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finally rolled around and for once she found herself not dreading going to school. As she approached the school building, she noticed Lizzy making her way through the front door on her crutches . . . alone. Where was her usual entourage? They were nowhere to be seen.
    Now she’ll know what it’s like to feel ignored. Emmy thought, barely able to keep the smile off her face. At lunch Emmy glanced over at Lizzy’s usual spot with Sophie and Cadence, but Lizzy wasn’t there. Emmy scanned the lunchroom, trying to find her. She finally saw her eating alone at a table near the corner. She looked miserable. As Emmy got up to bus her tray, she walked slowly by Sophie and Cadence. She could hear their conversation clearly. Being invisible had its benefits.
    â€œWhatever,” Sophie was saying. “If she wants to be weird, let her be weird with other people. She didn’t need to ruin my night.”
    â€œI know, right?” Cadence replied. “She was acting like she’d just escaped from the loony bin.” This made both girls crack up.
    Emmy continued walking with her tray and, as she exited the lunchroom, took a backward glance at Lizzy, alone in the corner, her crutches propped up on the wall next to her. For a moment she felt bad for her and paused as she considered going over to Lizzy and talking to her. Then she remembered what a totally bad friend Lizzy had been to her. Let her come to me, Emmy thought as she turned her back and walked out of the cafeteria.

    After school, sitting at her kitchen table, Emmy made herself a snack of crackers and peanut butter. Happily munching away, Emmy replayed the day’s events in her mind and relished the idea of Lizzy’s rapidly dwindling popularity. Could Lizzy even get more miserable? Emmy wondered. Oh, yes. Yes she could.
    Emmy went to her room and picked up the doll from her desk, stroking its long yarn hair. She looked out her window into Lizzy’s room, but her old friend wasn’t there.
    â€œDon’t you think it’s about time for a makeover?” Emmy asked out loud, addressing the doll. “I have a vision.”
    She reached across the desk for her scissors and held them out, pointing them at the doll like a magic wand.
    Then Emmy slowly, methodically cut the doll’s hair off, in as random a pattern as possible. There were pieces sticking out every which way. It took a few minutes to snip all that yarn off. When she had finished, she held the doll up and admired her work.
    Emmy looked at the doll as if it had spoken to her. “What, you don’t like it?” she asked the doll innocently. The doll’s button eyes stared back vacantly.
    Emmy’s voice had two layers: it was warm on the surface but cold as ice underneath. “I think it looks cool.”

CHAPTER 9
    As she got dressed for school the next morning, Emmy caught the doll on her desk out of the corner of her eye. She remembered the haircut she had given it, but she had already forgotten just how far she had gone. Had she really chopped all the doll’s hair off, and would that mean what she thought it would mean for Lizzy?
    Oh, wow, she thought as she looked more closely at the uneven threads of yarn sticking out of the doll’s scalp.
    At lunchtime, as Emmy had predicted, Lizzy sat at her new spot alone in the cafeteria, her head covered in a big winter hat. Even from far away, Emmy could see that her food was spread on the table in front of her but she wasn’t eating. She was just staring into space. She could also tell from far away that there was no hair poking out from under her hat. Emmy wanted to eavesdrop on Sophie and Cadence, who were deep in conversation at their usual table, so she pretended that she needed ketchup and got up to walk slowly past their table.
    â€œI have no idea,” Sophie was saying. “How can I even guess at the reasons she does what she does? She must have whacked out again, like she