The stories all say that a deceased infant was found by a student in the girls’ locker room, but other than that, the reporting varies. Some pieces lament the lack of access to birth control in rural, conservative communities, and others offer condolences to the anonymous teen mom and applaud her apparent desire to keep her baby, inferring that from the fact that she swaddled it—they can’t tell what it was swaddled in, from the photo—and made no attempt to hide its body.

None of the news stations show the picture, and none of them mention me by name, but they all keep trying to contact me for an interview. Several of them have come to town, and there’s footage of them following my high school principal, asking for a comment. Then they camp out in front of the police station, and Chief Stoddard tells my mom to put out a statement. Live, in front of the media.

On Sunday night, I emerge from my room to watch the press conference on TV, but Landry and Norah Weston are on the couch, arguing about some extra credit project they’re working on for their earth science class.

“But the carbon snake is so cool.” Landry flips her phone around to show Norah a picture of what looks like a gnarled black branch growing from a bowl full of sand.

“Yeah, but I really want to build an infinity mirror,” Norah whines. “We could use little pink bulbs, and—”

She jumps up from the couch when she sees me. “Beckett! Check out my new boots! Landry wanted to borrow them, but her feet are too big. Aren’t they adorable?”

She sticks one foot out and rotates it slowly, so I can admire her white leather ankle boot, with little pom-poms hanging from the ends of the laces.

There’s a knock at the door, and I veer that way to open it, but Norah jumps in front of me and throws the door open. Even though this isn’t her house.

There’s an eighth-grade boy standing on the porch, tugging awkwardly at the zipper of his jacket. Behind him, a bicycle is lying on its side on our front lawn.

“Fletcher!” Norah squeals, then she pulls him inside. “I invited Fletch, because he always gets an A.”

“Hey.” He regains his balance, then he glances from Norah to Landry, his hands out in front of him, as if he’s about to perform a magic trick. “I have three words for you. Rube. Goldberg. Machine. I made one in fifth grade, and it won second place in the school’s science fair.”

I shut the door and try to figure out how to get them out of the living room, so I can watch the press conference without an audience of middle school kids.