Title: Hang in There, Baby Summary: It's 14 years later, and Charlie is nearly 16 years old. When she stumbles upon a box in the attic of videos from a girl claiming to be her big sister, Charlie wants to get to the bottom of it. Who is this mysterious Teddy, and why does no one want to tell her about Teddy?

Rating: T

Warnings: Depression, attempted suicide (non explicit), mild cussing in strong situations, paranoia.

A/N:Another chapter!

The rest of the day went fairly smoothly—History was hilarious, as always and English was beyond easy. B-lunch was a bit interesting today, since it was just Tris and I. Both Nina and Krista had D-lunch today, since they were both in PE. I sat with the paper/yearbook kids and Tris hung out with the techies. YES, we call them "techies." You'd be surprised how many people think it's strange.

Now that I think of it, lunch wasn't really all that interesting. If it's not an A-day, we don't normally eat lunch together.

I was scribbling through my ask Annie letters (Helpless Hopeful was one of the better ones—for example, I got one that went like this. "Sos annie i hav a problem my bf is cheating on meh & idk wut 2 do do u hav any advice i need major help, asap sosgurrlll". I literally had no idea what do do with that. Half of that, I needed a texter to translate.) and halfway through one from "Kitty Queen", who was worried about her cat coughing up hairballs (do I LOOK like a vet to you? No, don't answer that), the freshman PE class, led by Nina and Krista, burst through the doors and started doing jumping jacks.

But not ORDINARY jumping jacks, no, that's too simple for Krista and Nina. They did them on one of the cafeteria tables…the one where all the teachers sat.

They then performed a kickline on the table, ran through the Macarena once, three people did backflips and then they were back out the door less than two minutes after they'd entered, leaving the cafeteria in a prolonged, stunned silence.

Methinks Nina was protesting mile run day. She does this once a month, so me and Tris and about fifteen out of the four hundred fifteen people in our caf that were still eating.

What? I'd missed breakfast, I was hungry, and besides, it was NINA. She does this regularly.

What made it unusual was that none of the teachers got up and started having aneurisms like last just sighed, tossed out their food and returned to chatting.

We have the coolest teachers, ever. Nina nearly got expelled when she did that at the middle school. I was one of the kickline—and got detention for a month. Nina was suspended. But she came back within the week when the pretty much the whole student population refused to go to class until she was allowed back.

Needless to say, they unsuspended her.

After that, the rest of the day was pretty dull. World History was, as always, hilarious (our teacher cracks jokes and uses funny accents the whole block) and English was really interesting.

We're going through Shakespeare, starting with Romeo and Juliet and then hurling ourselves into a Midsummer Night's Dream—and finishing up with his sonnets. Before that, we did Of Mice and Men, The Odyssey and The Illiad, and Deathwatch, and a whole lot of short stories, grammar and punctuation worksheets on top of that.

We've got a pretty heavy courseload in English, but I love it.

That afternoon, I got home and Mom was already buzzing around, wearing her work jeans (they're so ripped, stained and generally destroyed that I'm amazed they still stay together) and a long sleeved purple top.

That's another thing about Mom. Even if it's a hundred degrees outside, she wears long sleeves. I don't know if it's because there's something there she doesn't want me to see or if she just likes hiding her arms. I would ask her, but she's done it so long that it doesn't even really register in my mind at all.

I kicked off my shoes and stuck them on the rack by the door and yelled, "I'm home!"

I got two responses. One from Gabe, who was apparently doing a term paper. "SHUT IT, CHARLIE! I'M WORKING ON A TERM PAPER!" See? Proof he's doing a term paper. I am such a d

"GABRIEL DUNCAN, THAT WAS INAPPROPRIATE. Hey, Charlie, hon, go put your stuff in your room, change into your work clothes and head up to the attic please, hon." I nodded and went through the kitchen to grab a quick snack before I dropped my stuff off in my room.

Krista texted me once and I laughed, sending back a reply at lightning speed. I put my backpack under my desk and put my tablet and cell on the desk while I pulled off my school clothes and yanked on a paint-splattered brown t-shirt and jeans that were as worn as Mom's.

I slid my phone back in my pocket and pulled on one of mom's old battered tennis shoes that she'd given me for work. Krista texted me and I had a mini conversation with her as I pulled the attic ladder down from the middle of the hallway. Once I was up in the attic, I flipped on the light and opened the windows. Mom was already up there and she tossed me a cleaning rag. I started to dust and checked in boxes to find broken things we could toss or not.

Krista and I texted a couple times through the whole thing, until I found a shoebox labeled, "Teddy's Videos for Charlie."

I instantly sat down, holding the box in my lap. I opened it, and inside, a row of CDs in jewel cases gleamed up at me. A letter was neatly folded on top of them, and I read it.

It was a good thing I was sitting down, otherwise I would've collapsed. My phone buzzed several times, and finally, I picked it up and texted my friends to meet me at my house after they finished with tennis and drama.

I might have found the mysterious Teddy.

R&R?