Forget Me Not

When Calli finds her mom, she’s piling socks into moving boxes. She tells Calli to pack the kitchen rags, and Calli obeys silently. Calli notes that she won’t have time to say goodbye to her teachers, and she hides away to begin pulling at her hair as a response.

Though Calli’s hair is “the only thing / [she’s] ever liked about [herself]” (5), she still twists it around her fingers and pulls it out as a nervous habit. Her mom has threatened in the past that if she catches Calli pulling her hair out again, she’ll cut it off. Rather than stop pulling, Calli hides her habit as best as she can.

The deuteragonist is Jinsong, a seventh-grade boy who is student council president and preparing to try out for Little League along with his friends Nyle and Duncan. Jinsong is conflicted between his desire to earn a spot on the Little League team and his wish that there wasn’t only one spot for which he and his friends have to compete.

Calli wishes that she could live somewhere “long enough to make a best friend, / to keep a best friend” (7). Calli’s mom makes them move every time she breaks up with her current boyfriend, and she chooses the town based on how long a drive it takes for her to forget her past relationship.

Calli’s mom gives her cheese puffs for breakfast on their drive, but Calli doesn’t want cheese puffs. She wants to have a best friend.

Calli and her mom arrive in St. George, Utah, later that evening. Though the town is beautiful, “like someone took a paintbrush, / dipped it in a sunset” (10), Calli is angry and bitter about her mom moving their family.

Jinsong is sitting by a window in his family’s apartment when he first notices Calli. She climbs out of her mom’s car, “the afternoon sunlight [bouncing] off her hair like a pot of sparkling gold” (11), and Jinsong assumes from the boxes that she and her mom must be moving into the apartment complex. When she notices Jinsong staring at her, she smiles at him. Jinsong is stunned.

Once she arrives in her new apartment, it takes Calli seven minutes to unpack her belongings and blow up the air mattress that she uses as a bed.

Calli hears her mom crying in the other room, so she goes to comfort her. Her mom promises that one day she’ll find “someone who’s / handsome / and funny / and kind / and most of all / financially stable” (13).

As Calli and her mom finish unpacking, Calli realizes that her pear-scented shampoo bottle was open and spilled all over their towels. Calli’s mom goes to pick up dinner while Calli takes the towels down to the apartment laundry room to wash them.

Jinsong sees Calli walking down to the laundry house, and he quickly grabs some clothes to go wash as a cover for wanting to meet her. His little brother, Chonglin, tries to follow, but Jinsong successfully locks him out.

Calli notices that Jinsong keeps stealing glances at her while they wash clothes. The jerseys he’s washing remind her of her dad (the narrative later reveals that he has passed away).

Calli introduces herself to Jinsong, telling him that she lives in Number 14. Jinsong smiles at her with “eyes / the color of cinnamon” (17).

Jinsong notices that Calli smells like pears, his favorite fruit, and when he introduces himself, he stumbles over his words. Calli and Jinsong discover that they are both in seventh grade and will be going to the same school. As they talk, Jinsong notices that Calli keeps pursing her lips together in a pattern. He wonders if this means that she likes him. Calli has Tourette syndrome, and she is attempting to hide her tics.

Calli’s mom first noticed her “quirks” when she was four, and soon after, Calli was diagnosed with Tourette syndrome. Calli’s symptoms include eating her food in a particular order, chewing, pulling her hair, and worrying, in addition to vocal tics. Both Calli’s mom and her doctor have advised Calli to hide her tics to make friends.

On Sunday, Calli’s mom notices Calli pulling her hair out again, so she takes a pair of scissors and gives Calli a short haircut, right above her ears. Calli is upset because she thinks she looks like a boy, and her hair was her favorite feature.

Calli describes her cut hair as “pools of golden blood” on the floor (23).

Calli’s mom is grateful for Calli’s new short haircut because it will take less time for Calli to get ready in the morning, but, Calli notes, it is her mom who often makes them late, not her. Calli tries to comb her hair to hide her bald spot from her previous hair pulling, but it doesn’t work anymore.

