For years, Lenny could still see Mrs. Miller’s face. It appeared in her mind from time to time—not for any rhyme or reason, but there it would be, just as it had looked that morning in the spring of her eighth-grade year, through the big glass window of the school office. They’d held each other’s stare for only a few seconds, but it was long enough. Had she felt bad? Eventually, Lenny would admit that no, she hadn’t, not really. At the time, she had only cared about escaping Trina’s wrath. But for a long time, she thought about Mrs. Miller and the expression on her face. She tried to convince herself it was anger, betrayal, disappointment. But deep down she knew—it takes one to know one—the look was heartbreak.

***

In all her years of schooling, Melissa Miller had never been sent to the principal’s office. One time, in fourth grade, she’d been called down to see Sister Reggie, the dean of students at St. Clare’s, because of a small part she’d played in some recess bullying. (The details were vague now, but Melissa recalls being nudged into stealing a classmate’s mittens.) As a first-time offender, she’d been let go without demerits.

“Just be good,” Sister had said from behind her gray metal desk. “But follow your own mind and heart from now on, yes?”

Melissa nodded silently. She never caused trouble at school again.

So, it was a strange feeling, nearly 40 years later, to be sitting in the lobby of the middle school principal’s office on a Tuesday morning, waiting to be called in. Dr. Packett’s email the day before had been terse: “I have scheduled a meeting to discuss an incident that occurred last week. Please be in my office at 10:15 am tomorrow.”

Melissa knew right away it was about Lenny. Mostly because her husband, Jack, had warned her the previous Friday night that this would happen.

“I am legally obligated to make the call,” she insisted from the passenger seat. He had picked her up from school at the end of rehearsal because her car was in the shop. It was early March and still very much winter. She’d been standing outside for ten minutes, waiting for Jack to pull up, already on hold with the state’s protective services hotline. Once she was in the car, holding one hand at a time in front of the heating vents and clutching her phone with the other, she explained the situation to her husband. “If I don’t call, I can get in trouble.”

“You’re vulnerable,” he’d said. “This is a part-time job for you. Not even. It’s a part-time part-time job. Let one of the teachers call. What about Evelyn?”

What about Evelyn? The truth was Melissa had volunteered to call. She believed she could present a more detailed, level-headed account of what Lenny had told them. And Lenny had meant to confide in her, really. Besides, it was all anonymous. She’d have to give her name to whomever she spoke to at the hotline—she remembered that from the online training she’d been made to complete—but Lenny would never know it was her who called it in.

“You weren’t there,” Melissa said to Jack, as the hold music played in her right ear. “You didn’t see how she was trembling. She couldn’t stop crying. This girl is in trouble.”

Jack blew out his cheeks and made the face he made when he believed he was right and Melissa was wrong. She shook her head and plugged her other ear with her finger so she could hear the helpline operator who’d just picked up the call.

When she saw Packett’s email in her inbox three days later, she didn’t tell Jack. She convinced herself for a few minutes that it was a meeting about something else—they were three weeks from opening night of the school musical and had plenty to discuss. But then Evelyn had called to let her know she’d been summoned for a separate meeting with Packett, and Melissa knew Jack had been right.

Melissa hadn’t wanted this job, not at first. Neither of her sons went to the school anymore; there was no reason to spend any of her time or energy there. But Evelyn Vaughn—whom the kids called Mrs. V, who’d directed both of Melissa’s boys in musicals—had worn her down. “I need you,” she’d said over the summer, in her bossy-but-somehow-endearing Evelyn way. “You know how to do the shit I’m terrible at.”

“Like being organized and remembering things?” Melissa had said.

“Exactly! Come on. Be my producer. It’s not like you have anything else going on.”

She had a point. Melissa said yes. And though she was being paid a very small amount of money—it barely covered all the takeout they had to order for dinner because she was suddenly too busy to cook—the whole thing gave her a kind of legitimacy she’d been missing. Finally, she was doing something she loved, and it was not entirely frivolous.

“Mrs. Miller?”

Melissa looked up to see the school secretary standing behind the counter. She had a phone receiver tucked between her shoulder and her cheek. “Dr. Packett is ready for you.”

