Ebony sighed when she heard the loud buzzing of her alarm clock, mornings always came too early. She pulled her blanket over her head and rolled around. "Make it stop." She sighed reaching out for the sound.

"Breakfast is on the table." Rosa smiled, turning the alarm off. "Miss Ebony, it's time to get up."

"It's too early." Ebony mumbled sitting up in bed. She took the bathrobe Rosa handed her, and followed her out of her room.

"You will feel better, after some coffee." Rosa said as they went down the stairs.

Ebony stopped inside the kitchen and wasn't sure if she was awake anymore. "What are you doing here?"

"I stayed over." Java said rubbing her head. "Are they always like this?" she asked her sister.

"What?" Ebony asked looking confused, rubbing the sleep from her eyes as Rosa poured her coffee.

"Do they always fight like this?" Java said looking at her.

"Who? Mom?" Ebony asked. She had gotten so use to hearing it that it seemed normal to her, the background nose to her daily life.

"No the Easter bunny and Santa." Java said rolling her eyes.

"Yeah, I guess." Ebony said picking up her coffee and some toast. "I'm going to shower." She said before heading back for the stairs she just came down.

"Don't get back in that bed!" Rosa shouted after her.

"No, coffee." Ebony said inhaling the sweet smell. When she walked into her room the first thing she did was check her answering machine.

"You have three new messages." The voice came out of the speaker. Then came Tai-san's muffled voice. "Ebony where are you? It's almost 11 and your still not here." The next one was Jack. "Seriously? I can't cover for you forever. You said you were going to call, and tell them you weren't coming. Tommy is here, and he's pissed."

Ebony sighed and waited for the next message.

"Ebony where are you?" It was Tommy. "We have to talk and I know something is up with you and that football player. I'll try your cell again."

Ebony rolled her eyes in disgust and shoved the rest of her toast in her mouth and headed for the shower. Warm water would relax her and allow her to think about things more clearly.


Ebony and Mackenzie walked into the school looking at each other from the corner of their eyes. Trudy was in between them rambling on about all the reasons they should be friends.

"Ebony this is weird. What's going on?" Mac asked looking at her sister. Trudy hated them. She always had. "Wait what is on your neck?" she whispered. Her sister never wore make up but her neck looked a little discolored today.

"Burnt myself." Ebony replied putting her hand on her neck.

"We just thought that this would be a great way for us to start off the year. All of us being friends, it was your sister's idea." Trudy said smiling.

Ebony watched as people pointed at her as they walked down the hall. What was going on? She walked into the classroom and looked around when it got really quite. Bray, Cloe and Jack weren't even here yet. She looked at everyone else in the class and wonder what was going on.

"Hey Ebbz, what's up?" Jack asked when he and Cloe came into the class not long after Ebony did. Jack walked over to his set and sat down.

Ram and Amber came in next, Ram had a stack of what looked like flyers that he started to pass out to the people in class.

"Ebony, how are you today?" Amber asked smiling. She sat down next to Java and took the flier out of her hands. "Wow Ebony, I didn't know you were so, active." Amber said looking at the picture then back up at her.

"And we didn't know you were smart, I mean, I was sure that bleach had soaked straight into your brain." Mackenzie said rolling her eyes at her.

Ebony looked around confused at everyone. She grabbed one of the fliers off Amber's desk and looked at it. It was a picture of her from almost two years ago. She was drunk, high and half dressed leaning on some guy for support, and his hands were down her skirt. Her past was catching up to her faster than she wanted it to. She crumpled up the paper and looked at Java. She knew that her sister was the only person that could have gotten into her room last night. She threw the paper at her face and turned to leave quickly, but stopped when she saw Jay blocking the doorway.

Jay went over to Ebony and pulled her to him protectively. "You okay?" he asked softly. When he felt her nod, he let her go and turned towards Java and his friends.

"You think this is funny?" Jay asked looking down at Java and Amber.

"Look man it was just a joke." Ram said standing up.

"How is this a joke?" Jay asked shoving one of the papers back at Java. "She's your sister." His voice was full of hate and anger. He couldn't believe that she would do this to her own sister. "Your sister."

"Well she should be more careful." Java said sitting back trying to remain calm.

"More careful?" Ebony spoke for the first time. "I'm your family Java, but I can see that your friends mean more to you than I do." She fought the tears, she felt sick to her stomach. She couldn't believe that her own sister would dig up her past. "You're sick, seriously." She said before turning and leaving the class room. She couldn't face anything else right now.

"Looks like Little Miss Ebony is going to run away and cry." Ram laughed.

Jay had had it. The anger in him was overwhelming. He pulled away from Java's desk and looked up at Ram, his fist made contact with the side of Ram's face so hard that he was sure his knuckles were bleeding. He didn't even say anything else before he left the room to find Ebony.