When Jinsong arrives at school on Monday, several girls giggle at him as he passes through the commons, which he thinks is weird. He catches up with his friends Duncan and Nyle but doesn’t tell them about Calli. He wonders if she’s planning to start school that day.

Calli chooses to wear a dress that she thinks is “hideous” for her first day at school so that it might distract people from her tics. Her mom reminds her, once again, to not tell anyone about her Tourette syndrome. As Calli’s mom is running late for work, she drops Calli off at the office and leaves her to register herself. Her paperwork lists her name as Calliope Snow.

Calli blames the snow for her father’s death, so she feels like “it mocks [her] every time / someone says / [her] name” (28).

Calli tries to change her last name on her admission slip before arriving at her first class, but Dr. Khan, her teacher, waves her into the room before she can finish. Calli stands alone at the front of the room, and her tics start.

Calli is unable to hide her tics and starts making gestures and noises from where she stands at the front of the classroom.

Jinsong is in Dr. Khan’s class and is shocked by Calli’s new short hair and her clothes, which are so different from the t-shirt and jeans she was wearing when they met. When her tics start, Jinsong is confused, but when Duncan and Nyle call Calli “Freak Girl,” he pretends to not know who she is. Instead, he drops a pencil on the floor to avoid making eye contact with her.

When Dr. Khan asks for Calli’s name, she lies and says “Calli June.” She hopes that her dress is doing its job distracting everyone from her tics and her short hair. Dr. Khan welcomes her to the school.

Calli’s dad died when she was three, and she has decided to go by Calli June because “[l]ast names come from fathers / and mine / is gone” (33).

One of Calli’s few memories of her father is a day in June when they played outside together in the sprinkler, ate popsicles on the porch, caught toads in the yard, and he told her that he loved her.

Dr. Khan asks Calli to introduce herself, and she quietly tells the class that she’s from Salt Lake City. She hates introducing herself in front of the room but has had to do it each time she’s moved.

When Dr. Khan reads out Calli’s name, he mispronounces it and uses Snow rather than June. Calli corrects her last name but doesn’t correct his pronunciation of her first name, wondering if he was paying attention when she introduced herself a moment before. Dr. Khan asks everyone to adjust their seats so that Calli has a spot, alphabetically, and he reminds the class to save a seat for Beatriz, a girl who is absent. Calli would’ve preferred to sit near Jinsong or in the back, but she is stuck in the middle of the room.

Jinsong notices Calli sitting alone by the garbage cans at lunchtime. Instead of inviting her to sit with him and his friends, he lies and tells her that the garbage cans are infected and that she should sit with the popular girls. Jinsong hopes that if the popular girls take a liking to Calli, then it will be socially acceptable for him and Calli to be friends at school.

Calli is uncomfortable around the popular girls—Ivy, Hazel, and Gweneth—because they all dress and talk the same as each other but so differently from Calli. When the conversation turns to Calli, she calls it “an interrogation” (41).

The girls mock Calli’s dress and ask her why she made “a weird noise / this morning. It sounded like a frog” (42). As soon as the girls point out Calli’s vocal tic from earlier, she makes the sound again and the girls laugh at her. Calli decides that she will sit by herself by the trash cans for the foreseeable future.

Calli divides her tics into two categories: whispers and shouts. Sometimes, she can hold the whisper tics inside and not let them out, but at other times, she can’t keep them from happening—loudly.

In fifth-period art, Calli’s art teacher, Mrs. Ainsley, assigns the class a life-size self-portrait project based on a piece of art that Beatriz, the absent girl, brought from home. The portrait will be due April 1.

Calli compares herself to Beatriz, who has long brown hair, and decides that she doesn’t want to do the project. Calli sees herself as “[a] quiet / girl with too-short hair and a cringing face” and doesn’t want to do the project (47).

