Extraordinary Means

“Over what, getting well enough to go home?” Nick asked, not very nicely.

Marina shook her head. And then she told us what Amit had said it was like for him after going home. How his parents babied him like he was an invalid, and wouldn’t let him leave the house. How, when he’d finally gone back to school, everyone had been terrified that he’d relapse and infect them.

“He said they called him plague boy,” Marina said. “And defaced his locker. When he sat down at a lunch table, everyone would leave. Apparently a lot of the parents at school got really upset that they let him back in, and then last night some guys jumped him and threatened that he better not come back to school or else.”

“Or else?” Nick said skeptically.

“That’s what he said.” Marina shrugged. “Maybe it’s just his school, or whatever, maybe a lot of kids were getting sick there.”

I listened to all of this in shock. Nick looked as horrified as I felt, and Lane was shaking his head like he couldn’t believe things like this happened. But I believed it easily. I knew all too well how cruel kids could be, how relentlessly they could taunt you and make you feel like no one would ever be your friend again.

“Maybe,” Charlie said. “It can’t really be that bad, can it? Getting better, I mean?”

“It wasn’t like that at all where I’m from,” Lane said. “I never knew anyone who got sick.”

“Yeah, but all it takes is one person who wants to stir up trouble, and suddenly everyone’s panicked,” Nick said. “Look at history if you don’t believe me.”

“Game of Thrones isn’t real,” I told him, and Marina snorted.

“The weird part was that Amit said he wished he’d never left Latham,” Marina went on. “He kept saying that he didn’t have any friends out there, that he was all alone. At least here he felt like he belonged. At least here he had a life.”

“Some life,” Nick deadpa

“Girlfriend, friends, your own room, no homework, and no chores?” Marina laughed. “Yeah, I’d say that’s a pretty good life.”

“Well, not all of us have that,” Nick said, with a look in my direction that was almost accusative.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

LANE

I FELL ASLEEP dreaming of Sadie every night that week.

Sometimes we were in the woods, and she was taking photos of a monster I couldn’t see. “No one will believe this,” she’d say, getting closer and closer while I shouted for her to run away with me to safety, even though she promised the monster wouldn’t hurt us.

And sometimes we were lying in a field surrounded by flowers, and she was holding my hand, which was covered with numbers. “Come on, Lane, let’s jump,” she’d beg, and suddenly we were at the edge of a steep cliff. I’d watch in horror as Sadie jumped off the cliff, giggling. But she’d float gently to the bottom, as though held aloft by an invisible parachute. And then I’d jump, trying to follow, and there wouldn’t be a parachute after all.

Each time, I woke up drenched in sweat, my body curled around the telephone. And each time, I looked around my dorm room with relief, convinced I was waking from a nightmare.

ON THURSDAY AFTERNOON, we were all in the library, using the router trick to get internet. Marina was at the computer, while Nick and Charlie were at the back tables.

Sadie and I had gone off together into the stacks and were sitting on the floor with our backs against the encyclopedias. Her hair was wet from the shower and knotted up in a bun. It smelled amazing, like mint and oranges and old books, although I guessed the last part was the library.

We both had our laptops out, the same MacBook everyone used. Hers was battered and dinged, like it had survived a war. I kept mine in a shell, with a silicone keyboard cover so it wouldn’t get scratched. When I’d taken it out, Sadie had laughed at me and asked why my computer was wearing a condom. Just hearing her use the word “condom” had sent my brain spiraling down all sorts of dirty alleyways, and I was having a hard time concentrating.

She was so close to me that occasionally, when she typed, her elbow brushed mine. I wanted to lean over and kiss her. I’d wanted to do that for a few days now, or maybe even longer, but I didn’t want to ruin things, and I didn’t know how to begin.

I glanced over at her screen, in case she’d found something interesting, but she was just scrolling through pictures of random pretty people posing in random pretty places with balloons and cupcakes and stuff. I was on the Stanford website, clicking around.

Dr. Barons said my vitals looked better and that my new X-ray had shown some improvement, so it turned out that not doing homework and participating in naptime and getting nine hours of sleep a night was actually a solid game plan. But he still didn’t have an answer on when, or if, I’d be able to go home. All he’d say was “as soon as you’re better,” with that bullshitty grin, like he had no idea what I was so eager to get back to, and my AP assignments weren’t still locked away in some secret drawer in his office.

Stanford listed their admissions deadlines on the website. Early action was almost up, and I knew I’d miss that, but regular decision wasn’t due until January. I’d wanted to see if it was possible, and it looked like it might be. If I got out of Latham within three months, my application would just make it. Getting in, with my name and social security number registered in the national database of active TB cases, was a completely different story. I was pretty sure Stanford wouldn’t want to risk assigning me a roommate even if Dr. Barons certified that my TB was inactive, because there was always the chance that I’d relapse. I’d tried to ask Dr. Barons what most kids did about college once they left Latham, but he’d given me a stern look and told me to “focus on the now,” which made me want to strangle him with his stethoscope.

I was focusing on the now. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t still wonder about what came after.

Sadie leaned over and asked what I was looking at, and I tilted the screen so she could see a picture of the campus.

“That’s pretty,” she said.

“Yeah,” I said wistfully, and then I clicked over to Facebook to make myself stop obsessing, which in retrospect might not have been the best idea.

The barrage of “get well soon” messages had stopped. Zero notifications. My account felt dead and forgotten, and I wondered how I’d missed the funeral. My high school’s homecoming dance had taken place over the weekend, and my feed was filled with pictures of it. Group photos in limos, everyone in suits and dresses, girls pointing their toes together to show off their brightly colored Converses.

I’d always skipped homecoming. It took place the weekend before the first big exams, and even if it hadn’t, I wouldn’t have had the nerve to ask anyone. Not when the first question they’d have would be whether my dad was one of the chaperones. I wouldn’t have known if they were turning me down, or turning down the idea of going with Mr. Rosen’s kid. It had seemed like a miracle when Ha

But there weren’t any more homecoming dances. I’d missed all of them. I hadn’t thought I’d care, but now that the opportunity was gone, I sort of did. Everyone looked so happy in the pictures, and if I could have done it over last year, I would have just asked someone to go with me. I scrolled a little farther, through pictures of everyone lined up in each other’s driveways and in the backseats of limos, and then I stopped cold.

It was a photo of Ha