“Thanks,” Melissa said in a voice that sounded tight and fake. Why was her heart pounding? She stood up and walked toward the corner office. The door was open, but all Melissa could see was an empty conference table. Dr. Packett’s desk was tucked out of view. She poked her head in and saw him sitting behind it, scribbling on a yellow legal pad.

“Come in, come in,” he said without looking up, and gestured toward the conference table. “Have a seat.” Packett was not a tall man, but he was broad. In his school logo quarter-zip, he looked more like a PE teacher than a principal. During every parent meeting she’d attended at the school, he’d presented like a PE teacher, too—more dumb jock than capable professional. No one would ever convince Melissa that anyone other than the secretaries ran that school—or any school.

“Thanks for coming in,” Packett said, sliding back from his desk. He rolled his chair over without getting up and parked directly across from her at the conference table. “I heard you had an interesting evening on Friday.”

Melissa squinted. That was one way to describe it. She was trying different responses in her mind when Packett went on. “I got a call from the superintendent yesterday. You’ve been accused of inappropriate contact with Lenora Shaw. I’m supposed to fire you.”

***

When Mrs. Miller came out of the last stall in the girls’ bathroom that first Friday night in March, Lenny had been curved over the sink, hands gripping the counter, while Alice splashed cold water on her face and neck. It wasn’t doing anything other than soaking her shirt collar and making her mascara run, but Alice was a compulsive helper, so Lenny let her do it.

“What’s going on, girls?” Mrs. Miller asked, washing her hands at the next sink. “Everyone okay?”

“Not really,” Alice said. “Lenny overheated. I think she’s dehydrated.”

Lenny glanced at Mrs. Miller’s reflection and tried to seem normal. She had started to feel extremely hot standing in the wings, waiting for her cue. She wasn’t in costume, only the black jeans and sweater she’d worn to school. And the wig. It wasn’t a dress rehearsal, just a regular after-school run-through, but she loved wearing the wig—short, black, sleek—and it was easy to put on. Right after 7th period, she’d slipped into the costume closet and stretched the skull cap over her hair in front of the mirror. She’d tucked her blonde ponytail up and slid the wig on. All it took was thirty seconds to look like someone different. She hoped eventually she’d feel like someone different.

“I’ll grab a bottle of water from the music room,” Mrs. Miller said, as she pulled paper towels from the dispenser. “The concession donations have started to come in; no one will miss it. Why don’t you take her outside, Alice? Maybe some fresh air will help.”

Lenny straightened and felt sink water trickle down the center of her back. She stared in the mirror and ran her fingertips under her eyes, which only made the mascara smear worse because she couldn’t stop shaking.

She’d thought this time would be different. Last year she aced her first audition, and the other kids told her she killed it at callbacks, but she wound up with a one-line part. Her parents came to only one performance—the matinee—and afterward her dad handed her a bouquet of dyed carnations with the grocery store price tag half-ripped off the cellophane.

“What time are you done tonight?” was all her mother had said, eyes darting around the lobby as other families posed for photos and laughed and hugged. Lenny saw that one of her castmates had a handful of “Congrats!” helium balloons, which seemed a little much and impractical, but she also wished she was holding them.

This year she’d landed a lead role. “FINALLY,” Alice had texted her the day the cast list was emailed out in November. “You totally deserve it.”

Lenny had gasped when she saw her name, not under “ensemble” but high up among the main characters. Disbelief, joy, and terror rippled through her. Without thinking, she ran downstairs and found Trina in the kitchen. “Mom, I got a big part in the musical,” she’d said, as Trina stood with her back to her, leaning against the island, head bent toward her phone. She was still dressed for work, and the kitchen faucet was running.

“How much time will it be?”

Lenny hated herself then. She should have just called Alice. Why did she never learn?

“I don’t know yet,” she said to her mother’s back, as her stomach slowly clenched into a fist. “I guess more than last year? Because it’s a lead? We’ll get the schedule this weekend.”

“Well, I can’t pick you up every day. You better find a ride.” Trina lifted her eyes from her phone and turned her head just enough so Lenny could see her profile. “And so help me if your grades slip.”

It was Trina’s voice she had heard backstage at rehearsal 20 minutes before she wound up in the bathroom with mascara running down her face. She’d been listening to the scene on stage, waiting for her cue, and suddenly it was you’re an embarrassment the way you cry, over nothing! Lazy and ungrateful, I gave up everything for you, Lenora, and this is the best you can do, and then someone from stage crew nudged her because she was supposed to be out there, saying lines she couldn’t remember. That’s when her face started to burn, and she felt detached from her body, which was both a relief and a curiosity.

