Chapters 1-2 Summary

In Chapter 1, Tara Sullivan starts to hear the catch phrase, Step on a crack, break your mother's back, all the time. At school, at dinner, during homework. She describes herself as someone who was normal until it started, but now she cannot get it to stop. She counts things compulsively, and when a girl named Emily interrupts her, she is mean to her. Tara's neighbor, Mrs. Scott, sees her fleeing from her friend, and calls to her and she doesn't hear, so Mrs. Scott comes over and grabs her. Tara sees Kevin and Richard, her classmates, watching her get reprimanded by her neighbor, and they laugh at her. This breaks her down, and she starts to cry. She runs home, and Mrs. Scott asks her where she's going, she says that she forgot something at home. Her classmates notice her confusion...