Natalie felt a wave of nausea rise up inside her. Keep calm, she told herself, the voice in her head sounding like a nervous flight attendant in a smoke-filled cabin begging passengers to proceed calmly but quickly to the exit slides. But her mind was screaming, Not a patient? Not ever? What about the photos of Anthony?

“Sir, we have photographs of the First Lady’s friend Anthony Cantrell visiting the center. How do you explain those?” Ryan asked.

“As I said previously, we pride ourselves on our discretion. We never reveal the identity of our patients or their visitors, so I’m afraid I can’t comment on that. But in this case I can definitively confirm that we have no relationship with First Lady Anita Crusoe, nor have we ever.”

I was wrong. I got it wrong. On the North Lawn of the White House, I got it wrong, Natalie’s mind was screaming. She could feel her legs start shaking as she stared into the North Lawn camera, her face burning with shame, her lungs filled with ice.

Ryan thanked Dr. Anderson and turned to another camera.

“I’d like to bring in our Natalie Savage at the White House, who originally broke this story.” She could hear Ryan saying the words but it felt like it was happening a lifetime ago, or to someone else, or in a movie. “Natalie, can you tell us, do you have any reason to doubt the word of Mr. Anderson? And if not, how did we get this so wrong?”

She felt like she was choking, like her throat was filled with sand and if she tried to speak, nothing would come out. Opening her mouth, Natalie was surprised to hear her own voice.

“I got this wrong because I didn’t wait for a second source,” she said quietly. “In the rush to be first, I made a bad call.” She felt numb. “The truth is, sometimes we get some things wrong. When we’re reporting about people who aren’t powerful enough to get a correction, our viewers never find out.”

“Wrap! Wrap!” someone was shouting in her ear.

“But in this case, I rushed to air, and we’re talking about the First Lady. I take responsibility and I’m very sorry.”

“Wrap! Wrap!” The shouting was louder.

“We’re going to move on now,” Ryan said in a hurry. The camera cut away from Natalie, and Ryan turned to another camera in studio. “This is a reminder that all of us are only as good as our sources. What matters is that we set the record straight.” Ryan smiled and added, “As my meemaw used to say—measure twice, cut once.”

Ryan went to break and the lights went off. Natalie watched other reporters rush back out to their live-shot positions, no doubt racing to retract her reporting and obliterate her reputation.

Mechanically she unplugged her microphone, pulled the earpiece out of her ear.