Chapter 1

"Daddy, your just going to love what I made for dinner, it's your favorite. Tomato soup." said a girl about twelve years of age. She spooned some of the red broth into a bowl and server it to her father.

"Daddy? You haven't called me that since you were little."

"Isn't it ok if I revisit my childhood to make you feel happy for once?"

"You wouldn't be doing this to suck up to me about your new step-mother, would you."

"Of course not." She said innocently as she poured out the wine. She took her seat and sipped the soup slowly.

"This smells delicious." her father began to spoon the soup into his mouth, bite after bite. He drank some wine to wash it down and continued to eat his soup. "It's to bad your new sisters, and your mother are out shopping, they would love this." he continued to gulp down his soup while the girl named Amanda sipped hers slowly. Suddenly her father jerked up in his seat and held onto his heart.

"Something's wrong." he gasped out.

"I know Daddy, you're having a heart attack." she looked at him smugly and sipped her wine. "In about ten minutes I'll be calling the emergency room." her father looked at her with shock, still holding his heart with one hand and bracing himself on the table with the other.

"What?"

"Oh, Jason. Didn't you notice how slowly I was eating my soup while you gulped down yours greedily?" he opened his mouth to say something but didn't get the chance to, he fell over and his face fell into his bowl of soup and his hand knocked over his glass of wine. "Poor boy. You shouldn't have told those three that you had a headache. An over dose often looks like a heart attack, especially when there is a special chemical laced into the pain killer." she stood up from the table, walked over to her now dead father, and leaned over. "You never saw it coming. You fool." she walked over to the telephone and dialed the three numbers nine-one-one.

"911 emergency how may I help you." a woman's voice reached the other end.

"Hello? I need help." Amanda said in a scared voice. "My father is having a heart attack." she choked out a fake sob.

"What's your address?" the woman asked.

"222 Cherry tree lane, Evansville."

"Some one will be there soon."

"No, I think it's too late, he's dead." she pretended to burst into tears while the woman hung up. She looked over at the lifeless form of her father. "What would mother say? You shouldn't have married her, now she's stuck with me." she smiled as she called forth some tears and walked onto the front porch of their fancy house. She sat on the sun chair that was always out there in the summer and continued to make her face streaked with tears.

Less than ten minutes later an ambulance stopped in front of her house and three men climbed out carrying a girder behind them.

"Is the body in here Ma'am?"

"Yes," she choked out. They went into the house and minutes later they came out with her father on the girder, covered in a white sheet. Two of the men carried her father down the driveway while the third lingered behind.

"Well call to make the funeral arrangements." he said.

"He always said he wanted to be cremated." her eyes began to fill with false tears again. The man carrying her father were half way down the driveway when another car pulled up and three women stepped out.

"Amanda! What's all this?" the oldest called out. The man looked at Amanda and began to walk toward the three ladies and their full arms. They had brought home the fruits of their shopping day.

"Ma'am, do you live here?" he asked walking toward them.

"Yes, the man who owns this place is my husband."

"I'm sorry ma'am, your husband has just died of a heart attack."

"No, you can't be serious. Amanda, what's going on?" Amanda stood up and wrapped her arms around her waist, slowly walking down to her step-mother she began to cry once more.

"Daddy is dead." the two younger women looked from the ambulance, to the man in front of them, to Amanda. Amanda ran back into the house and up the stairs, burying her face in her hands and making crying sounds as she went.

"Ella, Heather, take these bags inside." The two plain girls did as they were told in silence.

"I suppose you'll need my phone number." Paula said to the ambulance driver as the two sisters ran into the house. Inside Ella and Heather ran upstairs to get Amanda. They reached her room and left the door open when they walked in. They shifted their weight to one foot and placed their hands on their hips.

"I hope you don't expect up to clean up that mess down there." Ella said smugly. The smarter of they two, but still the most plain.

"My father just died." Amanda said normally.

"Why do we care? Our mother married him for the money." Heather said sarcastically, her blond hair reaching past her shoulders.

"You are very unlucky." Ella continued. "Your life has changed tonight. You're no longer the one that has to be babied to impress someone." Amanda looked at each of them, one thought running through her mind, what have I done?