“He certainly didn’t look thirteen. At least he didn’t look the way he’d always pictured himself looking at such an important age. He’d always pictured the thirteen him as tall, more grown-up, maybe even with a muscle or two. But the boy in the mirror looked just as short and just as skinny. He looked, well, twelve.”

These lines come from Michael’s perspective in the Prologue. He’s woken up on his 13th birthday with no memory of his flight powers or the powers of his friends, and he feels different in ways he can’t name. Looking in the mirror shows Michael physically unchanged from the day before, and this calls to how seemingly momentous occasions don’t always result in noticeable change. Michael feels more grown-up, and he believes this should be reflected in his appearance. In truth, a single day has passed, and other than the marking of another year he’s been alive, nothing has changed. In terms of the novel’s superpowers plotline, this moment signifies the arbitrary nature of Plunkett’s choice to remove powers when kids turn 13.

“On that morning his parents offered to drive him, but Daniel knew it was hard enough being the new kid without getting chauffeured around by your parents. He knew better than to give in to the butterflies in his stomach. The first day at a new school was like the first swim in a cold lake—it was better to just dive in and get the initial shock over with.”

Here, Daniel prepares for his first day at his new school in Noble’s Green. This passage calls to the difficulties of starting over somewhere new. Daniel had a school and friends in his old home, and even though he’d always felt like an outsider because of his interests, he knew where he fit and felt comfortable enough with the area he’d carved out for himself.