“How long can a dissociative state last?”

“It depends. Peter could have been dissociating for several hours.”

“Hours?” Jordan repeated.

“Absolutely. There’s no point during the shootings that illustrates to me conscious awareness of his actions.”

Jordan glanced at the prosecutor. “We all saw a video where Peter sat down after firing shots in the cafeteria and ate a bowl of cereal. Is that meaningful to your diagnosis?”

“Yes. In fact, I can’t think of clearer proof that Peter was still dissociating at that moment. You’ve got a boy who is completely unaware of the fact that he’s surrounded by classmates he’d either killed, wounded, or sent fleeing. He sits down and takes the time to calmly pour a bowl of Rice Krispies, unaffected by the carnage around him.”

“What about the fact that many of the children Peter fired at were not part of what could commonly be called the ‘popular crowd’? That there were special-needs children and scholars and even a teacher who became his victims?”

“Again,” the psychiatrist said, “we’re not talking about rational behavior. Peter wasn’t calculating his actions; at the moment he was shooting, he had separated himself from the reality of the situation. Anyone Peter encountered during those nineteen minutes was a potential threat.”

“In your opinion, when did Peter’s dissociative state end?” Jordan asked.

“When Peter was in custody, speaking to Detective Ducharme. That’s when he started reacting normally, given the horror of the situation. He began to cry and ask for his mother-which indicates both a recognition of his surroundings and an appropriate, childlike response.”

Jordan leaned against the rail of the jury box. “There’s been some evidence in this case, Doctor, that Peter wasn’t the only child in the school who was bullied. So why did he react this way to it?”

“Well, as I said, different people have different responses to stress. In Peter’s case, I saw an extreme emotional vulnerability, which, in fact, was the reason he was teased. Peter didn’t play by the codes of boys. He wasn’t a big athlete. He wasn’t tough. He was sensitive. And difference is not always respected-particularly when you’re a teenager. Adolescence is about fitting in, not standing out.”

“How does a child who is emotionally vulnerable wind up one day carrying four guns into a school and shooting twenty-nine people?”

“Part of it is the PTSD-Peter’s response to chronic victimization. But a big part of it, too, is the society that created both Peter and those bullies. Peter’s response is one enforced by the world he lives in. He sees violent video games selling off the shelves at stores; he listens to music that glorifies murder and rape. He watches his tormentors shove him, strike him, push him, demean him. He lives in a state, Mr. McAfee, whose license plate reads ‘Live Free or Die.’” King shook his head. “All Peter did, one morning, was turn into the person he’d been expected to be all along.”

Nobody knew this, but once, Josie had broken up with Matt Royston.

They had been going out for nearly a year when Matt picked her up one Saturday night. An upperclassman on the football team-someone Brady knew-was having a party at his house. You up for it? Matt had asked, even though he’d already been driving there when he asked her.

The house had been pulsing like a carnival by the time they arrived, cars parked on the curb and the sidewalk and the lawn. Through the upstairs windows, Josie could see people dancing; as they walked up the driveway, a girl was throwing up in the bushes.

Matt didn’t let go of her hand. They twined through wall-to-wall bodies, embroidering their path to the kitchen, where the keg was set up, and then back to the dining room, where the table had been tipped on its side to create a bigger dance floor. The kids they passed were not only from Sterling High, but other towns, too. Some had the red-rimmed, loose-jawed stare that came from smoking pot. Guys and girls sniffed at each other, circling for sex.

She didn’t know anyone, but that wasn’t important, because she was with Matt. They pressed closer, in the heat of a hundred other bodies. Matt slid his leg between hers while the music beat like blood, and she lifted up her arms to fit herself against him.

Everything had gone wrong when she went to use the bathroom. First, Matt had wanted to follow her-he said it wasn’t safe for her to be alone. She finally convinced him it would take all of thirty seconds, but as she started off, a tall boy wearing a Green Day shirt and a hoop earring turned too quickly and spilled his beer on her. Oh, shit, he’d said.

It’s okay. Josie had a tissue in her pocket; she took it out and started to blot her blouse dry.

Let me, the boy said, and he took the napkin from her. At the same time they both realized how ridiculous it was trying to soak up that much liquid with a tiny square of Kleenex. He started laughing, and then she did, and his hand was still lightly resting on her shoulder when Matt came up and punched him in the face.

What are you doing! Josie had screamed. The boy was out cold on the floor, and other people were trying to get out of the way but stay close enough to see the fight. Matt grabbed her wrist so hard that she thought it was going to snap. He dragged her out of the house and into the car, where she sat in stony silence.

He was just trying to help, Josie said.

Matt put the car into reverse and lurched backward. You want to stay? You want to be a slut?

He’d started to drive like a lunatic-running red lights, taking corners on two wheels, doubling the speed limit. She told him to slow down three times, and then she just closed her eyes and hoped it would be over soon.

When Matt had screeched to a stop in front of her house, she turned to him, unusually calm. I don’t want to go out with you anymore, she had said, and she got out of the car. His voice trailed her to the front door: Good. Why would I want to go out with a fucking whore, anyway?

She had managed to slip by her mother, feigning a headache. In the bathroom, she’d stared at herself in the mirror, trying to figure out who this girl was who had suddenly grown such a backbone, and why she still felt like crying. She’d lain in her bed for an hour, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes, wondering why-if she’d been the one to end it-she felt so miserable.

When the phone rang after three in the morning, Josie grabbed it and hung it up again, so that when her mother picked up, she would assume it had been a wrong number. She held her breath for a few seconds, and then lifted the receiver and punched in *69. She knew, even before she saw the familiar string of numbers, that it was Matt.

Josie, he had said, when she called back. Were you lying?

About what?

Loving me?

She had pressed her face into the pillow. No, she whispered.

I can’t live without you, Matt had said, and then she heard something that sounded like a bottle of pills being shaken.

Josie had frozen. What are you doing?

What do you care?

Her mind had started racing. She had her driver’s permit, but couldn’t take the car out herself, and not after dark. She lived too far away from Matt to run there. Don’t move, she said. Just…don’t do anything.

Downstairs in the garage, she’d found a bicycle she hadn’t ridden since she was in middle school, and she pedaled the four miles to Matt’s house. By the time she got there, it had been raining; her hair and her clothes were glued to her skin. The light was still on in Matt’s bedroom, which was on the first floor. Josie knocked on the window, and he opened it so that she could crawl inside.

On his desk was a bottle of Tylenol and another one, open, of Jim Beam. Josie faced him. Did you-

But Matt wrapped his arms around her. He smelled of liquor. You told me not to. I’d do anything for you. Then he had pulled back from her. Would you do anything for me?