“Here you go, Len.” She was outside now, sitting on the half wall by the music wing entrance, shivering in the early March air. Mrs. Miller held a plastic water bottle toward her. Mrs. Miller—with her cardigan and her glasses and the clipboard she was always clutching—was quieter than Mrs. V, but also calmer. Lenny realized, as she took the water with a shaky hand, that she was glad it was Mrs. Miller who had been in the bathroom. She took a small sip and tried to smile as she swallowed.

“I have to get back in the auditorium, girls,” Mrs. Miller said, turning toward the door. “I’ll let Mrs. V know where you are. But don’t stay out here too long. You’ll freeze.”

“Don’t leave,” Lenny almost said out loud, but didn’t.

***

“I’m sorry?” Melissa said to Packett across the conference table. “What kind of contact?” She noticed there were no decipherable words on the legal pad in front of him. It looked like scribbles, like what happens when little kids—or, she had to admit, any kids these days—pretend to know cursive.

“According to the superintendent,” Packett said, “Mrs. Shaw called her Monday morning, very upset, with concerns about—”

“I followed protocol,” Melissa cut in. “I followed my training. I was obligated—”

“You were not obligated to give Lenora your phone number.” Packett folded his hands on the table.

“I don’t understand,” Melissa said. “Evelyn and I were concerned for the girl’s safety. Anything could have happened over the weekend, at home with that—with her mother. The phone number was a lifeline.”

“It’s against district policy.”

Melissa felt her pulse in her temples. “How would I know that? My training was limited to the reporting process. I just did what I hope any thinking, responsible adult would do in that situation.”

“That may be so, but there are rules, and those rules were created for a reason, and when they’re violated, there are repercussions.” Packett leaned back and stared at the ceiling for several seconds. Melissa noticed a shaving nick in the crease of his neck. The blood had dried and turned a shade of burnt sienna. She stared at it until he lowered his chin again. “Mrs. Shaw wants you removed. She doesn’t want you in this building ever again.”

Melissa inhaled. The shame was instant—Catholic school had trained her well. She felt an apology brewing and a lump burning, and she pressed her lips together to keep either from escaping.

Packett tapped the end of his pen on the table a few times. “I understand that you are important to the musical,” he said, without meeting her eyes, “and that your removal would be disruptive so close to the end. I said as much to the superintendent, but Mrs. Shaw has threatened legal action.”

“On what grounds—”

“I know,” Packett said, holding up a hand to quiet Melissa’s protestations. “There are no actual legal grounds. Unfortunately, in this case, that doesn’t really matter. It’s all about the optics.”

***

For the first several weeks of the musical, Melissa sat in one of the back rows of the auditorium, if she sat down at all. One afternoon in February, Evelyn called out, “Sit next to me, Mrs. Miller,” and that was that. In the span of two years, Melissa had gone from occasional parent volunteer to a seat next to the director.

Though she was very aware this was middle school, the fact that she was now Evelyn’s right hand—taking notes, giving feedback, making decisions—felt both thrilling and absurd. She hadn’t done a musical in thirty years. And yet she felt home, like she’d finally landed where she belonged after years adrift. She believed she’d eventually be found out for being nothing more than a former theatre kid living vicariously through middle schoolers, but for now she worked harder at this role than she ever had at any of her real jobs.

After getting Lenny water and fresh air during that rehearsal on the first Friday in March, she took her seat next to Evelyn. The actors onstage were mid-scene, so she scribbled in her notebook: Lenny getting air outside, maybe dehydrated. Then she nudged Evelyn and pointed at the words. Evelyn nodded distractedly and turned back to the stage.

“Stop!” she yelled. “Look at where you are right now. No, look down. Is that your mark? And Davis, I can see you behind the curtain!”

Evelyn was gruff and—by her own account—not everyone’s cup of tea. The kids loved her, though, probably because she was honest with them. She didn’t tiptoe; she didn’t speak the way other teachers and administrators did, as if they might turn to dust if treated like the fully formed people they actually were. She told them what she thought, what she knew, and they respected her for it, even if they feared her a little in the process. It worked: they became better performers.

