Finally she could see the roof of Lena's house. As she got closer, the house became more and more visible from the top down. Her heart raced as she strained to pump her short legs more...she hadn't had to run this fast since her last tennis season in high school. Needless to say she was out of breath and ready to fall over after about 50 feet, but still, Carmen trekked on. As she got closer she arched her neck to get a view of the driveway. She continued to run, with her flip-flops smacking on the cement. A few houses away Carmen slowed, but while doing so the bottom of her plastic shoe bent under her foot and she tripped. Her balance kicked in and she did a weird double-step to avoid falling. She stumbled and stopped her movement. As soon as she registered that she was safe her head popped up to examine the state of Lena's driveway. No car. Lena wasn't home. Fury and panic overloaded Carmen's brain.

Rational Carmen stopped by for a visit. What if Effie had taken the car? It had been hers for most of the year. She had a life, a job, and always had much more going on socially than Lena. Therefore, Carmen deduced, Lena must be inside. Silently Carmen cursed herself for not checking her computer or calling Lena's home phone before she spazzed out. Rational Carmen continued to taunt with her good ideas. Carmen new Lena hardly had her cell phone on and the few times she did she never bothered to answer it. Stealthily Carmen pulled her cell out of her pocket and called Lena's house.

Carmen listened to the tone. One Ring. Two. Carmen's teeth gnashed. Three, she could feel her face getting warm.

"Hello?"

"Hello...Effie?

"Carmen?"

"Yeah. Is Lena there? It's important." Why did she say that? No it wasn't. She was paranoid and crazy.

"Ummm..." Carmen knew she had just woken Effie up. She was slow and cranky. Previous experience told Carmen that the more urgent it seemed, the slower Effie would go. She silently cursed herself and Karma for teaching hear a lesson about sanity.

"No. She's not. She must have gone someplace because the car isn't here...Wait? Are you standing outside?"

"No! Not me. At home. Thanks, Eff. Gotta go. Bye." Carmen shut her phone with a defining click and darted up the street, left only with her restless paranoid self.

Bridget looked around. She was all alone in Greta's house. Her uncle Perry had wordlessly grabbed her duffel bag and gone up the steps after the doctor left. It was difficult to explain how she felt at that moment. Unease. Panic. What were certain was the jitters in her quads attempting to coerce her into running. Possibly for the first time in her life Bridget ignored her nagging muscles. She was certain that Greta needed her. Bee would stay put, not that there was any doubt she would leave. The challenge that faced her was, in essence, reality.

In an attempt to calm her case of the jumpies Bridget walked around the lower level of the house. She gazed at all the different picture frames and ceramic doo-dads that every grandmother in the world seemed to have. The old, musty furniture had fallen victim to a moth feast. The sudden harsh appearance of the room forced Bridget to look around. It was now that she noticed the thick layer of dust on the objects scattered around the room. Suddenly everything seemed to move farther and farther away for Bee until her back hit something hard. The wall. Right. Not moveable, at least, not by her own strength. A sudden image in her mind of the wall falling away caused Bee to jump forward. She was scared. She was in Greta's house, but it was as if Greta had been gone for quite some time. Everything she looked at was a constant reminder of Greta's possible death. Either way, the image before her gave Bridget a sudden feeling of loss that buried a hole inside her chest.

This posed a problem for Bridget. She couldn't leave the house, she wouldn't let herself. She couldn't go upstairs because she was afraid. She couldn't stay where she was because it scared her. She closed her eyes and paced back and forth, only to think of an idea seconds later. Moments later she was standing outside the door that would grant her access to her solution. She yanked on the doorknob. It wouldn't budge. It was apparent that it had been a long time since it had been opened. The giant hole inside Bee's chest grew a little bigger and maybe a little heavier. Either way, it gave her strength. She gave a greater tug and the door flew open. Bridget stumbled backward but regained her balance before falling.

She didn't hear her uncle coming down the stairs; he had heard a loud noise and came downstairs to investigate. He hadn't turned the corner before he was met with Mighty Bee. Armed with cleaning supplies, Bridget was prepared to conquer the dust. While Bridget had conquered her past in the attic, upstairs, it was time to conquer her present downstairs. If Uncle Perry had rounded the corner the area in close proximity to the closet door would give the impression that the cleaning supplies aisle at Wal-Mart had thrown up. Bridget had already dragged her booty to the various parts of the room that needed immediate work.

Constant movement was exactly what she had needed. The strain in her shoulder muscles satisfied her eager legs as she dusted and buffed the doo-dads and the surfaces on which they lay. Despite the years of cleaning ahead of her, she would move until she couldn't, a casualty of the fatigue that only cleaning provides. She would move until her lungs were clogged with dust, until her back was sore from all the contortions, until her legs would support her weight no more, and then probably, she would move some more. Bridget couldn't stand the thought of Greta upstairs sick and all alone. If she was up there while the rest of her home mourned her pre-mature passing, then Bee would find little hope for her recovery. The seemingly dark room would give her energy until light sparkled all around her.

Tibby was in a bad way. After the sun had begun to rise Tibby left the cemetery and headed home. She had gotten very little sleep since she had come home from school -- even less before that. A few blocks down she turned a corner and found herself on a street full of commercial businesses. As she passed a local merchants window she glanced at her reflection and began to cry a little. Her reflection made her think of the past few months. The things she had done to Carmen, herself, others...had taken a toll on her body and her psyche. It was lonely in the city for Tibby and the one thing that once made her feel alive now left her worse off than she had ever imagined.

There are many drugs in the world, Tibby mused. Thanks to many lectures and videos in health class Tibby had never actually done drugs, nor wanted to, but she didn't need to experience it herself to know what an addiction felt like. Drugs give you brief satisfaction and escape from your
hellish world. They only leave you knowing full well that the hell you thought you were in was Heaven compared to where the drug left you. Win wasn't even Tibby's drug. Tibby was Tibby's drug -- her own enemy. Making her life miserable by going to New York for school and then feeling the need to seek something, anything to help cure her loneliness. Why she chose blissful abandon was beyond her. Maybe it was because it presented itself conveniently on her couch as opposed to dragging her butt to some loud obnoxious club full of real drugs. The worst part of Tibby's addiction was that she kept going back to that initial evening in her mind. Each time she did she felt a familiar rush in her veins. Every detail, every sensation she experienced in her mind. When she came back to reality she craved his body like a coke addict craves a hit. It hurt so bad to want that much. It hurt so bad to betray Carmen and the Sisterhood that way. Still, Tibby couldn't help it.

A bus stop was nearby and Tibby made her way over to it. She boarded the next bus and sat in the back, ignoring the stares of society's productive members. She's looked this way before and she didn't care much either, her focus was channeled into one outlet, similar to that of a coke addict seeking a hit. Unaware of the sweat on her skin, Tibby was focused on nothing but sweet release to help her deal with the stresses of her life. Like a struggling recovering addict she talked herself into it, out of it. Her reflection in the window next to her seat dictated her thoughts. Her mere image convinced her of all the trouble it's caused her. Finally, she stopped looking, got up and blindly walked off the bus when it arrived at her stop.