After school, Duncan and Jinsong go to Nyle’s house to practice baseball. Duncan and Nyle start making fun of Calli, then look to Jinsong to join in. Jinsong does join in and mock her tics, but on the inside, he feels sick to his stomach.

Calli walks home from school alone and worries that someone could kidnap her right off the street.

As Calli passes an orthodontist’s office, she picks up a piece of red sandstone to add to her rock collection, “in place number ten” (50).

Calli collects one rock from every place she’s lived and keeps them in a numbered egg carton. The red sandstone from St. George, Utah, will be number 10, but Calli hopes that she won’t be able to fill up the whole carton one day.

Jinsong watches Nyle and Duncan “see who can fit the most Cheerios on their armpit hair” and is reminded that his grandfather always told him to choose friends that were “better than himself” (52).

Calli’s mom works at a flower shop called Rosamelia’s, and Calli decides to walk to the shop rather than go straight home. When she arrives, her mom immediately tells her to move from her seat because her mom “needs the space” (54).

Calli’s mom asks Calli about her first day but interrupts her to tell her about a guy she met who came into the shop. Calli is immediately concerned that her mom has found a new boyfriend and that inevitably they will not live in this town for very long. Calli’s mom leaves her in the back of the shop to tend to customers.

While Calli’s mom works with the customers, Calli looks at the bouquet of perfect white roses that her mom was trimming and is reminded once again of snow. Then, she sees a red flower cast off to the side, forgotten. Calli gently picks it up and puts it in the vase with the other flowers saying, “There is a home for you” (58).

Calli’s mom returns to the back of the shop and scolds Calli for putting the poppy flower into the vase with the white roses. She tells Calli that poppies don’t belong with roses and takes the poppy out of the vase.

Jinsong’s mom sends him to the store to buy more ginger ale to help with her morning sickness. At the store, Jinsong sees Beatriz, who was absent from school that day, and they have a short, terse conversation. Beatriz and Jinsong’s dads had been roommates in school, and Beatriz and Jinsong grew up together. They have fallen out of touch in the past few months.

This poem is a list of the rocks in Calli’s collection, including a description of each rock and where it was found. She has added the red sandstone from the orthodontist’s office. The last two numbers, 11 and 12, are left blank.

Calli wakes up from a dream where she was a poppy flower being eaten alive by white roses with teeth.

The next morning, Calli and her mom are running late again, but before they leave, Calli rushes to page 27 of her astronomy book, where she pressed the poppy from the flower shop. She takes the poppy with her to school.

Calli hopes the poppy can be a symbol of courage in the same way that forget-me-nots signify remembrance and carnations signify gratitude.

Throughout the day, Jinsong hears many people mocking Calli for her tics, her clothes, and the sounds that she makes. He watches as other classmates cut in line for the water fountain in front of Calli repeatedly. It reminds him of the way he was teased in elementary school for his eyes.

Calli notices Jinsong staring at her a lot throughout the day. She decides to ask him to walk home with her that afternoon.

Calli reaches to twirl her hair, but it’s too short. She tries to satisfy the tic by pulling one strand of too-short hair, but it doesn’t work, and she yelps instead.

Calli has tried medication for her Tourette syndrome before, but it was expensive and made her sleepy, so she stopped taking it.

Jinsong goes to the lunchtime student council meeting, and the students are still talking about Calli. Beatriz, who is also the secretary, asks the students to give her more information about Calli so that she can make fun of her. Jinsong notes that Beatriz started making fun of people after her mother left her and that she often eats lunch alone in a teacher’s classroom. Jinsong tries to protect Calli by telling Beatriz not to pick on Calli because Calli knows karate (which is a lie).

Calli wanders around the library looking for a book and overhears two students talking about her. One student calls her “Cantaloupe” instead of Calliope and says, “Cantaloupe June / is a goon” (72).

Calli peers through a bookshelf to see who the two students are who have been mocking her. She doesn’t recognize one of the girls, but the other is Beatriz. Calli recognizes her from her self-portrait, though she thinks that Beatriz “looks a lot sadder / in real life” (73). Beatriz notices Calli staring at her and tells her to look up the word “goon” in the dictionary.

