But that hardly mattered, not in the grand scheme of things.

The best item the cafeteria served was Tater Tots, soaked in grease. You could practically feel the waist of your jeans getting snugger and your face breaking out-and yet, when the cafeteria lady held out her massive spoonful, Josie couldn’t resist. She sometimes wondered: If they were as nutritious as broccoli, would she want them so much? Would they taste this good if they weren’t so bad for you?

Most of Josie’s friends only drank diet soda for their meals; getting anything substantial and carbohydrate-based practically labeled you as either a whale or a bulimic. Usually, Josie limited herself to three Tater Tots, and then gave the rest to the guys to devour. But today, she’d practically been salivating for the past two classes just thinking about Tater Tots, and she couldn’t stop taking just one more. If it wasn’t pickles and ice cream, did it still qualify as a craving?

Courtney leaned across the table and swept her finger through the grease that lined the Tater Tot tray. “Gross,” she said. “How come gas is so expensive, when there’s enough oil on these babies to fill Drew’s pickup truck?”

“Different kind of oil, Einstein,” Drew said. “Did you really think you were pumping out Crisco at the Mobil station?”

Josie bent down to unzip her backpack. She had packed herself an apple; it had to be in here somewhere. She rummaged through loose papers and makeup, so focused on her search that she didn’t realize the banter between Drew and Courtney-or anyone else, for that matter-had fallen silent.

Peter Houghton was standing next to their table, holding a brown bag in one hand and an open milk carton in the other. “Hi, Josie,” he said, as if she might be listening, as if she weren’t dying a thousand kinds of death in that one second. “I thought you might like to join me for lunch.”

The word mortified sounded like you’d gone to granite, like you couldn’t move to save your soul. Josie imagined how years from now, students would point to the frozen gargoyle that used to be her, still rooted to the plastic cafeteria chair, and say, Oh, right, I heard about what happened to her.

Josie heard a rustling behind her, but she couldn’t have moved at that moment if her life depended on it. She looked up at Peter, wishing there were some kind of secret language where what you said was not what you meant, and the listener would automatically know you were speaking that tongue. “Um,” Josie began. “I…”

“She’d love to,” Courtney said. “When hell freezes over.”

The entire table dissolved into a fizz of laughter, an inside joke that Peter didn’t understand. “What’s in the bag?” Drew asked. “Peanut butter and jelly?”

“Salt and pepper?” Courtney chimed in.

“Bread and butter?”

The smile on Peter’s face wilted as he realized how deep a pit he’d fallen into, and how many people had dug it. He glanced from Drew to Courtney to Emma and then back at Josie-and when he did, she had to look away, so that nobody-including Peter-would see how much it hurt her to hurt him; to realize that-in spite of what Peter had believed about her-she was no different from anyone else.

“I think Josie should at least get to sample the merchandise,” Matt said, and when he spoke she realized that he was no longer sitting beside her. He was standing, in fact, behind Peter; and in one smooth stroke he hooked his thumbs into the loops of Peter’s pants and yanked them down to his ankles.

Peter’s skin was moon-white under the harsh fluorescent lamps of the cafeteria, his penis a tiny spiral shell on a sparse nest of pubic hair. He immediately covered his genitals with his lunch bag, and as he did, he dropped his milk carton. It spilled on the floor between his feet.

“Hey, look at that,” Drew said. “Premature ejaculation.”

The entire cafeteria began to spin like a carousel-bright lights and harlequin colors. Josie could hear laughter, and she tried to match her own to it. Mr. Isles, a Spanish teacher who had no neck, hurried over to Peter as he was pulling up his pants. He grabbed Matt with one arm and Peter with the other. “Are you two done,” he barked, “or do we need to go see the principal?”

Peter fled, but by that time, everyone in the cafeteria was reliving the glorious moment of his pantsing. Drew high-fived Matt. “Dude, that was the best fucking lunch entertainment I’ve ever seen.”

Josie reached into her backpack, pretending to search for that apple, but she wasn’t hungry anymore. She just didn’t want to see them all right now; to let them see her.

Peter Houghton’s lunch bag was beside her foot, where he’d dropped it when he ran away. She glanced inside. A sandwich, maybe turkey. A bag of pretzels. Carrots, which had been peeled and cut into even strips by someone who cared about him.

Josie slipped the brown bag into her knapsack, telling herself that she’d find Peter and give it back to him, or leave it near his locker, when she knew she would do neither. Instead, she would carry it around until it started to reek, until she had to throw it out and could pretend it was that easy to get rid of.

Peter burst out of the cafeteria and careened down the narrow hallways like a pinball until he finally reached his locker. He fell to his knees and rested his head against the cold metal. How could he have been so stupid, trusting Courtney, thinking Josie might give a rat’s ass about him, thinking he was someone she could fall for?

He banged his head until it hurt, then blindly dialed the numbers on his locker. It swung open, and he reached inside for the photo of himself and Josie. He crushed it into his palm and walked down the hall again.

On the way, he was stopped by a teacher. Mr. McCabe was frowning at him, putting a hand on his shoulder, when surely he could see that Peter couldn’t bear to be touched, that it felt like a hundred needles were going through his skin. “Peter,” Mr. McCabe said, “are you all right?”

“Bathroom,” Peter ground out, and he pushed away, hurrying down the hallway.

He locked himself inside a stall and threw the picture of himself and Josie into the toilet bowl. Then he unzipped his fly and urinated on top of it. “Fuck you,” he whispered, and then he said it loud enough to rattle the walls of the stall. “Fuck you all.”

The minute Josie’s mother left the room, Josie plucked the thermometer out of her mouth and held it up against the lightbulb of her nightstand lamp. She squinted to read the tiny numbers, and then stuck it back into her mouth as she heard her mother’s footsteps. “Hunh,” her mother said, holding the thermometer up to the window to better read it. “I guess you are sick.”

Josie gave what she hoped was a convincing moan and rolled over.

“You sure you’re going to be all right here, alone?”

“Yeah.”

“You can call me if you need me. I can recess court and come back home.”

“Okay.”

She sat down on the bed and kissed her forehead. “You want juice? Soup?”

Josie shook her head. “I think I just need to go back to sleep.” She closed her eyes so that her mother would get the message.

She waited until she heard the car drive away, and even then she stayed in bed for an extra ten minutes to make sure she was alone. Then Josie got out of bed and booted up her computer. She Googled abortifacient-the word she’d looked up yesterday, the one that meant something that terminates a pregnancy.

Josie had been thinking about this. It wasn’t that she didn’t want a baby; it wasn’t even that she didn’t want Matt’s baby. All she knew for certain was that she didn’t want to have to make that decision yet.

If she told her mother, her mom would curse and scream and then find a way to take her to Planned Parenthood or the doctor’s office. To be honest, it wasn’t even the cursing and screaming that worried Josie. It was realizing that-had her own mother done this, seventeen years ago-Josie wouldn’t even be alive to be having this problem.