By the time I reached the journalism lab, it felt like sparks were exploding from my head. There were a few articles taped to the door, and even in my rage, I saw that almost all of them had David’s byline. Gritting my teeth, I stepped inside.

Thanks to all of the computers lining the back wall, the classroom felt a lot warmer than the hall. No one was working at the computers now, and there were only three people in the room. David was sitting on a desk, laughing with two other newspaper staffers, Michael Goldberg and Chie Kurata.

I’d planned out this whole speech in my head amidst all the bad words—yay, multitasking!—about how what he’d done was not only personally offensive to me, but demoralizing and degrading to the school, because when we make one of us look bad, we all look bad. And honestly, how did he expect to get away with this kind of crap? He had to have written the article and printed up the paper over the weekend. That meant he’d done it behind Mrs. Laurent’s back, and that had to be a detention-worthy offense at the very least.

But something about seeing him sitting on top of a desk, eating yogurt and laughing with his friends made me snap. I could feel my face get red, and this intense, trembly feeling rose up from the middle of my chest. My intelligent and calm speech flew right out of my head.

“WTF, David?” I asked, storming into the room and throwing the paper on the nearest desk.

He at least had the good grace to look chagrined. “Harper—”

“No!” I said, or at least I meant to say. It came out a little shriek and Michael flinched and looked at his feet. Chie, a pretty, petite Asian girl who’d transferred to our school just this year, raised her eyebrows so high they disappeared underneath her heavy black bangs.

David stood and put his hands up in front of him in the universal sign for “calm the heck down.”

But there was no stopping me now. “Why would you do this?” I gestured angrily at the paper. Just over David’s head, there was a poster featuring a typewriter and the quote “Journalism Is History on the Run,” and I made myself stare at that rather than meet his gaze. Man, laser eyes really would’ve come in handy now.

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. He was always doing that, which is why he usually looked like he’d been electrocuted by fourth period. “It was a valid story, Pres,” he finally said. “Something was definitely wrong with you that night and I think the student body of the Grove has the right to know if their golden girl is hiding something.”

“No, they don’t,” I fired back. “What was going on that night was none of your business!”