One morning, Jack Straw - an ordinary boy with a most ordinary name - woke up and made an extraordinary discovery. There, on his nose, was a...a...

Jack didn't know what to call it. It was more than a pimple. It wasn't quite a bump.

"A boil!" Jack's sister screamed at the kitchen table. Annabelle was two years older than Jack. She was in the sixth grade. She had just finished her project on The Plagues of Europe by Annabelle Straw, and 'boil' was now her favourite word.

"It's not a boil," Jack said, picking at his toast.

"It's more of a...growth," Jack's mother said.

"Whatever it is, I want it out of this house by this evening, "Jack's father snapped.

Sometimes, Jack's father said things he didn't mean. Sometimes, he said what he thought he was supposed to say, even if it didn't make sense. This was one of those 'sometimes.'

"I'm not going to school," Jack said. "Everyone will laugh at my...my..."

"Boil!"

"Growth."

"Appendage."

Jack, Jack's mother and his sister all stared at Jack's father.

"I'm trying to be helpful," Jack's father said. "Appendage was the first word that came to mind."

"I don't care what it's called," Jack said. "I'm not going to school. I don't want to be laughed at."

Jack's mother crouched beside Jack. She gently pulled his hair behind his ear. Jack loved his mother, but he hated when she did that "hair-behind-the-ear" thing.

"No one will laugh at you, sweetheart," she said softly. "They'll understand."

They laughed. Oh, how they laughed and jeered and made fun of the thing on Jack's nose. There was, for instance, Harold, a weedy boy who lumped the world into two piles: Harold, and Everyone Else (everyone else being a dork). Harold wasted no time in proclaiming Jack the King of Dork. According to Harold, that made the thing on Jack's nose, "the Prince of Dorkness." A girl with a high-pitched voice convinced her friends that the lump on Jack's nose was contagious. If anyone got too close, Helen said, they might end up with a really ugly nose, too. Or they might lose a limb. Or go blind. Helen's friends were horrified. They agreed with Helen that others in the schoolyard should be warned. They used sun-yellow chalk on a cloud-grey wall to let everyone know about THREE DANGERS TO CHILDREN: Second-hand Smoke. Driving without Seatbelts. Jack Straw's Nose.

By recess, Jack felt small enough to ride on the back of an ant. By lunch, an ant's back seemed awfully high. He ate his cheese sandwich alone, the brown bread salted with his tears.

That afternoon, Jack's teacher, Ms. Hanwell, told the class there would be "No- more-name-calling-no-more-giggling-no-more-rude-remarks-have-I-made-myself-clear?" Ms. Hanwell divided the class into pairs to work on a geography exercise but Jack couldn't keep his mind on the Baltic Sea. He could feel everyone looking at his nose. He could hear the silent laughter, which was worse than laughter itself. Finally - after visiting Bolivia, Bristol and Benin - the bell rang. Jack ran all the way home and into his room. He lay on his bed and stared at the ceiling, at the faded glow-in-the-dark stars that no longer glowed.

"Let's wait a few days and see how things turn out," Jack's mother said at dinner that night. "It will probably be gone by then."

"Fat chance," said Annabelle. "The only way to get rid of a boil is to boil it."

"Nonsense," said Jack's mother.

"It's not a boil!" said Jack.

"Just put your nose to the grindstone, son," said Jack's father.

No one said a word, not even Annabelle. By then the damage was done but not beyond repair. To make up for his "faux pas", as he put it (Jack's father knew very few words in many different languages), Mr. Straw took Jack and Annabelle out for ice cream. Although Jack loved butterscotch sundaes, nothing his father or sister said could convince him to eat his favourite ice cream at his favourite table. He wouldn't step out of the car.

"Then we'll have to join you in the back seat," Jack's father said. Annabelle agreed.

Sitting between his father and sister, savouring his butterscotch sundae, Jack felt safe and warm after what had been a long and horrible day.

After a long and difficult week, Jack's mother and father took Jack to see a doctor. The doctor told Jack he could call her Dr. Judy. She had a big smile, and big, seashell earrings. Jack wanted to hide inside Dr. Judy's earrings and come out only when the thing on his nose disappeared. Instead, he sat on an examining table while Dr. Judy examined him.

"Does this hurt?" Dr. Judy asked, gently pushing the thing on Jack's nose with a finger wrapped in a rubber glove.

"No," Jack said.

Dr. Judy looked into Jack's nose with a special light.

"It looks good," she said. Jack was relieved, though he couldn't begin to imagine what the doctor saw in his nose that could look good. Dr. Judy turned off the special light and handed Jack's mother a tube of cream.

"Apply this twice a day, " she said, "and we'll see what happens."

Nothing happened. A week later, the thing on Jack's nose was still there, unchanged. The teasing continued. The name-calling wasn't as bad as it had been, but Jack still felt like a target had been tattooed on his back. Every soft whisper and small giggle was a dart.

That night, Jack locked himself in the bathroom and stared at the mirror. "Please go away," he told thing on his nose. "Pretty please." He paused. "Pretty please with whipped cream and a cherry on top." He looked at the thing on his nose, as if he expected it to talk back. He looked around the bathroom for something, anything, to remove the thing on his nose. He thought of clipping it off with a nail clipper. He thought of shaving it off with his father's electric shaver. Then he thought again. He decided to brush it with a toothbrush, scrubbing and scrubbing until it disappeared. He was about to start scrubbing when there was a loud knock at the door.

"I need the bathroom!" Annabelle hollered.

"I'm using it," Jack said.

"Don't be a dilettante," Annabelle said, pounding the door. 'Dilettante' was now her favourite word. She didn't know what it meant, but she liked the sound of it.

"I'm not finished," Jack said, placing the toothbrush on the thing on his nose. The bristles stung. "And I'm not a dilettante." He didn't know what it meant, but he didn't like the sound of it.

Jack put the toothbrush down. He decided he would find another way to remove the thing on his nose. He opened the door. Annabelle ran in. Jack went to his bedroom. It was an hour before his bedtime, but he felt very, very tired.