“Mrs. Miller, Lenny needs you.” Alice had appeared next to Melissa’s seat, stage whispering as the scene continued onstage. “She’s in the hallway.”

With a heavy sigh, the kids were all used to and didn’t take it personally, Evelyn handed Melissa her notebook. “Let me handle this,” she said. Melissa started to speak but then turned her attention to the stage, where the music director was coaching the ensemble through a bit of choreography that should have been simple, but it was five-thirty on a Friday and jazz pivots were more than many of them could wrap their tapped-out brains around. She noticed Alice reenter from stage left and murmur something to a girl named Juliette, who brought a hand up to her mouth in response. They were completely oblivious to the pivots.

Her phone buzzed then, and Melissa glanced down. A text lit up the screen. “Come to the hallway,” it read, from Evelyn. “Now.”

***

Lenny didn’t feel nauseous, but she had the same feeling as when she’d had a stomach bug—inevitably, something was coming up. She held the sides of the chair she was sitting on to stop her hands from trembling, to quell the urge rising in her chest, but she felt powerless.

“What’s going on, honey?” Mrs. V had asked her as she strode down the hallway from the stage doors. She pulled up a chair and sat knees-to-knees with Lenny. She’d asked Alice to get Mrs. Miller, but she should’ve known Mrs. V was not one to share the spotlight.

“I’m just thirsty,” Lenny said. “I forgot to drink anything today.”

“What?” Mrs. V barked. “All I do is tell you guys to hydrate. This is ridiculous.”

“I...I had a tough week.” Lenny heard the tremor in her own voice.

Mrs. V’s head tilted as she locked eyes with her. She pulled her phone from the back pocket of her pants and tapped quickly before putting it back. “Listen,” she said, her voice quieter now, her hands resting on Lenny’s knees. “I know this role is a big jump for you this year, but you’re killing it. You’re gonna be phenomenal. But you need to take care of yourself. You really need to, kiddo.”

Mrs. V called everyone kiddo, and Lenny loved it. It reminded her of Miss Amy, her first preschool teacher. She’d only been four, and Lenny wasn’t sure how much of what she remembered was fact and how much she’d filled in with her imagination, but she had a memory of never wanting to join circle time—she was frozen around other kids, always—and Miss Amy would leave a spot next to her open, pat the carpet and call to her, “Come on, kiddo! We’re not a full circle without you!”

She’d made Miss Amy call her to circle so many times.

“Hey,” Mrs. Miller said, coming down the same hallway Mrs. V had walked through a few minutes before. She was a little out of breath. “What’s going on?”

“This girl hasn’t had anything to drink all day,” Mrs. V said. “I think she’s not taking good care of herself.”

“Well, that’s not okay,” Mrs. Miller said gently, and Lenny felt her eyes fill with tears. She pulled a mini candy bar out of her pocket and handed it to her. “Comfort food?” Mrs. Miller said with a wink, and—as Lenny had predicted—everything came up.

***

Melissa had grown familiar with almost all of the students in the cast since January when rehearsals started. At first, she didn’t know how she’d keep all their names straight or remember faces. She felt awkward, too, unsure of how to be around so many middle schoolers. She’d had two of her own, but that was different. Here, at the musical, she was new. Even though many of the kids recognized her, she was an outsider. She had to earn their trust. Somehow, by keeping her head down and doing the work, she had.

Most of the kids fawned over Evelyn with a mix of admiration and brown-nosing, but a few had taken to Melissa, always greeting her, always finding questions to ask her. Melissa thought of herself as the security blanket. Evelyn was the fearless leader, the one who could make a kid’s day with her compliments or induce tears with her criticism. Melissa was the doer, writing emails, hanging posters, making phone calls, organizing volunteers. She was the keeper of the details, the question-answerer, and, especially among the anxiety crowd—there were so many these days—she was a source of comfort. She could provide information that eased their racing minds.

Lenny was one of the few kids Melissa could never get a good read on. She hung out mostly with Alice and one or two other girls and kept her distance from the adults. Melissa couldn’t recall Lenny seeming happy or at ease very often, but most middle school students who were inclined to get on stage were often moody and dramatic.

