prologue

I could hear the Hanson family continuing to eat downstairs. Their cheerful laughs and joking banter followed me, haunted me, up the stairs into the bathroom where I knelt in front of the toilet. It almost made me feel guilty, knowing that they cared enough about me to invite me over for dinner. Dinner at the Hanson family household was definitely an event, particularly when Isaac, Taylor, and Zac were all home, for once. Family dinners were so important, and to be invited to one was practically an honor to me. Granted, those three boys had been my best friends since childhood, and with all the hullabaloo surrounding them recently, what with their "comeback" and all, it was nice to see them again. I know they were excited to see me. It made me feel bad to spend five minutes sitting in the upstairs bathroom, shoving my fingers down my throat, trying desperately to do anything other than gag and make my eyes water.

I spotted a tube of toothpaste on the counter. Colgate with Whitening. I put a little bit of it on the tips on my index and middle fingers, and tried again. For some reason I was having trouble finding "the spot" - the place where I could press and make all the contents of my stomach come up. Maybe it was because of the tears that were streaming down my face.

I hadn't realized how much I had missed them. When the three of them walked through the front door of the Hanson house, I had leapt up out of my comfortable seat next to Jessica, wanting to run up to them and hug them, but I couldn't bring myself to. I felt as though I wasn't worthy of their love anymore. I was dirty, defiled, sick. Zac had been the first to approach me. He shrieked my name, came over, and picked me up, twirling me around and hugging me. When he set me down, the first thing out of his mouth had been "Damn, you've changed."

Was that for the better or for the worse?

I finally found "the spot", and the fabulous chicken dinner that Diana Hanson had made finally came out. I gagged myself a few more times, just to make sure it was all gone, and hung my head over the toilet bowl for a moment before finally standing up and flushing it. I looked at myself in the mirror for a minute before pulling the travel-sized toothbrush out of my back pocket and using the aforementioned toothpaste to quickly brush my teeth.

Knock knock knock. "Lilly? Mom's bringing out dessert. Lemon tart or chocolate cake?" Taylor's voice cheerfully said from the other side of the door. "And did you fall in, or are you just constipated?"

I forced myself to laugh. "Neither, Tay. And…No dessert, thanks. I'm peachy." I lied. I reapplied my lip gloss before sighing at my reflection. "Just peachy."

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