You guys are weird," Tori said.Simon sat on the crate beside me. "That's right. We are totally weird and completely uncool. Your popularity is plummeting just by being near us.

Hair is gray and the firers are burning. So many dreams on the shelf. You say I wanted you to be proud of me. I always wanted that myself.

I don't know how to be anything but pretend," I replied, and it ached in me how true that really was. "But if I could be real, I'd be real for you.

A hand touched my shoulder, shaking me. I was back on the bus. It was dark and warm and I just wanted to sleep, but Chloe kept shaking my sho

I used to think that once we started going out, Derek would change. When I admitted that to Tori, she nearly laughed herself into an aneurysm and gave me a lecture on the stupidity of expecting to change a guy. Maybe I didn’t have her dating experience, but I knew you didn’t go out with someone because you thought you’d change him. That wasn’t what I’d meant. I liked Derek the way he was. I’d just hoped getting closer would mean landing on the sharp side of his tongue less often.

My fourteen-year-old sister Lara is a brat. Unfortunately, no one sees it but me. To everyone else, she’s adorable. She’s tiny and blonde and sweet and as helpless as a kitten. Chloe reminded me of Lara, at first. The difference, as I discovered, is that Chloe really is as sweet as she seems and she isn’t as helpless as she looks.

Chloe. Always Chloe with him and his brother. I know I sound like a whiny brat when I complain, but I think I have a good reason. I’d just discovered that I was a witch and my mother was a bitch—the murderous kind. I was now on the run with three kids who didn’t want me along.No matter how hard I tried to keep up and help out, the guys only cared about Chloe. If I ran in front of this bus to push her to safety, they’d race to her side to see if she was okay. Probably give me crap for bruising her when I shoved her out of the way.