The door opened slightly, only enough to allow a single person to the room. Soft footsteps crept across the hardwood floor carefully (but barely) avoiding the furniture. Once the person had reached the window on the opposite side of the room she paused for a moment to look at the two sleeping figures in the rooms twin beds before flinging open the curtains.

"Get up girls! You have to go to school today!" The small woman smiled brightly as she pushed a strand of nut-brown hair away from her face. "I know you don’t want to go but.." She stopped as the girl sleeping closest to her rolled over. "Vi I’m talking to you!"

The other girl poked her head from beneath the sheets revealing her almost golden eyes. "Mom, Vi and I know you mean well.. but its 6:00 a.m. and there is no way you should be this damn chipper." With that the girl resumed her position underneath the sheets.

"Watch your language Rose, and try not to be so difficult. For once just listen to me and get up." Rose shrugged (or appeared to, the sheets made it hard to tell) and climbed out of bed. Violet was a bit more reluctant but the thought of going into the bathroom after Rose gave her the motivation she need to haul herself out of bed and make a run for the bathroom. She got there just in time for Rose to slam the door in her face

***

The three women drove towards the school about thirty minutes after classes started. Violet sat in the front seat clutching a digital map while her mother sat hunched over the steering wheel searching for a landmark. Rose sat in the back with her arms folded across her chest. "If someone had let me drive we wouldn’t be lost." She said to no one in particular. Violet turned around and smiled slightly.

"Of course not Sis, if you drove we’d be smeared across the side of some building by now." Rose gave her sister a look and then leaned forward pointing.

"There’s the school mom. Make a right up there."

***

An hour later the two walked through the empty hallways comparing schedules. "Well at least we have lunch and Phys Ed together Vi." Rose didn’t seem to excited about the new school.

"Joy." Vi’s voice dripped with sarcasm and she turned off down another hallway heading towards her Trig class without so much as a wave good-bye. Rose shrugged, her usual response to her sisters’ indifference, and walked towards government.

The class was packed and one glance told her there was a sub. Shway Rose thought as she slipped into an empty seat near the front of the room. She reached into her book bag and pulled out her sketchpad. Before Rose could even flip through it the girl sitting just in front of her whirled around and smiled.

"Where from?" She smiled cheerfully and leaned towards Rose waiting for a response.

"Italy. My name is Rose by the way." The girl’s eyes got wide when she heard Rose’s previous zip code.

"Wow..Italy..Hey Shway contacts." The girl gazed intently into Rose’s eyes.

"Contacts?" Rose looked totally confused.

"Yeah. That’s a great color. Did you get them spliced? I heard that’s getting really popular, Terry and I are thinking of getting our eyes spliced." The girl grinned at the thought.

"Well I got my eyes from my mom..For my birthday. Who’s Terry anyway? Sounds kind of deep." Rose abandoned her sketchpad and let herself get drawn into the convo.

"Oh well Terry’s my boyfriend, oops I forgot a detail in all this data hunting. My name’s Dana." Dana held out her hand for a formal handshake but the sparkle in her eyes took away the official feel.

"Nice to meet you. Mind if I see your schedule? I have no idea where I’m going after this." Rose laughed a little at her own ignorance and sat patiently while Dana explained the lay out of the school. After that the two compared schedules and talked about everything from music to computers until the bell rang.

"Hey lets razor I really want you meet everyone in my little group. I know their going to love you." Dana helped Rose get her things together as she spoke. "Do you want to stop by your locker first though? No one around here really carries anything with them except maybe a purse and whatever they need for their class." Dana let her eyes fall on Rose’s book bag.

"I kind of thought so.." Rose looked around the quickly emptying room at the people wandering out with just a Government book or a notebook in their hands.

"Well off to the lockers’..I hope Terry decided to show today. If I had the time and patience I would seriously sit down and try to figure out guy time." Rose laughed at Dana’s comment and as they walked she glanced around the hallways. "What are you looking for?" Dana began to glance around too.

"My sister, Violet, I’m hoping she decided to go to her classes." Rose gave a much suffering sigh.

"Violet..so you two are flower girls." Dana leaned against the wall while Rose put everything away.

"Yeah..but call Violet ‘V’ or else she gets all bitchy." Dana nodded and pretended to seriously consider it.

"I think I’ll be able to do that." The two laughed and walked off towards their next classes.

***

"So maybe we should grab a soda or something.." Blade turned to her new ‘best-friend’ with a smile hoping for some sign of approval.

"No..not thirsty..I just wanna drift." ‘V’ glanced around the empty hallway not even bothering to look at Blade when she answered. Suddenly V straightened up a little and pointed. "Whose that guy?"

"Oh him?" Blade sounded uninterested. "That’s just Terry..Dana’s boyfriend, I’m surprised he came to school today." V frowned a little at the word boyfriend but mentally shrugged it off.

"He’s cute….but why does he have a bag with him? No one else does." V stared openly..But she definitely wasn’t looking at the book bag.

"I don’t know..Maybe it’s a purse or something." Blade felt a small surge of triumph when her smart remark got a small chuckle out of V.

***

Dana, Max, and Rose sat with their lunches chatting easily. Max was very interested in Rose’s computer knowledge and Dana wanted to know all about Florence Italy. V sat slightly apart from the group staying out of the conversation and pointedly ignoring any questions directed at her by anyone other than her sister. Rose ignored her sisters’ attitude and made a mental note to ask her why she was staring at Dana.

"You know ladies." Max declared suddenly. "We should exchange numbers and maybe do something tonight. Anyone got a pen?"

"I do." Rose reached down to grab her purse and came up empty handed. "What the fudge happened to my purse?!" Rose looked around getting angry.

"Oh that..its in my locker..do you need it?" V gazed at her sister with an expression of complete and total innocence. As Rose opened her mouth Max, sensing a fight coming on, broke in.

"Don’t worry I’ll get one." Max jumped up and walked off.

"Why did she do that? Terry left his bag right here." Dana picked up Terry’s book bag from the seat next to her and handed it to Rose. Rose, suddenly caught up in one of her frequent moments of de ja vu, handed the bag to V and got out her sketchbook.

As she was flipping through it V lifted the bag up and down in her right hand weighing it carefully. "Kind of light, the way he carries it you’d think his life was in it." Rose gave her sister a look knowing that V rarely made an unnecessary statement. Rose knew from experience that this was some kind of warning that her sister was subconsciously giving her. Before she could follow up on her opinion Rose found the sketch she was looking for.

It was something she had hastily sketched the night before. Rose recalled waking up in the middle of the night with a slight headache. She knew from experience the headache would not go away unless she drew and so she had. The picture that had appeared on the paper was of herself sitting near her sister Violet she thought because in her mind her sister could never simply be ‘V’. She was holding Pandora’s box (well Rose’s box in her picture) and she was carefully opening. However in this version of the story it was not little punishments on the human race that flew out but hundreds of bats instead.

"Hey..is there a pen in there?" Dana’s voice knocked Rose out of her trance and she looked around to collect herself. V lounged in her chair adjusting the shades that she always wore while Dana leaned across the table trying to spot Max. Having collected herself Rose carefully unzipped the bag half expecting a hundred bats to fly out. When nothing happened she hesitantly reached inside the book bag and felt around. Her eyes widened as her fingers traced what seemed to be an ear. As she leaned down to look inside the bag a voice shouted.

"Hey you! What the hell are you doing?!"