By the time I stepped outside, it was fully daylight and there were television trucks all over the square, pulling up on the sidewalks, taking up every available space. Police officers in bright neon Windbreakers were moving around them, telling drivers to move, pointing camera people away from the school. A female reporter immediately descended on me.

“Were you in there talking to the police?” she asked.

“I just saw a guy,” I mumbled.

“You saw someone?”

“I—”

“What exactly did you see?” Suddenly, there were two cameras in my face, blinding me with their lights. I was about to answer when two police officers hurried over, one sticking her hand over the camera lens.

“You lot, you stop filming now,” she barked. “I want to see all your footage—”

“We have every right—”

“You,” the other officer said to me, “get back to your house.”

As I hurried off, the cameras followed me, and the reporter called, “What’s your name? Your name?”

I didn’t answer. Call Me Claudia was standing in the door of Hawthorne, and this time, I was happy to see her. As I left, I was sure that the cameras trained on my fleeing figure got some really excellent footage of my butt hustling through the rain in my alligator pajamas.

Chapter 14

14

JAZZA WAS PACING OUR ROOM WHEN I RETURNED. She had her pink piggy mug out, which was the tea mug she reserved for times of extreme stress.

“Is everything all right?” she asked. “You were gone for ages!”

“It was fine,” I said. “They just asked me a lot of questions.”

Jazza didn’t ask if I’d said anything about her. Instead, she waved me over to the window.

“I can’t believe this is happening. Just look out there.”

We both knelt on the spare bed we had pushed against the wall and were using as a sofa. It was right under our middle window. Through the rain-streaked glass, we saw the white-suited figures coming in and out of the white tent. More lights were set up. More people arrived. More cameras and police and police tape.

This activity remained the focus of the next few hours, with the occasional break to drink tea. Since the view from our room was so good, lots of people from the other side of the hall came in to have a look. The view out the windows was actually a lot more interesting than the news—in fact, it was the news. The news cameras filmed our buildings and the little tent until the police moved them back and set up a cordon around the campus, stranding us on a little island of activity.