Stargirl

“Did you see her?” 

The whisper that goes around Mica High on the first day of school reveals the students’ fascination with the new student—Stargirl. It also reveals their unity. They unanimously define her as someone different from them. Stargirl is a curiosity before Leo even lays eyes on her. 

“I had to admit, the more I saw of her, the easier it was to believe she was a plant, a joke, anything but real.” 

Stargirl’s appearance and behavior are so far outside Leo’s box that he and the rest of the student body have trouble believing she is genuine. This foreshadows the othering directed at Stargirl later in the book. It is easier for the students to view her as something less than a real human than to engage with how she exposes the student body’s total conformity and groupthink.

“So I turned from her.”

Even before their relationship, Leo is both fascinated by Stargirl and terrified of being singled out by her. This quote shows Leo’s shyness and his fear of being embarrassed in front of the rest of his peers. It reveals early on his dependence on the group. Leo turns away from Stargirl literally, in this instance, and later figuratively when she stops trying to be the normal girlfriend he wants.