Sophie Simon Solves Them All by Lisa Graff

A Genius with a Problem
    Every morning as they walked to the bus stop, Sophie Simon and her parents had the same conversation.
    â€œHave fun at school today, lamb chop,” her mother would say, straightening out Sophie’s blouse.
    And Sophie would wrinkle her cute button nose at her mother and tell her, “School is not for fun. It’s for learning.”
    But that Friday morning, instead of simply patting Sophie on the head and nodding, Sophie’s parents did something that surprised her.
    â€œSnickerdoodle,” Sophie’s father replied, “your mother and I have been thinking. Perhaps today you might try to make some friends.”
    Sophie tugged at the straps of her backpack. “No, thank you,” she said. “I don’t need friends.”
    â€œBut, walnut,” Sophie’s mother said, taking hold of her hand as they crossed the street. “Don’t you even want one or two friends? All of the other children seem to have them.”
    â€œThat’s true,” said Sophie’s 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 parents’ 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 Sophie’s parents delighted.
    It did not.
    Aileen and Maxwell Simon worried that their daughter wasn’t “well-adjusted.”
    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 Sophie’s 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 neighbor’s grand piano, her parents rubbed their temples and complained that well-adjusted children played the kazoo.
    Sometimes Sophie wondered if maybe her parents weren’t 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 mother’s wavy hair, blond like straw. And she had her father’s blue eyes, and the same curvy earlobes. So she most definitely had not been switched at birth.
    Too bad.
    â€œGumdrop,” Sophie’s father said as they reached the bus stop. They were the first ones there, as usual. “Isn’t that nice boy from your class having a birthday party this Sunday?”
    â€œWhy, yes,” Sophie’s mother said. “That charming little boy we met at parents’ night. Owen Luu. The one who was afraid of paste. He seemed extremely well-adjusted.”
    Sophie rolled her eyes.
    If Owen Luu was well-adjusted, then she was the president of Finland.
    â€œThat’s the one,” Sophie’s father said. “An invitation for the party came in the mail last week. Wouldn’t you like to go, marshmallow? It’s going to be a ‘birthday pool-party extravaganza.’ There will be an eight-layer ice cream cake, a high-dive contest, and an old-fashioned taffy