Her eyebrows lift before she shakes the surprise from her face. “That’s right,” she replies. “Two people, actually. One friend from high school and one from college.”

“What do they do?” I ask.

“Hmmm, well, one’s a lawyer,” she says. “The other does something with music production, I think. He lives in Hollywood, anyway.”

“Oh, wow,” I say. “And are they—I mean—what does their vitiligo look like?”

“Well, the lawyer has some on her face, and the music producer has it mostly on his hands and feet, I think. I don’t keep in touch with him much. But the lawyer is one of my good friends. If you ever—well, if you want to talk with someone about it, I’m sure she would be happy to talk to you.”

The whole time I felt so alone because of my vitiligo, I never even thought about talking to someone else who had it. Never thought, until today, that it might help me feel less lonely. But actually, it would be really nice to talk to somebody who’s gone through what’s happening to me. Someone who doesn’t have to try to understand. Who just . . . understands. “Thanks, Ms. Singh,” I reply. “That would be great.”

“Sure thing. I’ll give her a call after the Thanksgiving break. And Emma? Are things, you know, going okay for you? Here at school, I mean?”

“They’re—” I start, thinking about the crumpled note now lying in the library trash can. “I think they’re going to be, Ms. Singh. I think they’re going to be more than okay.”

“Glad to hear it, Emma,” she says, beaming.

A few minutes later, while I’m waiting for Mom to pick me up, I google “famous people with vitiligo” and scroll through the list. Turns out, not only is there a supermodel with vitiligo, there are actors and singers and politicians—even a ballerina. The pale spots sprinkled across her dark chest twinkle in the stage lights like stardust.

And the best part is, the comments section of the article isn’t filled with trolls calling the people in the article awful names.

It’s filled with people saying how beautiful they are, how unique and brave.

My chest feels warm inside by the time I’m done reading. The feeling floats with me out into the parking lot when Mom’s car pulls up.

“How was your day, sweetie?” she asks.

“It was pretty good.”

“Well, that’s great!” she replies brightly. “We need to stop at the grocery store before we go home. There’re still some things I need to get for Thanksgiving. Actually, can you pull my list out of my bag? I want you to write down a couple more things before I forget them.”

I grab her briefcase in the back seat and start rummaging through the papers inside.

“No, not my briefcase,” she says. “My purse.”