101 pages • 3 hours read
Sharon M. DraperOut of My Mind
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2010A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapters 31-33Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 31 Summary
Melody’s parents go to the hospital with Penny. Mrs. V helps Melody get out of the car. She puts Penny’s toy Doodle on Melody’s tray, having found it on the ground outside. Melody touches the toy and begins to cry. Mrs. V determines to put the toy in the laundry, so it is nice and clean when Penny comes home. Melody is not convinced things will work out that way.
Mrs. V tells Melody that what happened was not her fault, but Melody angrily disagrees with her. She was in a bad mood, she was angry with her sister, and she insisted that her mother take her to school. If she hadn’t done that, Penny wouldn’t be hurt. Mrs. V tries to reassure Melody that “Toddlers are very resilient, you know” (279), but Melody is worried that her sister hit her head and that she will be “messed up” (279) just like her.
When Melody tells Mrs. V that she should have been the one to be injured, Mrs. V turns on her ,saying, “My whole world would fall apart if something happened to you. Your parents’ as well” (280). When Melody tells Mrs. V that she wants to be like other kids, she points out that Melody isn’t like other kids because she isn’t “mean and fake and thoughtless” (281). Mrs. V emphasizes that being normal is boring, and people love Melody because she isn’t normal.
The phone rings, and Mrs. V takes the message, then hangs up crying. Melody fears that her sister is dead, but the news is good: she has internal injuries and a broken leg, but she will live. Then Mrs. V cries some more.
Chapter 32 Summary
The situation at the Brooks’s house is chaotic for a few days. Mrs. V steps in to help, as Mrs. Brooks has been at the hospital with Penny since the accident. Melody wonders if her mother is still angry with her.
Mr. Brooks, short on sleep and heavy on stress, is dropping items all over the house, forgets what he wants to say, and is unshaven. Mrs. V offers to get Melody on the bus so he can shower and get some rest. Melody asks Mrs. V more questions about Penny. She is afraid her sister will have to be in a wheelchair, but Penny is awake and in a cast. Most importantly to Melody, Penny didn’t strike her head on the ground, and so she is whole.
At school, Melody prepares to face her former teammates. In the room with the other special needs students, she looks around and admits, “I don’t even know where I belong anymore” (286). Catherine comes in and gets teary-eyed after Melody gives her the thank you card. She asks Melody how Penny is doing, and then surprises Melody by pointing out that she saved Penny’s life. Melody is confused, but Catherine points out that Melody’s antics caused Mrs. Brooks to back slowly out the driveway, thereby minimizing the damage to Penny.
Mrs. Shannon comes up to see how Melody is faring and asks Melody if she plans to go to her inclusion classes. Melody says yes because she had “decided [she] wasn’t going to hide” (288). The first class is Mr. Dimming’s history course; the room goes uncomfortably quiet as Melody enters. She notices the small trophy on the teacher’s desk.
When no one says anything to her, Melody decides to address the situation directly and types out on her computer, “Why did you leave me?” (288). For a few minutes, nobody speaks. Then Rose gets up to explain what happened. She tells Melody they did not mean to leave her behind, but when Melody asks why she wasn’t invited to breakfast with the rest of the team, Rose goes silent. Claire responds that they thought they’d be slowed down because Melody would have to be spoon-fed her meal. Melody points out that Claire threw up at the dinner, but she wasn’t left behind. Worst of all, Claire was the person chosen to take Melody’s place in the competition.
Rose then says that they all got to the airport early and found out about the canceled flight. The earlier flight was almost ready to leave, so they rushed to check their bags and board. Melody asks, “Nobody thought about me?” (290). Elena responds that she did, and she reminded Mr. Dimming that Melody was missing. The teacher said he was so busy trying to get everyone on board that he asked someone to call Melody’s house. Rose had the Brooks’s number; Melody looks sadly at her as she admits that she meant to call, but after seeing her teammates shake their heads “no,” she didn’t call.
Mr. Dimming apologizes, Rose bursts into tears, and Molly tells Melody that a reporter from the Washington Post came to interview them but left when he realized Melody wasn’t there. To make up for what they did, Connor brings the trophy to Melody and offers it to her. She looks at the trophy and realizes it is painted and made of cheap plastic and metal. Melody begins to laugh at the pitiful little trophy, then swipes it off her tray and to the floor; it breaks into pieces. She is unsure whether the action is intentional or not.
Melody tells the class she doesn’t want the trophy, “You deserve it!” (292). Then she powers on her wheelchair and rolls out of the room.
Chapter 33 Summary
Melody reflects on how her worries—fifth-grade homework, peer pressures, clothes, body odor, boys—are not so different from everyone else’s problems after all. She compares her life to having a puzzle but not having the box with the picture as a guide.
Penny comes home from the hospital, and Melody is glad her sister is being spoiled. Even the dog brings her toys into Penny’s room. Melody is working on Miss Gordon’s autobiography project while classical music is playing in the background. She knows that the project will take a long time, but she has to start somewhere, so she begins with words, specifically the words she starts Chapter 1 with, bringing Melody’s story full circle.
Chapters 31-33 Analysis
Melody’s reaction to Penny’s accident is to blame herself. She worries that the accident will handicap Penny, and she’ll have to suffer the same way Melody has. This section of the novel again reveals Melody’s self-consciousness. Rather than accepting herself as she is, Melody believes that there’s something “wrong” with her and doesn’t wish her disability on anyone else. Her mentors, Mrs. V and Catherine, help give her a different perspective. Mrs. V points out that she wouldn’t have Melody any other way, as the “normal child” that Melody aspires to be is cruel and petty (as evidenced by Melody’s teammates). Catherine alleviates Melody’s guilt by suggesting that Melody may not have been able to stop the car, but she slowed it, saving Penny’s life. Having the support of these mentors gives Melody the confidence she needs to confront the Whiz Kids team.
At school, Melody is determined to face her teammates and not shy away from the situation. When she learns that they intentionally left her behind, and that Rose gave into the pleadings of her peers, she’s angry and unsurprised. Rather than reconciling with the other children, she is dismissive of them, like they have been to her all along. She breaks the trophy that Connor offers her and leaves the room, laughing. At this point in the narrative, it seems that Melody sees what Mrs. V was trying to tell her—she shouldn’t want to be like regular children because regular children are cruel. For so long, Melody has sought acceptance in this group, and her laughing retreat suggests that she won’t any longer. She isn’t like them, and she doesn’t want to be like them. She is her own person. That the story ends with Melody working on her autobiography project for Miss Gordan’s class backs up this development in her character; she’s both literally and figuratively writing her own story independent from her peers.
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