Friends with Boys #[nn]

In "null," ninth-grader Maggie navigates her first year of high school, stepping into the same halls her older brothers once did—though she’s far from ready. Haunted by the silent presence of a sorrowful 19th-century ghost and grappling with her mother’s sudden departure after teaching her eighth grade, Maggie struggles to find her place in a world that feels both unfamiliar and strangely familiar.

In "null," Maggie finds herself drawn into the quiet orbit of Lucy and Alistair, two outsiders whose presence unsettles the familiar rhythms of her high school world. As she watches Alistair linger on the edges of both Mark’s athletic crowd and her brother Daniel’s theater circle, she begins to wonder what it means to truly belong—or to exist apart.

In "null," Lucy shares a haunting local legend about a ship that arrived in port empty, save for a captain’s artificial hand now on display in the town museum. When Maggie and her friends steal it in hopes of freeing the ghost, their plan unravels when Mark and his crew steal it from them—leading to a tense chain of thefts, confrontations, and quiet revelations. As Maggie’s brothers step into the mystery, the ghost’s presence grows clearer, weaving a fragile bond between three teens and the past they never knew they shared.