Amber was sleeping over at Terri's house, and they were poring over Terri's yearbooks. They giggled as they looked at the pictures of their fellow classmates when they were young. They were looking at Terri's first grade yearbook when Amber clapped her hand to her mouth.

Thinking that Amber was horrified for some reason, Terri worriedly asked, "What's wrong?"

Amber took her hand away, and then started laughing uncontrollably.

Terri, astonished and indignant, said, "What? What's so funny?"

"Well, I was going to laugh at Spinner's picture, but the expression on your face...It was classic!"

A little insulted, Terri asked, "What do you mean?"

"I don't know...You just looked so...so concerned! Nobody's ever looked like that because of me before..."

They were silent.

Terri ventured, "It must have been pretty horrible at your old school."

"You could put it that way. Everyone hated me." Amber became angry. "But it wasn't my fault!"

Gently, Terri asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No," Amber decisively said. However, she changed her mind, and said, "Yeah. I do." Amber then proceeded to pour out her story to Terri.

After Craig had developed his film, he sat on the floor, and looked through all the photographs he had taken. He threw away some of the pictures because he thought they weren't any good. He put the 'good' pictures into a pile next to him. He threw a picture away into the trash can, but then suddenly retrieved it. It was a picture of Amber and that other guy in the park. He looked at it closely. Once again, he was struck with the thought that the boy wasn't all that good looking.

Amber is willing to walk around a park with that kind of a guy, Craig thought, but she's not willing to go around with me!

Craig was jealous of the boy in the picture, and he didn't even know the guy! For Craig, the maddening part was that he could not think of anything that the boy had that he himself didn't have. Craig, frustrated, pulled at his dark, curly hair and stomped around his room.

"What's going on up there?" Joey called up the stairs.

"Nothing! Sorry!" Craig called back, but stomped once more before collapsing on his bed.

"Wow," Terri said. "Wow."

Amber wiped the tears away from her eyes, and said, "I don't expect you to understand. It probably doesn't seem like that big of a deal. But it is! It is."

"Wow," was all Terri could say.

Amber accepted the tissue that Terri handed her. She sniffed once more, and cleared her throat.

Amber said, "I'm sorry for bugging you. You probably don't care." She laughed. "It's funny. All normal girls have to worry about are guys and other small things like that. And I..."

Terri, sympathetically said, "It must be tough for you. You must worry about stuff like that, too. And you have to worry about...you know..."

"I've never had much luck with guys anyway. So it's not that big of a deal."

"What about Craig?"

Amber stiffened. Pretending to be indifferent, she said, "What about him?"

"I just thought you guys would make a great couple. You two looked really good together."

It looked as if Terri was going to elaborate further, but Amber cut her off. "It would've never worked. He doesn't even like me, anyway."

Skeptically, Terri just replied, "Sure..."

"But it doesn't matter now, Terri. I've got you to keep me company."

"It's not like you didn't have friends before."

"Not exactly. All my so-called friends stopped being nice to me once they found out. So I've never really had a true friend."

Terri patted Amber's hand. "You do now."

The next Monday, Amber practically skipped when she went through the front doors of Degrassi Community School. She had gotten a load of that weekend, and she truly felt that Terri was a friend. Unfortunately for Amber, being relieved of this burden had its drawbacks.

In the halls, Paige saw Amber's cheerfulness and decided to go for it. Paige started out with, "Amber, we need one more person for the Dance Committee."

Amber panicked. This was a bad thing. Dance Committees and Amber Sullivan did NOT mix.

"But the dance is months away!"

Paige calmly replied, "Believe me, you need all the time you can get. So, will you do it?"

Amber had no choice. She smiled weakly and said, "Sure."

In English class, Ms. Kwan announced, "Okay, class. We've been a bit delayed, but now we can really get started on our projects. But first, let me remind you of who is in your group." Ms. Kwan took the list out of her desk drawer. "Ellie and Ashley, Amber and Craig..."

Amber's heart almost stopped. She was working on a major project with Craig?

Craig brightened. Maybe he could finally get Amber to like him.

Ms. Kwan explained, "In this project, you will be given a classic story. You'll work on several essays and hands-on activities. Now, get into your groups. I will come around and assign you your story."

Craig eagerly sat down next to Amber. "So, what story do you hope we get?"

His question went unanswered because Amber was talking to Terri.

Ms. Kwan then came around and gave them their story.

During the rest of the hour, there was a tense silence between them. It was occasionally broken when Craig nervously tried to start a conversation, but Amber only ignored him.