As soon as we spotted Mr. Donahue’s car, we hustled to it and found Lucy crouched in the front passenger seat. Ben opened the door and held it as Janie and I climbed inside. Behind us, we heard the reporters vie breathlessly for attention. “Mr. Donahue, sir, can we get a comment on the situation with your new home?”

I turned to see Ben shaking his head even as his dad rolled down his window. “No comment,” Mr. Donahue declared. And then he pressed a button so the window rose up.

When I tried to buckle my seat belt, I noticed my hands shaking and looked up at Ben to see his jaw set rigid in anger. When he spoke, his barely contained rage flared at his father. “Why not comment? I mean, you called them, right?”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. And you’re emotional.”

“Yeah—I’m a little emotional. So is Janie. And Olivia, who is trembling and has absolutely nothing to do with this circus. Did you think about any of us, Dad? Lucy, how are you doing?”

“I’m fine. I’m certainly not overreacting.” Lucy glanced up at her dad.

“Oh no. It’s not overreacting—” Ben started.

But Lucy cut him off. “I would think you’d be used to scenes like that.”

That jab landed. Ben grimaced and spat out, “Great job, sis. Now you get to be the favorite.”

But Lucy only laughed. “Don’t be silly. I’ve always been the favorite.”

Next to me, Janie stared out the window.

“Just to be clear,” Mr. Donahue said, “I have no idea how the press got ahold of our story. Your mother and I filed a lawsuit at the courthouse this morning. There must be some kind of case log reviewed by the local news.” Mr. Donahue looked back at me. “Olivia, I apologize that you got caught up in that. I thought you might have cross-country practice after school.”

“Not on the first day.” My voice came out in a whisper. Even that embarrassed me.

Ben was not ready to let the matter go. “Well, they sure got people out to our school pretty fast. You know, for a local news story.”

“It’s compelling stuff. They’re just doing their job—bringing news to the people.” Mr. Donahue hit his blinker and we turned onto Olcott Place. Behind us, two vans turned too. “I will be honest; press doesn’t hurt us. We’re not the ones with anything to hide. And unfortunately, people sometimes need to be forced to do the right thing. Harrington’s will settle faster if their reputation is on the line.”

“And the Langsoms?”

“The Langsoms will take care of the Langsoms. They had every opportunity to disclose those letters. Don’t ask me to feign sympathy for a family who willingly put my family in danger. My children.”

Ben snorted.

“We understand, Dad,” Lucy said, looking back at Ben as if she dared him to say different. “It’s just that we were all nervous already about starting a new school.”

“I hear that. As I said before, I have absolutely no idea how they knew to go up to the high school this afternoon. But you handled yourselves with maturity and grace. All of you. I could not be more proud. We have the police investigating these letters, and if the press wants to add to the pressure, I can only think that will lead to a break in the case.” Mr. Donahue pulled the car into the drive. The vans behind us parked on the street in front of their house. “Who cares if we’re on the local news? There’s no reason to feel ashamed that people are paying attention to what happens in their community. We are not the criminals here.”

“Really?” Lucy asked. “Ben doesn’t count as a criminal anymore?”

“Lucybelle,” Mr. Donahue admonished. “Let’s remember that we’re all on the same team.” And then, as if he suddenly remembered that I didn’t exactly qualify, Mr. Donahue met my eyes. “Olivia, if I had dropped you off, those vans would have just parked at your house. I didn’t want to compromise your family’s privacy.”

Another snort from Ben, but I said “Thank you” in a politely firm way that would have made my mother proud.

“Here’s how we’ll handle this. Lucy, Ben, and Janie, when you get out of the car, I want you to go straight to the house. Have your keys out and ready. Olivia, I’m sure your parents are eager to hear about your first day. You should take the opportunity to walk directly and briskly to your home. Any reporters will have focused their attention on the kids and our house.”

“Olivia can’t come over?” Janie seemed to suddenly wake up.

“Why would Olivia want to come over?” Ben asked, and I thought that he possibly didn’t understand me at all.

But it’s not like I could sit there and argue. “Your dad’s right. I mean, my mom wants me home. I’m sure she’s dying to hear how everything went.”

“Maybe she saw some of it on TV!” Ben spoke with fake cheer.

“Call me if you need me,” I told Janie.

