"Do you have a phone?" Kaila asked. For some reason, she could not picture Jordyn using a phone.

"No," Jordyn replied cryptically. "But I can call you anytime I like."

Kaila nearly knocked her mother over as she blazed into the kitchen. "You people have kept me locked up in this centuries-old house, and I am getting into this century right now. Everyone has a cell phone and clothes and I am a complete loser. I have got to get a phone-like today!"

"I take it you met a boy you liked?" Mike asked.

"No," Kaila said, reddening. "I made two friends, Melissa and Pia, and they both want to come over, but I have no phone." She would die before she told her parents about Jordyn.

"Why do you need a phone?" her mother asked. "Why can't you call on the home phone like we did when we were kids?"

"Because home phones are dinosaurs," Kaila said. "You can stay in this cave, but I am moving ahead." She folded her arms and jutted out her chin. Her mother rolled her eyes.

Paw Paw trudged into the kitchen. He was painfully thin from the chemotherapy. Kaila ached to see him so frail. She recalled him strong and riding horses. He'd lost all his hair and his dark eyes were sunken in a shriveled face. But when he looked at her she could still see his love.

Paw Paw always had to have something sweet to eat. Even in the morning. He never chastised her for eating a Twinkie for breakfast.

"Goosy," he called her by his pet name. "I'm glad you're in school and away from this death trap. Come on. We're goin' to the store."

"No, Dad," her mother said. "You can't drive."

"Like h.e.l.l I can't."

"Oh," Nan said, nervously fiddling her reading gla.s.ses.

"Get out of our way," Paw Paw said. "I'm takin' my granddaughter to the store. She's gettin' a phone."

They went to AT&T and bought Kaila an iPhone. In the minutes it took to get to the mall, she had the phone figured out. Kaila could dissect anything electronic. She had gotten her computer and printer working in less than five minutes. She was the one her family relied on to program the TV or work the DVD; she could program any device with focused concentration.

Someday, people won't need these phones. They will communicate with their minds, Kaila thought. Now where had that thought come from? Forget it-iPhone. She began downloading apps.

When they entered the mall food court, Kaila smelled fresh baked pretzels and her mouth watered. But when Paw Paw said, "Now I might be an old man, but you have till this mall closes to buy whatever you need to make yourself feel as pretty as you are," she forgot her hunger.

"Oh Paw Paw, thank you," Kaila said, hugging him, feeling his bony thinness.

"Don't thank me," Paw Paw said. "I've been living for this. I want to see you happy. You're the apple of my eye."

"Paw Paw, why are you so corny?" Kaila asked, dying to get into the mall and find some cute outfits.

"Come on," Paw Paw said, linking arms. "Let's get you decked out and get them boys shoutin' yee-haw and whistling at you."

"Stop!" Kaila said, pleased.

Paw Paw turned onto the long, clam-sh.e.l.l driveway leading to home in the dark, the truck tires crunching on the sh.e.l.ls. In the distance, gas lanterns glowed in front of the house. Crickets and tree frogs chirped in the humid night air. Paw Paw carried bag after bag into the kitchen, then leaned against the wooden kitchen table, panting.

"I can help you, old man," Mike said. The kitchen was cozy and redolent with the odor of gumbo, garlic, and deep-fat frying.

"Don't need any help," Paw Paw said. He sank into a chair. He turned to Kaila. "Show 'em what you got."

Kaila opened the bags of skirts, tops, and jeans. She hadn't known what to get. Finally, she had bought anything that hit her fancy, borrowing from all the groups she'd seen at school; and then she hit the makeup counter at Dillard's.

"Oh my," Nan said. "You spent a king's ransom."

"Yes, oh my," Kaila's mom echoed, dressed in baseball cap and yoga pants. Her mom taught a yoga cla.s.s in the converted dining room several times a week.

The Guidry family, historically, were thrifty where money was concerned. "Money doesn't grow on trees," Nan often said, whose parents struggled during the Depression. This was why many of the furnishings in the house were antiques. Nan saw no sense in replacing things as long as they worked.

"We're going to have the prettiest girl in school," Paw Paw said.

"That we are," Mike agreed, palming his thinning brown hair.

"In fact, she'll be seventeen soon and I propose we have a party," Paw Paw said. "You can invite all your new friends from school to come and go riding. Have a barbecue. Would you like that?"

"Oh, yes," Kaila said. She could invite Jordyn. And Melissa and Pia. Have real friends to her home!

