Skin Deep Enough
Copyright© 2026 by Danielle Stories
Chapter 6: Media Storm
Monday dawned not with a bang, but with a buzz.
My phone, which had been a brick of dread for days, exploded at 6:17 a.m. Not calls, but notifications a cascade of them: Twitter, Instagram, news alerts. The sound was like digital rain, a relentless pattering downpour of attention.
I fumbled for it, my heart already in my throat. The screen was a kaleidoscope of headlines:
LOCAL TEEN SUES SCHOOL FOR THE RIGHT TO ATTEND CLASS NAKED
“SPIRIT WEEK” ASSAULT LEADS TO LEGAL BATTLE OVER DRESS CODE
MESA MIRAGE STUDENT: MY BODY IS MY PROTEST
There it was. My name. My story. Reduced to clickbait.
Janelle had warned us, but the reality was a physical blow. I clicked on one from the local NBC affiliate. A file photo of Mesa Mirage High filled the screen, followed by a grainy, zoomed-in still from the video my face blurred but recognizable, contorted in fear. Below was a professional headshot of Janelle Reed from her firm’s website, looking sharp and serious. And then, unbelievably, a photo of me. It was from last year’s yearbook: I was smiling, my hair in a braid, wearing a crewneck sweater. The “Before” picture. The normal girl.
The article was a jumble of half-truths. It mentioned the “alleged assault,” the suspension, and the “unusual lawsuit.” It quoted a single line from my affidavit: “Forcing me to wear clothing is forcing me to participate in a lie.” It ended with a bland, prepared statement from the school district: “We do not comment on pending litigation, but the district maintains its policies are in place to ensure a safe and productive learning environment for all students.”
Safe. Productive. The words were like splinters under my skin.
I scrolled to the comments. They were a familiar sewer, but bigger, more vicious.
Lock her up.
Attention whore.
This is why we need school uniforms.
She needs a psychiatrist, not a lawyer.
Disgusting.
What about the rights of other students not to see that?
And then, amidst the filth, a new kind of comment:
This is a landmark case for bodily autonomy!
You go, girl! Fight the patriarchy!
This is about power and who gets to control women’s bodies!
I was no longer just a local freak. I was a political football. A symbol. People were projecting their ideologies onto my skin without my consent. It was another kind of stripping.
Downstairs, my mother’s phone rang. Then the landline. Then her phone again. She answered one, her voice tight. “No comment. Please refer to our attorney, Janelle Reed.” Click.
The doorbell rang.
I crept to the window. A news van was parked at the curb, a satellite dish on top like a mechanical parasite. A reporter a man with perfectly coiffed hair and a practiced, concerned frown stood on our walkway, a cameraman looming behind him. My mother yanked the front door open before he could ring again.
“This is private property. You need to leave. Now.”
“Ms. Delane, we just want to give Amara a chance to tell her side of the story.”
“Her side is in the legal filing. Now leave, or I will call the police for trespassing.”
She slammed the door. I watched from above as the reporter shrugged, said something to the cameraman, and they retreated to their van. But they didn’t leave. They sat there, a predatory metal insect waiting for movement.
The siege was literal now.
A panic, sharp and animal, rose in my chest. I was trapped. The house was no longer a sanctuary; it was a glass box under a spotlight. I couldn’t go outside. I couldn’t even go downstairs without risking being seen through a window.
I paced my room, the bare floorboards creaking under my feet. The walls felt like they were closing in. The attention, which I had courted in my own defiant way, now felt like a suffocating blanket. This wasn’t a quiet challenge. This was a public evisceration.
My phone buzzed again. A text from Lena:
Holy shit. You’re on the news. You okay?
I typed back, my fingers clumsy. No. Trapped.
Want me to come over? she offered.
They’re watching the house.
Back door. Through the Andersons’ yard. I know a way.
Twenty minutes later, a soft tap came at my bedroom window, which overlooked the side yard. I pulled up the blind. Lena was there, crouched by the oleander bushes, grinning like a commando. I unlocked and slid the window open.
“This is some spy movie shit,” she whispered, hoisting herself up and tumbling into my room. She brushed dirt off her jeans and looked at me. “You look like hell.”
“Thanks.”
“I mean it. You’re pale. You have circles.” She plopped onto my bare mattress. “So. You’re famous.”
“Infamous.”
“Same difference.” She looked around my room at the garbage bag of clothes, the legal petition on the desk, the stripped bed. “They’re talking about it in first period. Bloom made an announcement, ‘no discussing ongoing legal matters.’ Which, of course, made everyone talk about it more. Cynthia and her crew are walking around like they’re celebrities. It’s sick.”
A fresh wave of nausea hit me. They were thriving in the chaos I’d created.
“What are they saying?” I asked, dreading the answer.
Lena shrugged. “The usual. That you’re crazy. That you’re making it up for fame. That the lawsuit proves you just want attention. But...” She hesitated. “Some people are asking questions. Not defending you, exactly, but ... questioning. Like, ‘Why did the school only suspend her?’ ‘What kind of prank is that?’ One guy in my history class said, ‘If the roles were reversed, the guys would be in juvie.’ It got really quiet after that.”
A tiny, fragile spark ignited in the darkness of my panic. It wasn’t support. It was doubt. And doubt in their narrative was a crack I could widen.
“What about you?” I asked. “What do you say?”
Lena met my gaze. “I say they’re scared. They thought you’d crumble. Put on a sweater, take your suspension, and fade away. You didn’t. You lawyered up. You’re fighting back in a language they have to respect. It’s terrifying to them.” She smiled, a fierce, proud thing. “I say keep scaring them.”
Her words were a lifeline. They pulled me back from the edge of pure terror. This was still my fight. The media storm was just weather. I had to learn to stand in the rain.
After Lena slithered back out the window, I went downstairs. My mother was in the kitchen, staring at a coffee cup she wasn’t drinking. The news van was still outside, a constant presence in the corner of the window frame.
“We can’t live like this,” I said.
“We won’t have to,” she replied, her voice thin with fatigue. “Janelle called. She’s holding a press conference tomorrow morning at her office. She wants you there.”
My blood went cold. “On TV? Talking?”
“No. You’ll be there, but you won’t speak. Janelle will make a statement and take a few questions. Your presence is the statement. She says they must see you, not just hear about you. They need to see that you’re a real person, not a headline.”
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