The kids closest to him glanced up and examined Héctor head to toe. Then, a Black kid on the end, thick-framed glasses on his face, nudged the brown-skinned girl in a hijab next to him. They scooted over, and Héctor decided to take a chance. Where else was he gonna sit?

He plopped his tray down. “Hi,” he said. “Héctor.”

The boy with the glasses smiled at him. “Jackson,” he said. “Well, my first name is Jeremy, but I go by Jackson.” Then he pointed across the table. “That’s Carmen.”

Carmen waved. She was brown, slightly lighter in complexion than Héctor’s deep brown, and he really liked how she did her makeup, with sharp eyeliner and red lip gloss.

“That’s Taylor.”

Taylor was abnormally tall and had dirty blond hair, and he looked just like a surfer, down to his sunburned white face. He flashed Héctor a peace sign.

“I’m Aishah,” announced the girl in the hijab. “Welcome to the Table of Misfits.”

Héctor laughed at first, then saw no one else was laughing. “Oh. You’re serious.”

“We are,” said Jackson. “And not just because of him.” He gestured with his head to the far end of the table.

“What’s that kid’s deal?” asked Héctor.

“That’s Pat,” explained Carmen. “He doesn’t want to be friends with anyone.”

Héctor let loose a chuckle, but cut it short when, once again, he was the only one reacting that way. “Oh. Really?”

Aishah nodded. “He literally announced it during lunch on the first day of school. He stood up on the table and just yelled at all of us.”

“Said that we were all beneath him and that none of us were worth the time,” Jackson added.

“Wow,” said Héctor. “So, this is his table, then. Table of Misfits.”

“Well, also, none of us fit in anywhere else, bro,” said Taylor. His drawl was absolutely that of a surfer. “Like, I don’t know if you know this about me, since you’re new and all, but, like . . . I surf, bro.”

“Really?” Héctor said, his voice shaking as he struggled to keep a smile off his face. “I couldn’t tell.”

“Totally,” said Taylor. “And I don’t know if you know this, either, but there’s no ocean here in Orangevale.”

Héctor glanced over at Carmen, who had her face in her hands and was shaking her head.

“Yeah, right, of course,” said Héctor. “We’re so far inland.”

Taylor’s mouth dropped open. “Bro. We are.”

There was silence at the table as all of them stared at Taylor. He is . . . a special person, thought Héctor.

“Anyway,” said Aishah, “Taylor isn’t wrong. I’m the Black Muslim girl into art, and all the art kids think I’m pretentious.”