"Look at this," her mother marveled at the iPhone. "How do you figure out this fancy equipment?"

Kaila sighed, wondering why old people were so technologically inept.

"Enough," Nan said. "I made a big pot of gumbo, some fried chicken, and cornbread. Let's eat and get this girl to bed. It's a school night."

Kaila gulped the gumbo and nearly inhaled the chicken and cornbread. Everyone chattered about her new phone and clothes while she daydreamed about Jordyn.

"Hey," she asked, her mouth tingling with the gumbo's cayenne pepper and file. "You heard about that cult in New Mexico where they brought in some students to our high school?"

"Sure," Mike said. "It was all over the news."

"I remember," Paw Paw said.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," her mother said. "And stop feeding the dog under the table." Lucy gobbled up a hunk of cornbread. Woofy nuzzled her knee for more.

"Me neither," Nan said, chomping on a chicken wing.

"How could you not remember that cult?" Paw Paw asked. "I clearly remember us sitting together watching the news. We all watched and said how sorry we felt for those kids."

"Well, I don't remember it," Nan said.

"Alzheimer's, old woman," Paw Paw said, shaking his head and pushing back his plate. He'd barely eaten a thing.

"I don't remember it either," Kaila's mother said.

Kaila looked at her mother and grandmother, one wearing a navy baseball cap, the other an old pink Easter bonnet-with the black Velostat plastic hidden inside. She had this creeping feeling that everything was not what it seemed. She scratched the skin above her ear under the black plastic. She too, had never heard one word of this cult before today. Gooseb.u.mps lifted the hairs on her arms, her intuition prodding chills. She determined to remain watchful. She could figure out anything if she set her mind to the task.

Kaila trudged upstairs. Her bedroom was in the front of the house on the second floor. Her room was s.p.a.cious with wood floors, worn rugs, and floor-to-ceiling windows that led out to a balcony spanning the width of the house. The damask curtains, once royal maroon, had faded from too many years' sun. A white wicker rocking chair sat outside on the gallery. In cooler weather, she could rock and look out over the wrought-iron railing to the pond, the fields, the barn, and the forest beyond. Now, it was too hot, the air sticky with humidity.

Kaila neatly laid her new outfit for the next day on the antique velvet chair next to her canopied bed. Tomorrow she'd wear a new skirt and blouse. She yanked off the c.r.a.ppy hick jeans and t-shirt and hurled them into the closet. She tore off the wig and the plastic wrapped around her head and scratched her scalp. She often sat alone in her room without the plastic; it just felt so good. She changed into a comfy nightshirt.

At the far wall opposite her bed was an old-fashioned roll-top secretary desk with many drawers and cubbyholes. On each side of the desk stood a heavy wooden bookcase filled with dusty books. Above the desk hung a gilded oil painting of some long-dead relative. She wore a floor-length gray dress and held a fan in her hands, staring demurely with gloomy eyes from another century.

That painting has got to go, Kaila thought. She would replace it with a Star Trek poster of Dr. Spock in his powder blue Starship Enterprise crew shirt and red gla.s.ses (Spocktacles) with the slogan "Party like a Vulcan." Not this old stuff. It was as if she had lived in one of those old black-and-white movies and now stepped into a new Technicolor life. She switched on her MacBook, the screen lighting an electric blue.

Lucy and Woofy stared up at her, panting.

"You're right," Kaila said to the dogs. "I have been ignoring you. I still love you though."

She gazed at Woofy, who would forever have one eye shut, having been in a dog fight and lost his left eye. She had cried when it happened and held him in her arms for days, soothing him.

But animals and humans were different creatures. He had acted on instinct. Or maybe animals and humans weren't so different: she thought of Douglas Lafarge thrown in the dumpster and everyone teasing that fat guy, Albert Jackson, for eating three lunches.

Woofy had one tooth that stuck out above his lower lip. Despite his comically tragic appearance, he was a wise dog. Lucy, the black Labrador, licked her hand; Woofy tried to hop up on her lap.

"No, sit. Be good." Kaila communicated well with her animals. Talking to them was like listening to music. She just had to listen with an open mind to hear their true message.

Lucy and Woofy sat on the b.u.t.ter-colored threadbare needlework rug and gazed up at her adoringly. Kaila reached into a plastic container decorated with dog bones and gave them a treat.

Lucy gobbled the Milk-Bone then barked.

"No," Kaila said. "I'm not making popcorn tonight."

