Chapter-2

Nobody is ever home at my house. My mother, Sandra, works at the hospital in a town called Sydney. Crane, where we live, doesn't have it's own hospital. She takes the morning and evening shifts so she's only home for a few hours in the afternoon, when normally I'm in school. Oliver Mitchell, my father, died from cancer six months ago. He didn't smoke, drink or do anything that could result in cancer. The doctors said it was a rare case; only two in five people devolved it. Why did my dad have to be one of those two? It still hurts to think about him. When my father was alive, he liked to work with children. Anything from volunteering at the local theaters or other organizations to simply taking a child to the park.

I, myself, don't believe my mother mourned at all when her husband died. For that reason, we don't get along well. The most words we say to each other in a day are merely a "hello" in the morning, a "goodnight Lisa" in the evening and a few more words here and there. I don't have any siblings or pets. Maybe if I did, I wouldn't be so lonely in the summer! That's one of the other reasons I have imaginary friends.

As I opened the door to my house, I called out "hello" to see if anyone was home. I don't know why I still do that; I guess it's a habit. I ran down the stairs and into my room.

My room is very similar to me, plain and simple, but that's how I like it. I've always thought there was something, well, magical about it.

"Lisa! Lisa where are you?"

"In my room."

"Of course!"

A bright face with a bunch of wavy brown hair, just recently cut short, appeared in my door.

"Hello, Hermione."

"Hi, how was school today?" Hermione asked eagerly.

Hermione was one of my imaginary friends. She knows everything, that's something imaginary people can do, so obviously she knows about my school issues.

"It's the last day of school, so better than usual." I said with a half smile.

Hermione looked at my sympathetically. There were so many things I liked about Hermione, for one she thinks I'm beautiful and she doesn't care about what others think even though no one can see her except me. She's my only true friend I've ever had.

Brittney was sort of a friend, but all she ever cared about was being popular. By ditching me, her dream came true. Hermione and I are such good friends; we can hear each other's thoughts. It's a good thing because sometimes I won't want to explain something to her so I can just give her my thought.

"Did anything else happen today?" Hermione asked.

"Not really, just a few more laughs and name callings." I replied.

"Well don't worry, maybe this summer you can meet some new friends!"

I gave Hermione a disbelieving look. Seeing how I was painfully shy, I had no idea how I was going to be able to gather the courage to make a friend.

"It could happen, it's summer, anything could happen."

Anything could happen.