New grade, new mistakes—Robert suffers fashion mishaps and humiliation, while locker drama and a girl fight disrupt the day. Routine mishaps and rivalries deepen bonds.

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Math and track meets blend with snack choices and peer banter. Roasting friends over shoes, budding relationships, and tentative dating mark awkward steps into adolescence.

Basketball continues, with accidental name mix-ups, sports victories, lost opportunities, and playful trash-talking. Sam navigates coaching advice and transitioning team roles.

Sam becomes a reluctant artist at a school festival. Dance drama, quirky encounters, fashion faux pas, and adolescent confusion shape his social and romantic prospects.​

Basketball season arrives. New teammates, competitive drills, and memorable sporting blunders drive transitions, friendship tests, and formation of group identity for Sam and his friends.

Sam’s card collection frustration and trading escapades reveal the social value of collectibles and the friends’ negotiations. Creative writing class brings nicknames and mild humiliation.​

Sam visits Chicago, writes a creative essay, and faces challenges in sports practice. Scheming with shortcuts and running mishaps shows his inventive problem solving and group dynamics.

The first day of junior high features fashion anxieties, social rivalries, transfer drama, and friendship forming through clothing trends and school politics among the boys.

Sam endures a tedious summer and a socially awkward party, dealing with younger kids and embarrassing moments. Childhood misadventures and fleeting victories mark his pre-junior high experience.

In the last week of elementary school, grades, awards, and quiet goodbyes mingle with pranks, punishments, and Sam’s defiant refusal to cry during a ruler-whacking incident, capturing a bittersweet transition where the boys carry forward both their triumphs and “gauche” missteps into the next stage of growing up.