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CHAPTER ONE

Today is my birthday and all I can think about is how my Mom is acting. She’s running around all fidgety and she looks scared to death. My friends have all said the same thing is happening with their parents. None of us knows what’s going on but its really starting to get on my nerves. “I don’t know what my Mom’s problem is. It’s like she doesn’t want me to turn thirteen or something. Like she wants me to stay her little girl forever, I mean I know my dad feels that way but come one she needs to be put on a chill pill sedative or something.”
“I know my Mom too.” The other girls replied at the same time. Man it was like we were all twins even though we looked nothing alike. I was about 5’4 with shoulder-length brown hair brown eyes and an average sized body. Cassie was about 5’6 with light brown hair that was halfway down her back curly as always with brown eyes lighter than mine were. She was the athletic one of all of us. She always tries to get us involved with some kind of sport but some things are not for the rest of us. Rachel was 5’5 with bright red hair and Hazel eyes she always says she never looks good even though she has a better body than me but her mom is also a health food nut and always makes her daughter exercise every night. So she is the only one who can really keep up with Cassie while the rest of us lag behind. Tammy is 5’4 with blonde hair and really pretty blue eyes that everyone just admires. We also said that it was totally unnatural just how blue they were. It’s kind of hard to explain but its like the color of the ocean and the sky combined into one. She is average sixed like me which makes it easy to share clothes and shoes. Let’s just say she gets way cute clothes because her mom knows a lot of cool designers. Angie is 5’6 with black hair and kind of pale skin. No matter what that girl cannot tan lucky. I’m still red from the beach trip we just took. She is the really shy one of all of us. She keeps quiet a lot of the time. Except when she was hanging with us. All and all we are totally different people but have been best friends since we came out of the womb. We were all next to each other at the hospital as were our mothers. The hospital was shocked to have five babies born at the exact same time not a second difference between them. It was pretty cool and a nice story to tell when we got older. But every birthday the mother’s get together and do a little story telling session all about it. It’s getting embarrassing now that we are getting older but they just love to tell it so we don’t say anything. Speaking of birthdays we were supposed to be getting ready. We were all wearing matching dresses as usual. This year’s dresses were blue spaghetti strap knee length sundresses. (Thank goodness it was hot outside) Perfect dresses for the hundred degree weather in sunny California. Cassie was curling my hair into little ringlets that she always seemed to do perfectly but I could never master. Rachel had her hair done earlier and was helping Tammy with her make-up. Angie was taking out the braids she had me do last night and it resulted in a nice wavy look that looked great on her. Fifteen minutes later the guests started arriving and we all geared up to have our life story told yet again. Hand in hand we all went downstairs perfect in every aspect and waiting to see all our friends.

The living room looked spectacular of course. My mom totally outdid herself this year. The walls were covered with blue, green, pink, purple, and red streamers and balloons. This party was all about just us and everything was in our favorite colors. Mine was Blue Cassie’s was red, Rachel’s was green, Angie’s was Pink and Tammy’s was purple. There was a table for each of us that guests had already packed with colorful boxes and weird shaped packages. There were no kid games thank goodness but my mom had done her research into what teenagers like. Our big screen TV was hooked up to the Playstation and kids were playing Dance Dance Revolution one of our favorite games. So far Greg Saldini was beating the crap out of Roger Salcos. Others were lined up to play while there was some people playing cards and stuff like that in the corner. Our whole seventh grade was here and we were well known all through out the school. We sat through the next four hours saying hi mingling and getting our share of DDR which we were all really good at no one could beat us. Some of the time we couldn’t help but watch our mothers who chose to sit in the far corner and talk. They all looked so worried and none of us knew why. We all had our theories of course. There was the theory that they didn’t want us to turn into those rebellious teens they always hear about and Cassie thought that it was something to do with us getting older and wanting to hang with boys and do grownup stuff. What none of us knew was that tonight was going to change our lives forever. As the party drew to a close and all the presents were opened our parents got more nervous with every moment. After we said our thank yous and our goodbyes to all our guest we started to clean up but we were rushed away to my room by my father he looked stressed to the point of no return and I couldn’t bring myself to ask him if something was wrong. As he left and closed the door my friends and I started to whisper “Did you guys see his face he is scared about something and so are our mothers.” “I know I have never seen that look on my moms face before.” Cassie said. “Neither have I said the other three girls as we all started to descend into silence. As we all sat there quietly I heard something from downstairs. “Can you guys hear that, It sounds like crying.” We were silent as we listened. It was kind of faint so we went and opened the door and leaned out. We could definitely hear crying but the question was from who. We all crept forward to the top of the stairs and looked down into the living room where the party had taken place. It had only been 15 minutes and yet it looked like there had not been a party at all. All our parents were gathered in a circle, the fathers had long and stressed faces while the mothers were crying there eyes out. None of us knew what to do as we stared down at the people who raised us to be strong and healthy while they looked so unhealthy and sad. After a couple minutes we couldn’t stand to see them so sad so we went back to the room and sat there contemplating what could be going on with our parents. It was like they had gotten some bad news about something and none of us knew how to grasp the situation and help them out. After half an hour with all of us sitting there quietly we heard someone coming up the stairs. It was my dad. “Dad what’s wrong? Why is everyone crying?” I asked pleadingly. “Its something that’s about to happen. Please follow me.” He said. As he turned around we all stood up to follow him. At the top of the stairs was Cassie’s mom who one by one was sticking a wreath of white flowers on our heads. They then lead us down to the sunroom which was never really in use. They set us in the center of the room and then made a circle around us. We just stood there not sure what to do. I could feel the fear of my best friends standing beside me but it was overwhelmed by the fear coming from our parents.