He actually wants to be friends, too. Partially because she's personally agreeable, and partially because everyone else seems to have their cliques pre-made since kindergarten and it's nice to have someone who isn't a part of any of them.

"The teacher called it a fancy thing and I forget the name of it, but - basically, take a paper, cover it entirely in charcoal, then erase from there to get whatever the drawing is. It's very messy."