Karen stands above the grandstand at the schools football field, with her hands on the railing. She dreams of being with the jocks when they play, despite her age, gender and small stature.
She looks at them while they are training American football, Damon is as usual one of the fastest. But her gaze stops on Ted. Ted which she have been in love with for so long, even before he and Mandy became officially together.
After a while she turns her shoe and walks away from the grandstand. She likes the smell of this place. Plastics, rubber, the scent of the grass... This is where she belongs, she is sure of it.
On a basketball court Dan and Bo is playing. They doesn't notice Karen. She is lucky that Damon is training football so he won't attack her for being on their ground.
Suddenly she gets a basketball thrown in her head. She turns to Dan and Bo, and they are pointing innocently at each other. She scratches her head where the ball bounced off and doesn't look happy. At all.
"What is your problem?" she says angrily, throwing back the ball hardly against Dan, who gets it in the stomach and flies down onto the ground.
They're both shocked, and Dan groans of pain.
"Chill, kid. We didn't mean to throw it at you!" he says while getting up.
"Then how come the basketball is on the other side, hmm?" she says suspiciously, crossing her arms.
"I dunno, maybe your head's magnetic!" Bo says jokingly - making Dan laugh, "Haha that one was good, dude!"
Karen walks up to them both and steals the basketball right from Dans hands. Then she bounces it on the ground several times and catches it.
"Let's play a little game. Me against you two."
The boys look at each other and laugh again.
"You? You must be like 5 inches tall, but ok. If you want to lose so badly then bring it on." Bo says with a cocky tone while getting in position.
Karen almost stands outside of the basket area and dribbles through it. Bo tries to jump up and block, but Karen succeeds to bounce the ball under his legs and take it behind him. Dan stands prepared by her side and stretches out his arm, but she tackles him very hard and throws the ball from the side up to the basket. It goes through.
Dan and Bo are truly amazed by the tough little 11-year-old with low pigtails. Karen once again takes the ball and throws it high up towards the basket, and it goes through again.
"Maybe we judged you too fast, kid." Dan says, and receives the ball.
"Yeah you're pretty damn good, we better tell the others about this!" Bo yells and Dan agrees. They run away towards the field. Karen stands below the basketball hoop and smiles happily. Finally.
After a few hours, the door to room 7 in the Girls Dorm opens. Karen enters and on one of the beds sits a very grumpy-looking Melody.
"What have you been doing?" she asks cheeky and lies down in her bed.
"Playing basketball and hanging out with the jocks. And you?"
"Been waiting for you." Melody snorts, barely half a second after Karen's response.
"For me? But you were at the freak show with Gloria ..."
"I know, but we were going to ask if you wanted to go with us, but you never came back from when you and your brother was shopping. "
"Oh..." Karen says a little embarrassed, sitting on her bed.
"And then it hit me - maybe you were one of the freaks at the Freak Show because that is where you live, but I didn't see you there so then I assumed you were somewhere else. "
The dodgy statement by Melody hurt Karen. To think that her own best friend can say something like that, of course, even after being mean and rejecting her on the school grounds.
"Whatever." Karen says, and turns off the light on her desk lamp.
Melody is still awake. Staring at Karen. Angrily.