Calli looks up “goon” in the dictionary to see that it means “a stupid person” (75). Calli is upset and whispers, “I am not” (75).

After school, Calli walks up to Jinsong, who is with his friends, and asks him to walk home with her.

Jinsong is embarrassed by Calli’s question. Nyle and Duncan make fun of Calli, and then Nyle lies for Jinsong, telling Calli that Jinsong has a meeting after school, so he can’t walk home with her. Dejected, Calli begins walking home alone. Jinsong waits until Duncan and Nyle leave, then he runs to catch up with Calli.

As Calli walks home alone, she thinks about how the other kids all have places to go or people to hang with, but she has nowhere to be and no one waiting on her.

Calli sees a purple truck backing out of a driveway, and she is struck by an intrusive thought. She imagines herself being hit by the truck and bleeding out on the sidewalk.

Jinsong interrupts Calli’s intrusive thought. She asks him why he is running and reminds him of the meeting he was supposed to be in after school. Jinsong lies and says the meeting is over and he ran to catch up with her. Calli calls him a “really nice guy” (82).

Jinsong feels guilty that Calli thinks he’s a nice guy because he has lied to her several times and has been embarrassed of her at school. He introduces her to a neighbor, Mrs. Sumner, and then asks Calli about her clothes. Calli confides in him that she dresses in strange clothes to try to distract from her tics. Jinsong is fascinated by Calli and wants to hang out with her more, but his mom needs help preparing for the Chinese Moon Festival that night.

Calli eats her food in clockwise order around her plate. Even though the dry bread on her plate makes her cough, she can’t drink her water until its turn in the order. Calli’s mom tries to make her drink water out of order, but Calli refuses.

Calli’s mom tells her that she’s got a new boyfriend: the man who was in the shop the day before, Tom. Calli wishes that her mom could stay single “for two seconds,” and when Calli shows her disappointment at being left alone for the night, her mom “sticks out her lip” and complains (87). Calli’s mom tries to console Calli by reminding her that her favorite show is coming on that night, but Calli reminds her mom that the show is her mom’s favorite, not Calli’s.

Calli thinks that if her mom doesn’t go out with Tom, then her mom won’t break up with Tom and move their family again.

Calli gives her mom several excuses to try and get her to stay at home, but her mom decides to go out anyway. When Calli’s tics show up, Calli’s mom just asks her to hide them when Tom arrives.

Jinsong hopes that Calli won’t tell anyone at school that they are friends, but he also wonders if he will see her again at the laundry room that night. Jinsong is torn between wanting to spend time with Calli and not wanting to be mocked at school.

It is Friday night, which reminds Calli of the night that her dad died. He was driving home from the airport after a work trip and fell asleep at the wheel during a snowstorm.

Tom arrives at Calli’s apartment. Tom is tall and nice, but Calli wonders how long the relationship will last.

Calli is watching a show when there is a knock at the door. The sound triggers her intrusive thoughts, and she imagines a police officer coming to tell her that her mom has been hurt. However, it is Jinsong at the door, inviting her to his house. This is the night of the Chinese Moon Festival, and Calli’s mom let Jinsong’s mom know that Calli would be home alone. Calli is excited to go to something related to the moon and leaves with Jinsong.

When Calli opens the door, she sees Jinsong and refers to him as her friend for the first time.

Calli compares Jinsong’s apartment to her own. His apartment is warm and cozy, filled with the smells of home-cooked food, whereas hers is cold and impersonal. There are paper lanterns decorating the whole space.

Jinsong introduces Calli to his family and then the two of them take a plate of mooncakes up to the balcony. Jinsong notices that Calli has a tic—she “punches her chest and turns to the side real quick” (98)—and she seems embarrassed. Jinsong accidentally tells Calli that he thinks she’s beautiful, but then he tries to cover it up by saying that he was talking about the moon. Jinsong realizes that he likes Calli.

