There were seven girls ages 9-16 left in the dorm at the American Community School in Beirut, Lebanon, over the Thanksgiving break. It was past nine, our curfew. I peek down the hall, anyone sneaking out of their rooms? What are those sounds coming from Miss Moore’s faculty apartment?

I creep over, put my ear to her door. Sobbing? What should I do? If a teacher’s door is closed, you knock only if you have an emergency. I’m not having one.

I sidle down the hallway, knock on Gaby and Vicki’s door. “Can I come in?”

Gaby, round faced with corkscrewed dirty blond hair, looks up from her bed.

“Something’s wrong with Miss Moore, come on!” We hunch at her door. Vicki’s lips tremble, she whimpers. I pull her and Gaby into my room. We make a plan. They’ll hide in my closet. As the oldest, I rap softly on the door. When Miss Moore opens it, her eyes radiate red like she was in a photo taken with a flash.

“Are you OK?” I blurt out.

“It’s nothing … about me,” … a gasp … deep breath ... “Something terrible happened in the States.”

“Oh no.” Had we been nuked by the Russians? Air shudders in and out of her chest.

“What?” I implore.

“I can’t ... I can’t tell you,” she says beseechingly. Gaby and Vicki peer around the doorway of my room. Miss Moore doesn’t seem to care that they’re in my room, usually an immediate ten demerits. “Knox will meet with us after breakfast … we’ll know more then.”

Meeting with the headmaster, know more then? Clearly she knows something now.

“Girls, go to bed,” Miss Moore orders. “You’ll need a good night’s sleep.” She closes her door. A good night’s sleep for what?

I say to Gaby and Vicki, “Get the other girls. Bring blankets, flashlights. Sneak back here with your shortwave radio.”

I strip bedspreads from the bunks, pile stacks of books on one end of them on top of my desk, unfurl them over chairs. The six other girls arrive. We stretch thicker blankets on top of our “tent” so no light shows. We crawl underneath, turn on the radio. Newscasts on every station. We twirl the dial — announcers speaking rapidly in Arabic and French — no English. For hours we translate, puzzle-piece together: Texas, in a car, shot, trying to save him, blood, Jackie. Kennedy died at 1 p.m. CST. We sob like Miss Moore; keep listening, was Jackie OK, Caroline, John Jr.?

I slip out from under the blankets, retrieve my stash of Jordan almonds, but no one eats. Around four in the morning, the last of the girls falls asleep, feet sticking out of our tent. I crawl over them, slide open the door to the balcony; sit huddled in a blanket as the Mediterranean swooshes over and over, the sun rises and spreads its light across the sea. Kennedy, young, idealistic, bold, so different from grandfatherly Eisenhower. How could he be dead?

After breakfast, a somber Dr. Knox comes into the dining hall and tells us the news. We try to act surprised, but are too upset and exhausted to fake it. I get a message that my older brother, a student at the American University of Beirut and his Saudi roommate are waiting for me in the lobby. I run to them; we cling to each other. The receptionist on duty, Miss Asfour, motions me over. Breaking all the rules, she says, “Go out with your brother. Just be back in two hours.”

Men and women in tears mob us, “We’re so sorry!” “Such a good man!” Passersby walk with arms around one another, holding each other up. Most shops are closed. There’s little traffic. We head back. Brian’s roommate buys a newspaper in Arabic and French, presses it into my hands.

In my room that night, afraid for my country, its future. No way to reach my friends, parents. I open my wooden scrapbook from home, stare at photos where we’re in civil rights demonstrations in Seattle. Impossible. What can demonstrations do when Kennedy can be murdered in broad daylight? I slam the scrapbook down on the floor. You Can Survive Atomic Attack flies out of the Mad magazine I had stashed it in. Mom and her government pamphlets. Always prepared. Nothing prepared me for this.

Or for the killings now in the Middle East.

Kennedy’s words June 10, 1963: “And is not peace, in the last analysis, basically a matter of human rights — the right to live out our lives without fear of devastation … the right of future generations to a healthy existence? … Confident and unafraid, we must labor on — not towards a strategy of annihilation but towards a strategy of peace.”

How might the world be different if he had lived? What will we and our leaders do now?

Janine Roberts, professor emerita at UMass Amherst, lives in Leverett.