“I don’t understand,” she said to Packett in his office Tuesday morning. “What does ‘optics’ have to do with anything? This girl was being abused at home. How am I—”

“That’s what Lenora said,” Packett interrupted her. “That’s what she told you. Nothing has been proven. And her mother strongly disputes the accusation.”

Melissa felt hollowed out. It hadn’t dawned on her that Lenny would have made that up. How could she have made it up? She’s an actress. Jack hadn’t said that in the car Friday night, but she could hear him saying it in her head now. Jesus, what had she done?

But no, no—she remembered her training: the 47-minute low-budget video she’d had to watch and take a quiz on before being hired by the district. “It’s not up to me to determine whether a student is lying,” she said. “That’s up to protective services.”

Packett ran both hands over his face and exhaled deeply. “If that’s all you had done, you’d have an excellent point. But Mrs. Shaw found a message from you in her daughter’s phone.”

Melissa rolled her eyes to the ceiling.

“And,” Packett said.

She snapped her eyes back to his. “And?”

“There’s video. Security footage. Of you hugging Lenora.”

Melissa waited.

“It’s just the two of you in the hallway. Alone.”

She was suddenly nauseous. “Are you—accusing me of...” She couldn’t form the words.

“No, no,” Packett said. “It’s clear that you were comforting a child. But with the legal action Mrs. Shaw is threatening, all of this—the phone message, the video, the things Mrs. Shaw is saying you told her child...that’s where the optics come in.”

Melissa sat still in the chair opposite the principal. She thought of all the hours she’d spent at this school the last few months. All the dinners she hadn’t made, the chores and appointments she’d blown off because she was busy with the musical. And now it would be for nothing. Then she thought of Lenny’s voice Friday night, quavering but rushing, like someone had blown a hole through a dam. She’d handed the girl a mini-Snickers—was that on video, too?—and Lenny had doubled over in the metal folding chair, as if Melissa had punched her in the stomach. As her head hung down, Lenny pulled off her wig, then the skull cap. The hair underneath was matted and sweaty.

“Len?” Evelyn had said. She’d glanced at Melissa quickly, a question. What’s this? Before they could finish their telepathic conversation, Lenny sat up and said, “I wish I was dead.”

***

The last time Lenny had felt as reckless and relieved was when she sneaked two bottles of her dad’s beer from the garage fridge a few months before. Trina was in the dining room, helping Lenny’s little sister with her homework, her voice gentle, encouraging. Lenny smuggled the bottles upstairs in the kangaroo pocket of her oversized hoodie, keeping a few fingers between them so they wouldn’t clink. She drank both quickly, one after the other, sitting cross-legged on the floor of her bedroom. When the belches bubbled up, she clamped her hand over her mouth. As she tucked the empty bottles into a pair of tall boots in her closet, the most pleasant dizziness settled in her head. She stretched out on her bed and wondered what Trina would say if she burst through her door and smelled the Michelob on her breath. Lenny realized she wanted her to. She imagined herself laughing in Trina’s red, irate face. I don’t care, she’d whispered to the ceiling, wanting to scream the words at her mother. I just don’t fucking care.

Mrs. V and Mrs. Miller were staring at her, and Lenny knew she’d shocked them. Telling adults that you wanted to die always got attention, but as she went on, as she tried to answer their stunned and frantic “Why?” they seemed to believe what she was telling them, which shocked her. That was always her fear: not being believed. She’d said it out loud to them: “I wish sometimes Trina hit me, because then I’d have something to show for it. I’d have evidence.”

Both women winced when she said this, and Lenny felt guilty for wishing such a thing, but she’d decided it would be easier that way. Hitting kids was objectively wrong. The things her mother yelled and growled and whispered and said conversationally might be wrong, but they also might be right. That’s where Lenny struggled. She didn’t know if she was as bad as Trina said she was. That’s really what she wanted to know. She needed someone to confirm or deny it. That was the only way to decide what would come next.

“Lenny,” Mrs. Miller said. “This is—I’m so sorry. I’m sorry you’ve had to endure this.”

Mrs. V was oddly quiet. Had Lenny rendered her speechless? She’d have to tell Alice.

“It’s not okay, what your mom has been....” Mrs. Miller shook her head quickly. “You don’t deserve it.”

