“I contain multitudes…” What did that even mean?

I contain, she tried again.

But as she wrote, Mr. Flynn hovered by her desk, his fingertips grazing the edge of her notebook.

She looked up, expecting a rebuke, the usual reminder that she needed to pay attention. But Mr. Flynn merely stood there, surveying the scene. “What’s going on here?” he asked the room.

Eve forced herself to look around and had the same question.

One girl openly wept.

Two boys huddled around a phone, cackling and crying out “Oh man!”

And several kids sat there peering directly at Eve.

It seemed like they’d noticed her for the first time. One girl, Mari, glared at her as if Eve were a new dark mole appearing after a day in the sun, and a boy named Auggie gawked at her like she’d manifested out of thin air in a puff of smoke.

She snapped back to her paper.

Why were they looking at her?

Words. Focus on words.

I am large, I contain multitudes.

Once more, Eve tried to write what came next.

But they were still staring. She could feel it. The eyes shooting stares at the back of her head felt like hot sparks of oil spritzing off a stove onto her skin.

“Okay, can someone please fill me in?” Mr. Flynn mumbled as one of the kids offered him her phone.

His eyes widened. “Oh lord,” Mr. Flynn murmured, glued to the screen.

Eve registered a tap on her shoulder. The tap belonged to Miranda Garland, the girl who had sat behind her for over two years of homeroom. They’d hardly spoken before.

“Hey,” Miranda said. “I’ve been meaning to ask you for a long time … Where did you get that necklace with the little hand? It’s so cute.”

Eve did one of those “Are you talking to me?” gestures, and Miranda nodded.

“From my grandmother?” Eve answered, hesitant. Her bubbe had given it to her for her bat mitzvah over the summer, and the little hamsa hung on a silver chain around her neck every day. It was no big deal. Why was Miranda suddenly interested in this?

Out of the corner of her eye, Eve caught a face in the classroom door’s window. It was Nessa, motioning for her to come out.

Eve glanced toward Nessa and then Mr. Flynn. He stood next to a group of distraught kids, distracted. Eve sneaked out the classroom door.

“Did you see the list?” Nessa pulled Eve in close.

Maybe it was all about the cast list. Mr. Rhodes was supposed to announce the cast for The Music Man any day now. Maybe there’d been an upset, an unexpected casting decision. Eve momentarily worried for Nessa, the lead contender for the role of Marian the librarian. Nessa was “born to be a Broadway diva,” she’d always say, whereas standing on a stage in front of a bunch of people probably qualified as Eve’s worst nightmare.

“You got the part, right?” Eve asked.