Summary

Aza Holmes, a 16-year-old student at White River High School in Indianapolis, is eating lunch with her friends, Daisy Ramirez and Mychal Turner. Mychal is talking about an art project he is working on, but Aza is distracted by thoughts of the microbes in her body that assist in digesting her food. She thinks about the bacterial infection Clostridium difficile (C. diff.) and wonders if she has it. As a coping mechanism for her anxiety, Aza presses her thumbnail into the pad of her middle finger, where a callus has built up from years of doing this. Daisy brings up a boy Aza was friends with years ago, Davis Pickett, and mentions that his wealthy CEO father was about to be arrested on charges of corporate malfeasance when he disappeared. The authorities are offering a $100,000 reward for information about him. Daisy then asks...