Frohmeyer keeps us waiting till almost eleven, which is torture. When he opens the door to his office, we look as wholesome as possible. We both wear clothes that fit, and we have intuitively chosen our most conservative outfits: Chaz a light blue polo and khakis (he owns khakis?), and me a ring tee and jeans. Frohmeyer wears a suit—he always wears a suit, but today it looks especially funereal. His expression matches. “Anisha,” he barks, “don’t go far,” before ushering us in.

We sit across the desk from him, letting him settle into a huge rolling office chair. I’ve never looked at his desk before, and I pore over its contents trying to decode signs of hope or warning: a small American flag, a silly plaster figurine of a golfer swinging his club into his own head, a photo of his wife from thirty or forty years ago, a bonsai plant that is either fake or reveals him to be a master of the art, and a glass bowl of wrapped candies, labeled with a Take One sign. Nothing useful is revealed.

“I know you two had a rough night, and I want you to know that you are safe. The boys are already home. Once other students confirmed their absence from prom, they admitted their part. I called their parents myself. No one does that sort of thing at First Secondary and gets away with it.”

I feel like some knotted cord in my chest is unraveling. “Oh, thank god.”

Chaz sounds less relieved. “You expelled them?”

“No …” A frown. “They were suspended. For the month. They’ll finish up at home.”

“So they’re just going to come back and walk with us?”

“You know me better than that. They will not be on that stage. But this close to graduation, it doesn’t make sense for them to lose credit for the year.”

Right. Why slow up their promising futures just because they tortured a classmate?

Chaz says nothing else. I want to but can’t either. We simply don’t dare push back. The room is dead silent, but we don’t want to ask what happens next for us.

Frohmeyer’s eyes drift to the office window. The first gym class of the day, the juniors are jogging past, the sporty ones in the lead, followed by a few try-hards and then an ever-slower stream of kids just counting out the minutes to the next class. We all watch them.

He clears his throat. His eyes stay on the windows. “The boys said you were engaged in homosexual relations on school grounds.”

Chaz is indignant. “I have not had sexual relations with anyone ever. I would swear that on a Bible.”