guessed that was his name in a million years. I mean, it wasnât really his name but he used it so I guess it was his name. Kind of funky, actually. Wolf. Not that I was interested. I wasnât. I didnât have time for guys. Or for girls. I wasnât here to make friends. I had friends. Real friends who cared about me and were probably worried sick about me. Friends I was banned from talking to in this hellhole. All I had time to do was to figure out how I got here and how to get myself back out.
chapter 7 I was always excited to see Annie again after the summer. We always had a million things to talk about. We usually bought each other something new to add to the dragon collection in the summer and would get together the night before school started to exchange gifts and talk about the new year coming up. When the doorbell rang the night before day one of grade ten, I grabbed the dragon T-shirt I had bought Annie on the way home from camp and ran down the stairs to open the door. I couldnât wait to tell her all about the aliens. I knew sheâd have a good laugh over the thought of me in makeup at summer camp. I opened the door, a big smile on my face. Annie was standing on the porch, a bag in her hand and a smile on her face as well. Her hair was tied back from her face with a red scarf that matched her shirt and she was wearing crazy-looking shorts with huge flowers on them. I was about to make a comment about her outfit when Annieâs smile seemed to do an instant flip. âOh my God, Maddie, what happened? Are you all right?â She stepped forward and put a hand on my arm. I looked at her as if sheâd grown two heads. âWhat are you talking about? Of course Iâm all right! Am I bleeding or something?â I patted my face, feeling for large gashes that would panic Annie. âNo, itâs just youâre so thin. You look like youâve lost twenty pounds since I last saw you. Have you had the flu or something?â She didnât step back, like anyone else would have done when wondering if I had some dreadful disease, but leaned in to look at me more carefully. Thatâs the kind of friend she was. âI havenât lost twenty pounds!â I said indignantly, though I admit I was secretly pleased that she might have thought that was possible. âMaybe four or five. Iâve just been watching what I eat a little. I probably grew a bit too. Come on, we have a lot to talk about.â Annie still had her hand on my arm so I just turned around and started walking up the stairs. I didnât want to talk about the whole weight thing with Annie. Even though she was my best friend in the whole world, I didnât really think she would understand. She had never had to worry about her body the way I had. How could she know what it was like? It was really strange that night. We sat in my room like we always did and talked about the same things we always had. She gave me a beautiful dragon made out of soapstone that I added to the collection on my shelf. I gave her the T-shirt that had two dragons holding hands and the slogan âDragons Are Foreverâ on it. She tried it on and we laughed at how big it was on her. We looked at clothes and talked about school and boys. Everything seemed the same as it always had been, except that it just wasnât the same. Every once in a while I would catch Annie looking at me with a strange expression on her face as if wondering what I was thinking. I tried to keep my expression and mind blank so she wouldnât use her seer skills and take a walk inside my mind. I had my first major crush in grade ten. Jesse Grayson. He had his locker about three down from mine. He was definitely part of the cool crowd and way out of my league. I spent most of September dropping books on my foot while trying not to look like I was staring at him. He became my favorite topic of online conversation with Annie when I was supposed to