was well-adjusted, then she was the president of Finland.
âThatâs the one,â Sophieâs father said. âAn invitation for the party came in the mail last week. Wouldnât you like to go, marshmallow? Itâs going to be a âbirthday pool-party extravaganza.â There will be an eight-layer ice cream cake, a high-dive contest, and an old-fashioned taffy