The lights dim.
“Hey, Eggs. Can you hear me?”
I crack my eyes open again. Dad sits beside the bed. Mom moves back over to him from the light switch on the other side of the room. I swallow against the sandpaper in my mouth.
“Yeah.”
They both smile. Mom passes a hand over her face.
“What happened?” I ask.
“You tripped in the cafeteria at school and hit your head on a table.” Dad motions to my forehead. I don’t have to reach up and touch it to know there’s a bandage there. “Bled all over the place, I guess. How do you feel?”
“Head hurts,” I say. “Obviously.”
“Were you feeling okay when you left the house this morning?” Mom asks. “Did you eat your breakfast?”
I don’t say anything, because the reason I passed out finally comes back to me, and that squeezing hand hovers around me again. It threatens. My lungs seize in anticipation.
They told everyone about LadyConstellation. My whole school knows. The wholetownshipknows.
Wallace knows.
“How long has it been?” I ask.
“Since the cafeteria?” Dad looks at his watch. “Maybe an hour and a half? They didn’t want to take a chance with a head injury, so they got you in an ambulance and rushed you over here. The doctor should be back to check on you any time now.”
“You told them. You put it in the paper.” Tears blur my vision. The room spins, but I’m still lying down.
“Told them—what, you mean the graduation issue?” Mom blinks at me, then looks at Dad. “That’s only theStar, Eliza, no one really reads it. We didn’t think it would matter if we mentioned the webcomic. And you love it so much—and we really are proud of you for it. We thought—”
“Millionsof people read it, though! The comic!” I struggle to sit up, hoping that will alleviate the dizziness. It doesn’t. “Millions of people! Some of them live here!”
They’re going to find me. They’re going to know who I am and they’re going to find me.
“Eggs.” Dad puts a hand on my shoulder to push me back down, worry etched into his face. I don’t think he heard what I just said.
“Wallacelives here,” I say, shoving his hand off. “Where is he? He didn’t come here, did he?” He can’t see me like this.
Mom frowns. “He didn’t know? I assumed you had already told him.”
“Of course Wallace didn’t know! No one does!”
I swing my legs over the edge of the bed and feel suddenly light-headed, as if seconds away from fainting.
The door opens and a doctor strides in. The nameHARRISis stitched onto his coat. When he sees me there, he drops his file on the desk and hurries over.
“Eliza, are you feeling okay?” Dr. Harris gently pushes me back onto the bed.
“Can’t breathe,” I say. “Dizzy.”
“Youcanbreathe. Breathe deep. In your stomach.” He lifts my legs up and pushes my head between them. I breathe the way he says and after a minute the light-headedness goes away and the room stops spinning. “You’re okay in here. It’s just you and me and your parents. Okay?”
“Yeah.”
The white noise machine hums softly in the corner. The grip on my insides loosens.
“You suffered a pretty nasty cut to your forehead,” Dr. Harris says, “so you might have a little scar once that heals. Is this the same way you felt in the cafeteria, before you fell?”
