.. On with the story ..

On the next day, at school, she didn't see the girl and again, she caught the group of guys staring, but this time, it was at her. She went to their table and stood there. When they didn't say anything, she asked, "Is my faced messed up?"

The group of guys laughed. Someone spoke and said, "This is Tom, Wesley, John, and I'm Jack. "Uh.I'm Crystal."

Jessica, Christina, and Wendy ran up to Crystal, "Hey, did you forget all about us?" Wendy asked. They introduced each other and they all seemed so happy.

What's wrong with me, I should be happy too, Crystal thought, I'm meeting new friends. But all Crystal could think of was that lonely girl. "Hey Tom, do you know that girl's name?"

"Yeah, Annie." "Oh." After school, she went to the main office and asked about Annie.

"Sorry, never heard of her, I don't think she's in this school." "Oh-kay. Thanks."

"When she went out the door, she saw Tom and asked, "How'd you know Annie's name?" Tom blushed and said, "I kind of had a crush on her and when I had the guys one day, I walked up to her and asked." "Oh. I see."

Something was nagging at Crystal but she couldn't think of what it was. "Crystal?" Crystal blinked and looked at Tom. "Yeah?" "What are you thinking about?"

"Nothing, look, I gotta run. See ya."

A week later, Crystal was walking in the woods and then, she started to smell something awful. She held onto her nose and squeaked when she realized what she was smelling. "OH MYGOD!!!"

Right before her eyes was Annie. She forgot about everything else and ran to her. "Annie!" Crystal screamed. She had never seen a dead person before, why now?

Crystal called the police and when they came, there was so much questioning. She also called her friends and she was crying by the time they came. Tom came over to her and hugged her.

"It's okay, everything's gonna be okay." He whispered. Crystal thought back to the time when she saw someone running behind the house. The jacket was red.

That's it, Crystal thought, the jacket was red. She pushed Tom back a little bit and looked at his jacket. It was red. She looked at the others, neither one of them was red.