Calli talks with Jinsong about baseball, but she changes the subject when he starts to ask questions about her dad.

Calli changes the subject by telling Jinsong a fact about the moon. Jinsong is interested in Calli’s moon facts, and Calli tries to hold in her tics while they talk.

Calli can’t keep her tics from happening, but Jinsong doesn’t look away from her face. Instead of turning away, “he keeps on looking [...] smiling with his / cinnamon eyes” (102).

Calli is overwhelmed with happiness because of her friendship with Jinsong. She imagines spending every day with him, enjoying his company.

Jinsong and Calli sit silently on the balcony for a few minutes, then Jinsong decides that he wants to share something with Calli, since she shared moon facts with him. He tells her that people write riddles on paper lanterns. He takes a paper lantern and tells Calli that he’ll write her a riddle, and if she guesses correctly, he’ll give her a prize. Jinsong thinks that his first two clues are obvious, but Calli doesn’t get them. His final clue is “Jinsong likes me” (105). He is nervous, but certain that she’ll guess that the answer to the riddle is her.

Calli is almost certain that Jinsong is talking about liking her, but she’s so nervous that instead she blurts out, “Mooncakes!” (106).

Calli knows that she guessed wrong because she sees Jinsong’s face fall, but she moves on to talking about careers. She thinks that she’ll be a florist, like her mom. Jinsong thinks that he’ll be a baseball player.

Calli’s mom tells her that the date went great. Calli now thinks that she needs to keep her mom and Tom together forever so that she doesn’t have to move away from Jinsong.

Jinsong is grateful that Calli didn’t guess the riddle because he is afraid of what people at school would say about him liking Calli.

It has been one week since Calli’s mom cut her hair, and already her mom is trimming it. Her mom seems pleased that Calli hasn’t been able to pull her short hair. Calli doesn’t want short hair but is too afraid to speak up. Instead, she sits quietly while her mom trims the ends.

On Monday morning at school, Calli is daydreaming about her evening with Jinsong when she starts to feel a prickling and tingling in her legs. She swings her legs back and forth, but Beatriz tells her to stop. Calli thinks that if Beatriz could feel what she feels, then she wouldn’t be so quick to judge.

Beatriz warns Calli that if she continues with her “weird” behavior, she may not get a friendship locket from the popular girls. Calli points out that Beatriz doesn’t have one either.

Dr. Khan tells Beatriz and Calli to be quiet and return to their reading.

Jinsong sees Calli taking the poppy in and out of her pocket, and he wants to ask her about it without anyone noticing. He pretends to go to the trash can to throw something away but trips on Calli’s bag and grabs her arm, causing her to yelp. Dr. Khan tells Jinsong to stay after class.

Dr. Khan calls Calli to his desk and Calli worries that she’s in trouble.

Dr. Khan asks Calli if she’s okay, but Calli doesn’t want to tell him about her Tourette syndrome, so she lies and tells him that everything is fine.

After class, Dr. Khan scolds Jinsong for disrupting class because as student body council president, Jinsong is supposed to set an example for the other students.

When her teacher says the word “precipitation” in science class, Calli must sound it out in her head, and then she has to say it out loud. She ends up shouting the word in class.

Calli works with a small group in science class, and every time she hears the word “precipitation,” she has to say it out loud. Beatriz notices that Calli is doing this.

Beatriz starts repeating “precipitation” repeatedly so that Calli must keep repeating the word. After a while, Beatriz asks Calli, “Are you sure your name isn’t / Copycat?” (122). The whole group laughs at Calli.

Soon, the whole class is mocking Calli by repeating the word “precipitation,” and Calli notices that Jinsong and the teacher aren’t doing anything to stop it from happening. Jinsong won’t even look at Calli.

Jinsong hates that the class is teasing Calli, but he doesn’t want to lose his friendship with Duncan and Nyle. He hopes that the teasing will stop, but it never does, and he stays silent.