Then she talked about seeing the school counselor, and Lenny felt panic rise in her throat. What had she expected? To be rescued? To be adopted? She was so stupid. Rehearsal had ended, and the cast and crew streamed down the hallway, a few of them openly staring. Lenny focused on the wig in her hands, combing her fingers through its synthetic strands.

“Listen,” Mrs. Miller was saying, working her pen across the paper on her clipboard. “This is my number. If you feel like you might—do something...permanent...over the weekend, please call me. Anytime. I will pick up.” Lenny took the torn-off scrap and walked to the choir room to put her wig on its head-shaped stand. The sweat from her palm made the ink run a little, but she could still read “Mrs. M” and her number with a small heart underneath. She folded the paper three times and shoved it deep into her jeans pocket.

***

Melissa hadn’t picked up. Of course, she hadn’t known it was Lenny calling the next afternoon. She had been at the grocery store and felt her phone vibrating in her purse, but by the time she dug it out, the call was missed. The area code was out of state.

A few hours later, a text came through from the same number: Thank you for everything, Mrs. M. Melissa was confused at first and then sucked in a sharp breath. Lenny? she’d written. Yeah was the reply.

Her thumbs were hovering over the keyboard when Jack leaned into her shoulder on the couch and looked at her screen. “Don’t write anything else,” he said. “You reported it. That’s all you can do.”

This time she knew he was right. She felt, in a way, that she’d betrayed Lenny. She worried about repercussions the girl would face at home if protective services actually followed through. But she believed the repercussions they would both face if she didn’t make the report could be worse. Melissa put down her phone and left Lenny hanging. There had been no more messages.

***

“What about Evelyn?” Melissa asked Packett in his office. “She was there; she heard what Lenny said.”

“She didn’t give Lenora her number,” he said. “She didn’t hug the girl with no other adults present.”

“So, I have dinner reservations in a half-hour,” Evelyn had said after Lenny walked away. Melissa told her to go, that she could handle turning off the stage lights and the soundboard. And she could make the call. She’d just walked out of the auditorium and was digging through her bag for her phone to text Jack when she heard a door open. Lenny emerged from the choir room, coat and backpack on. The girl gave a small wave, the skin under her eyes still blotchy and an uncertain expression on her face. She turned toward the exit, then stopped. After a beat, she spun abruptly, walked quickly toward Melissa, and somewhat awkwardly threw her arms around her. The girl’s hold was strong; Melissa tried to return the hug, but her own arms were pinned against her sides.

“I love you, Mrs. Miller,” Lenny whispered, and Melissa pulled her head back to look at Lenny’s face, but the girl was already jogging down the hallway, her backpack zippers clicking in sync.

***

“So, what happens now?” Melissa asked Packett. The sun was streaming through his exterior office windows at an angle that illuminated a layer of dust on his horizontal blinds. She felt it was a metaphor somehow—but for what?

Packett sighed. “There’s a letter you need to sign from the school district, confirming your termination, and then I’ll talk with Evelyn about—”

“To Lenny,” Melissa said. “ I meant what happens now to Lenny.”

Packett had the decency to look chastened. “Oh. Well.” He ran a hand over his head. “A social worker is scheduled for a home visit with the family this afternoon. That same social worker was here first thing this morning to talk with Lenny—Lenora. Beyond that, I don’t know.”

Melissa nodded. She wondered whether Lenny would show up at rehearsal after school and then realized she wouldn’t know. She’d have to ask Evelyn. If Evelyn was still allowed to talk to her. Melissa didn’t know the rules now. The impact of her dismissal began to spread like the arms of an amorphous sea creature. She thought about missing dress rehearsal, the pre-curtain traditions in the choir room on show days, the staff speeches in between the matinee and the evening performance, the set strike and cast party. Who would take over ticket sales and oversee the concession tables?

She felt the pinprick of tears and turned her head away from Packett. Like hell she would cry in his office. She inhaled and focused her gaze to the secretary’s desk, visible through the glass walls. Beyond the desk were more glass walls, and Melissa could see that classes were changing. Eighth graders bumped and shuffled through the hallway. She never knew if Lenny had been waiting there, aware of what was happening in the principal’s office and hoping to catch a view, but there she was. Melissa locked eyes with the girl, who looked so different from how she had looked Friday night in the hallway outside the auditorium. The tears and fear had been replaced by something vacant.

Melissa stared for a moment, then turned away.