"Again." Tish's voice was cold and raspy. She was slumped over on the couch to such a degree that the tip of her perfect chin was touching her collarbone. Her eyes were half closed, her fists were clenched, and one rebellious foot stood proud on the coffee table, openly defying common courtesy, daring with its untied laces anyone to challenge it.

In sharp contrast, the Tish on the television was sweet past saying. Her skin was creamy, pale, and unblemished; her pastel pink lips formed a small, modest smile. She was painfully thin, so much so that Carver's fingers fit easily around her upper arm and her high cheekbones stood out like mountains in Kansas. Her legs and neck and arms and lashes were soft and long. And with the long, delicate, honey-colored ringlets that framed her heart-shaped face, she was anyone's idea of an angel.

She had been altered a bit for the commercial, of course. Her hair wasn't really curly, and it wasn't really honey-colored. It was more the shade of an old, scruffy wooden table in need of refinishing. Angelic Tish was wearing icy blue contact lenses to hide the murky brown that her eyes really were, so her wire-rimmed spectacles had been scrapped. In accordance with her wishes, I poked the remote control's Play button again. As her on- screen persona turned and smiled for the umpteenth time, line-drying white sheets billowing behind her, Tish's dark eyes narrowed even more, and her fists clenched even tighter.

"Dude?" asked Lor. "Why are you all, like, evil-looking?"

"Oh, but I'm not!" Tish said in a dangerously crazed voice. She leapt nimbly up from the couch. Turning on us, she copied perfectly the beautiful smile that the screen was showing. "How could you call someone who can do that 'evil-looking?'" she inquired sarcastically. "I'm not evil-looking. I'm not evil-looking enough!"

"Evil enough for what, exactly?" Carver ventured.

With a melodramatic sigh, Tish rolled her eyes heavenward. "I've been acting since I was ten," she announced. "Six years! And in those six years, all I've EVER played are fairies, angels, and leukemia patients!"

"Well," Lor said cheerfully, "that makes you a shoo-in for TV movies!"

"For once," she said in a wistful tone, "I'd like to play a proper teenager role. A high school student torn between two boys. The daughter of a troubled single-mom drug addict. A prodigal musician. The cynical comic- relief best friend of one of the above. You know what I'm saying?"

I raised my eyebrows. "A high school student torn between two boys?"

"So long as she hasn't got leukemia."

"Tish, you just have to play to your strengths," Carver told her, waving his hand dismissively, "and your strength is definitely angel. I mean, look in the mirror."

"Yeah," Tish agreed sadly. "It's all to do with looks, isn't it?"

I should have detected the danger in that comment. Unfortunately for us all, I didn't.