“Everyone ready? Let’s give it a count of three. And don’t worry—I’ll step in, if needed, and make a short statement. That will buy us all enough time to get inside.”

“Dad, that’s really selfless of you.” I could hear the disdain in Ben’s voice.

But Mr. Donahue didn’t take the bait. “Ready? One. Two. Three.” He popped the trunk and the rest of us opened our doors. I slid out Janie’s side, squeezed her shoulder, grabbed my backpack, and headed home.

Behind me, I heard the surge of cameras and questions. Not a tidal wave or anything, but still. I walked briskly, my head bent, ready to muscle my way past. But no one noticed me.

“We hope to resolve this situation quickly and fairly.” Mr. Donahue carefully enunciated his words. “If any of you have kids, I’m sure you know that my only concern is for their safety. My wife feels the same. We love our new community. But we never imagined that purchasing our dream home would put the lives of our children in danger.” From my own steps, I could see him preening. “Thank you. We will have no further comment at this time.” And then Mr. Donahue stepped back into the house and the heavy black door of 16 Olcott seemed to swallow him up.

I waited on the steps while the camera guys wound up their cords and the reporters compared notes. No one appeared worried about being scooped. “You guys using this?” one of the women reporters asked the other.

That one shrugged. “We’ll see how it reads.”

“It’s going to read as canned.”

They chuckled. “You can’t make this stuff up.”

“Maybe you can.” The two reporters laughed. But I still didn’t understand the joke. It took my mom and Aunt Jillian to explain that some people believed that Mr. Donahue had concocted the whole thing.

“Adults don’t always make the right choices,” Jillian told me later after dinner. She’d rushed right over after we were on the local news. Or, rather, the Donahue family and a sliver of my shoulder and backpack were on the news.

“The whole thing baffles me, Jill,” Mom said. “What’s the point of the press at the school? Why not just hold court in his driveway?”

“It reinforces the idea that the kids are young and vulnerable.” Aunt Jillian spoke with an unfamiliar authority. My eyes must have widened because she laughed. “If there’s one thing I know well, Olivia, it is the bizarre and brainless behavior of man-children. I know you feel close to Janie and her brother, but their father definitely qualifies as a man-child.” Another, darker look washed over her face. “Speak of the devil.” She crossed over to stare out our window.

“Oh, for goodness’ sake.” My mother sighed. “As if we needed any more drama today.”

The drama she spoke of had arrived in the form of Ned McGovern, who had started yelling at Janie’s house even before he’d finished slamming his car door. “Donahue! Donahue! Gavin Donahue, get out here.”

“Well, this promises to be a regular meeting of the minds,” my dad said dryly.

“Oh no,” Jillian murmured.

“This is not your circus, Jill.”

“I know, I know. But there are kids involved. Are those two even supposed to be in contact? Isn’t there a restraining order in place?”

“Not for Ned.” I spoke up before realizing that none of them wanted to know I knew about that stuff. Three sets of concerned eyes narrowed at me at once. “That’s just what I’ve overheard anyway.”

The drama played on, right outside our window. Ned McGovern first stood on the Donahues’ lawn and then he charged up the steps. “Come on out and face me like a man!” he yelled, pounding the door with his fist. “Donahue!”

My dad sighed. “Should I go out and talk to him?”

My mom bit her lip and peered out. “I think we should stay out of it for now.” She raised her arms up, reached over, and shut the open windows, immediately muffling the sound of Ned’s shouting. Mom’s eyes flickered to my dad as if she expected him to argue. “It’s a shame those reporters left. They’re missing a story.”

“Ned McGovern causing a scene on someone else’s front yard doesn’t exactly count as newsworthy,” Dad replied. Aunt Jillian cringed but didn’t argue. “Olivia, don’t you have homework or something?”

“It’s the first day,” I answered, without peeling my eyes from the window.

“And that means?”

“No one gives homework the first day.” While my dad focused on my scholastic endeavors, Aunt Jillian grabbed the opportunity to head out the front door. Presumably, she figured she’d try to calm Ned before the police made their now daily pilgrimage to Olcott Place.

“Jill! We just talked about this!” Mom called after her. “Honestly!” She looked at us helplessly.

Outside the scene unfolded like a movie with the sound turned off. I watched my aunt march toward Ned as he kept pounding on the Donahues’ front door. When she reached him, Jillian grabbed Ned’s wrist mid-swing and he spun around to face her.

