Extraordinary Means

I’d been the one who had decided to give up drama class to take AP Art History my freshman year. It wasn’t like I’d discussed it with them, or pleaded to keep taking drama; I’d been convinced it was a necessary sacrifice, and they’d praised me for “making a mature decision.”

Before I even knew what high school was, I’d already let my fear of not being the best at it make me miserable. And I was starting to think that if I hadn’t gotten sick, I would have done the same thing with college, rushing toward internships and grad school and a job. Somehow, without realizing, I’d made high school into a race toward the best college, as opposed to its own destination. It was only now that I hadn’t done the same thing at Latham that I could see it, and that I realized how unhappy it made me.

The last SAT date for early admission passed. I don’t know what I was doing that day. Lying in a field of overgrown grass, reading a Douglas Adams novel on my stomach. Pulling Sadie behind a building to kiss her on the way back from Wellness. Lounging in bed in the middle of the afternoon, listening to Charlie’s records through the open windows while the shadows of tree branches played across my wall.

Whatever I was doing that day, I wasn’t hunched over a too-small desk in a high school gym with a plastic bag of sharpened pencils, trying to raise my score another thirty points, even though it was already in the ninety-ninth percentile. I wasn’t terrified that if I screwed up a single question, my entire future might disappear. Probably, I was wondering if Sadie and I could slip off somewhere after di

WE WERE IN French class when it happened.

Sadie was sitting under the window reading a John Green novel, and I’d slid her worksheet onto my desk and was busy filling it in with the most hilariously wrong answers I could think of, since I’d already finished mine.

It was almost lunch, and I was starving. I kept hoping my stomach wouldn’t growl and give me away.

Mr. Fi

“Everyone’s supposed to go to the gym immediately,” Carlos said.

The whole class looked around, confused. It was Tuesday morning, and as far as I could tell, it was a pretty unusual request.

“The gym?” Mr. Fi

“Immediately,” Carlos said.

Our teacher thanked the kid, who disappeared out into the hallway. And then Fi

“Are we coming back?” Nick asked, but Fi

Everyone was in the gym, spread thinly across the rows of bleachers, which were meant for far more than 150 of us. I remember Sadie making some joke about it being a terrible time for a pep rally, and Nick chiming in about how come nobody told him we had a basketball team.

I was too nervous, and too confused, to say anything. I didn’t know what was going on, and I hated that. There were adults I’d never seen standing around the edges of the gym, teachers and nurses, which felt ominous, like whatever was going to happen was so bad that they thought we might try to escape.

Dr. Barons and this administrative lady Mrs. Kleefeld, who’d given my parents my admission forms, were discussing something behind an ancient wheeled lectern.

“What’s going on?” Sadie whispered, and I shrugged.

Some young tech-looking guy was helping to set up, and the microphone came to life with a squeal and then static. Everyone clapped their hands over their ears, making a much bigger deal of it than it actually was. Latham had never felt so much like a high school as it did then. Except for the small fact that most high schools have a survival rate higher than 80 percent.

Mrs. Kleefeld angled the microphone down and smiled tensely at us. Her pearl necklace was so tight that it almost looked like it was choking her.

“Good afternoon, children,” she said, which seemed like the wrong word to use, although I didn’t know what might have been the right one. She paused, as though waiting for us all to chant “Good afternoon, Mrs. Kleefeld!” back at her, but we didn’t. I glanced at the clock on the wall, which read 11:23. Not afternoon, but still morning.

“As you know,” Mrs. Kleefeld continued, “being at Latham House is a special privilege. The data that your medical sensors collect has helped scientists to understand so much about your illness. And these scientists have been working day and night to make advances in the treatment of total-drug-resistant tuberculosis. We thought it best to gather everyone here as quickly as possible to avoid the spread of rumors and false information. I suppose I should let Dr. Barons explain.”

Everyone else looked as confused as I felt. And then Dr. Barons stepped behind the podium. He wasn’t wearing his white coat, just a fleece jacket a lot like mine, and it was strange seeing him in a high school gym and not a medical building. The only thing we’d done so far in here was to watch movies, and I was pretty sure he wasn’t a

“Thank you, Mrs. Kleefeld,” he began, and then cleared his throat nervously. “There has been news this morning that the FDA has classified a serum called protocillin as a first-line treatment for total-drug-resistant tuberculosis. The protocillin has been approved for clinical testing and is moving forward into production.”

The gymnasium was silent, hanging on his every word. He couldn’t be saying what I thought he was saying.

“And as of thirty minutes ago, it has been confirmed that the first doses of protocillin will be ready in six weeks, and that Latham House will be participating in the initial trial.” He paused and beamed at us. “What this means is that in six weeks’ time, the TDR strain of tuberculosis will be curable.”

There was a moment of stu

I couldn’t believe I’d been so wrong about why they’d gathered us in the gym. It wasn’t something bad at all. It was something incredible.

“Sadie,” I said, turning toward her.

“Oh my God,” she said, fighting back tears.

We hugged each other close, and she sniffled into my shoulder as I struggled to wrap my head around the idea that we were going to be cured. All of us. Not temporarily stable but having to take it easy to avoid a relapse. Cured. Forever. In no time at all I’d be transported back to my former life, and Latham would melt away like a bad dream.

Except it wasn’t a bad dream. It was card games in the grass, and stolen internet, and Sadie in that green dress, and Charlie’s records, and subtitled Japanese movies, and Marina doing an impression of Nick eating scrambled eggs. It wasn’t the life I’d wanted, but it was the life I had, and I was finally starting to accept that.

“If I can have everyone’s attention,” Dr. Barons said, and the gym gradually quieted. “I’m sure you have a lot of questions, and I’m going to attempt to answer some of them now. Your parents will be notified over the next few hours by our medical staff. Protocillin will be administered by daily injection over the course of eight weeks. For the first four weeks, you will stay here so that any side effects and symptoms can be monitored and recorded. After that time, arrangements will be made with hospitals in your area so you can continue receiving daily, observed treatment at home for the rest of the course. Your hall nurses will be distributing more information to you and to your parents as soon as it becomes available. And we’ll be temporarily suspending phone and internet access until everyone’s parents have been contacted by our staff.”