I could tell my dad thought Ned might hit her. He tensed up and headed to the door. Ned gestured to the Donahue house and I saw Jillian shake her head furiously. She tugged at his arm, pulling him toward his car. Just as she reached over and opened the driver’s-side door, her head swung up and Mr. McGovern started struggling against her all over again. That’s when Dad arrived, leaving our front door gaping open, with me and Mom right there to hear.

“Hey, Gavin, stay inside.” Dad sounded nonchalant. “We’ve got everything under control here.”

“It doesn’t look that way,” Mr. Donahue called out from behind his screen door.

“Please, just stay inside,” implored Aunt Jillian. I moved to step outside but my mom placed a firm hand on my shoulder. I noticed she didn’t shut the door, though. We both stood there watching and listening.

“You’re going to name me in a lawsuit? Are you serious? If you wanted out of this sale you had every opportunity—the hours I put in,” Mr. McGovern spat and sputtered.

“You neglected to mention the house came with its own stalker, McGovern. I’d call that nondisclosure.”

“You don’t know what you’ve done. This is my livelihood. You have a problem with the seller’s disclosure, fine. Then we go back to negotiations. But to hold me personally liable—”

“Just business.” And then, maybe because he heard how that came off as cold and unsympathetic, Janie’s dad added, “Really, I’m trying to protect my family.” That became the refrain we heard Mr. Donahue repeat to anyone who would listen. He said it again as Dad and Jillian loaded Mr. McGovern into his car. Later I’d read it in our local newspaper and then national magazines.

The Detroit Tribune came out with its headline: “Unreal Estate: Dream Home Becomes Family’s Nightmare.” Buzzbot ran a list: “10 Haunting Sentences from the Sentry’s Letters.” It took all of two days for the British tabloids to latch on to the story, with breathless accounts of death threats and a description of the Langsom house fit for a gothic novel. When Entertainment America picked up the story, it led with the image of Mr. Donahue standing on the front porch of 16 Olcott, his arms folded across his chest, with the familiar quote plastered below: I’m trying to protect my family.

But the more coverage the story garnered, the more vulnerable the Donahues became. Traffic suddenly choked our sleepy street, with cars slowing down in front of 16 Olcott to get a look. Whenever I spotted Ben—in town, in school—he wore a hoodie, his hands in his pockets, hunched over, exposing as little of himself as possible. Lucy wrote draft after draft of her college essay, but bristled when a tour guide recognized her while touring Wesleyan University.

Janie told me she’d overheard her parents fighting—that her mom had come home from the natural food market in tears because the checkout girl, who’d dated one of the older Langsom brothers, refused to ring her up. She avoided restaurants because she was convinced the waitstaff spat in her food. “They hate us, Gavin,” Janie heard her say the afternoon Mrs. Donahue had walked out of a salon, her hair dripping wet, because the ladies there were so hostile.

As far as Janie, it turned out that nothing reverses the tide of ninth-grade opinion as quickly as a lawsuit against the Langsom family. Glennon Heights wasn’t about to let outsiders knock them down.

You couldn’t blame Thatcher. The definition of a Good Guy, you could not have even detected a hardening of his jaw when one of the Donahue kids walked by. His eyes matched his fixed smile even as he stared right through them. He left the casual cruelty of social consequences to the rest of the kids at school.

No one sat with us at lunch. The first day after the news stories broke, Mirabelle at least bothered to look apologetically in our direction, but Brooke and Kaia just wrinkled their noses in disgust. When we arrived at school and tried to make our way to the locker area, people moved aside for me the way you do when you are all rushing around to get to class before the first bell. But no one gave way for Janie. She stood there, in the school entrance, sealed off by a wall of cold shoulders.

Maybe because I grew up in Glennon Heights, it was harder to completely cast me aside. Or maybe I just functioned as a useful contrast. Treating me like I still mattered reminded Janie that she didn’t.

The first day after the lawsuit went like that. Blank, frozen stares. Glowering faces. “Don’t worry about it,” I muttered to Janie under my breath. “The whole town’s gone crazy.”

Janie refused to acknowledge any of it. She threw her elbows around like a power forward driving to the basket. She reached our locker well before the first-period bell rang and spun our combination expertly. “Don’t worry about what?”

All the Donahues steadied and steeled themselves to make it through the day.

But nothing could have prepared us for what happened when we got home from school.