Lucy's favorite treat was popcorn, and her eyes rolled back showing the whites in abject pleasure when she got lucky enough to eat popcorn.

Lucy barked again.

"No," Kaila said. "I told you I am not making popcorn."

Lucy barked three times.

"Don't you take that tone with me, young lady," Kaila said. "I will not be ordered around."

Lucy looked at Kaila, panting, her pink tongue sticking out.

"All right," Kaila said. "Yes, I agree. That's fair. I will make popcorn for you this weekend when I'm not at school."

Lucy lay down, resting her head on Kaila's foot.

Facebook beckoned. Soon as she logged on, Kaila was astonished to see the navy people icon beaming red with friend requests. Those two prep boys in her English cla.s.s, Derek Mendoza and Wade Stoops. That beautiful prep girl, Priscilla Snowden. The dork from the trash can, Douglas Lafarge. And friend requests from Melissa and Pia.

Almost everyone she had contact with wanted to be friends. Tears p.r.i.c.ked her eyes. Not unreal friends from half-way across the world that she'd never meet, but real, flesh and blood people.

Through blurred eyes, Kaila studied a friend request from someone named Valdyr Lawless whom she didn't remember meeting. She confirmed the request nonetheless. Valdyr Lawless. Such a strange name. She clicked on the profile, but it didn't say much other than he attended Bush High.

After confirming the friend requests, she searched for "Jordyn Stryker" but no luck. He probably didn't know about Facebook because he had been secluded in that cult. She tried to deny her disappointment. Or maybe, she pondered, he was Valdyr Lawless. People sometimes used phony names on Facebook. Valdyr would be a name someone like Jordyn Stryker might use as an alias.

She brushed her teeth, took a shower, and blow-dried her hair. Reluctantly, she wrapped the plastic on her head like a shiny black turban. Recalling her mother's terror and the subsequent visions upon removal of the plastic, she decided to keep it on. Still, there had to be a freer solution.

She climbed in bed. Homework. Ugh. She focused intently and scanned the books, turning the pages, absorbing the information. She scribbled on loose leaf. She finished her homework in minutes. Cla.s.s work was a breeze-and boring. It was the people and cliques that were difficult to understand.

Kaila turned out the table lamp. In the dark, her thoughts looped like speed cars around a racetrack. She thought of Jordyn, how cute he was, how she loved it when he studied her like she was the only person on the Earth. She thought of the others, how odd, yet how smart they were.

Wait a minute.

She recalled that creepy feeling when Echidna took her hand and insisted they be friends. Maybe she just didn't know how to act. There was something else, but Kaila could not recall. Well, forget it then.

Kaila thought of Melissa, recalling when Melissa first smiled at her and knowing they might become best friends. And Pia, when she said they'd have to hang out.

She thought of Paw Paw, how nice he was to take her shopping. She thought of her new outfits and imagined wearing them.

"You must quiet your mind," she heard in her head.

"How? How do I get rid of all these thoughts?"

"Acknowledge the thoughts and tell them to go," a voice deep in her mind answered. "Imagine your mind is the s.p.a.ce between words. Just emptiness, then you will sleep."

This was like what her mother said when she taught meditation during yoga. But this wasn't her mother's voice. Kaila imagined the s.p.a.ce between words in a sentence and focused on the emptiness. Exhausted, she welcomed the emptiness, darkness, and lack of thought. She slipped into unconsciousness.

The night sky held a new moon; its absence akin to the emptiness of the eyes in statues. Outside, the horses whinnied in the barn.

Darkness enveloped Kaila's bedroom. Though the balcony doors were shut, the damask curtains rustled as they lifted. Lucy and Woofy lifted their heads. Low, guttural growls emitted deep in their throats.

The dogs stood with lowered heads at the balcony door, growling. Outside, in the night, an owl called.

Kaila sat up in bed. She thought she heard the rocking chair creaking on the balcony. But it couldn't, for the night was still. Adrenaline darted through her veins, bringing her wide awake. Again the owl shrilled.

Something was outside on that balcony right next to her bed. She could feel its unseen presence. Then, the balcony door opened. It was so dark she could not see. The dogs frantically ran outside on the balcony, growling and snapping.

Fear invaded Kaila like fog as the balcony door opened wide. From the dark, something flew toward her, but she couldn't discern what. Her eyes strained in horror as she flattened herself against the headboard. As it hovered over her, she saw that it was an owl. She gasped. The owl's eyes were fiery orange with black dots as pupils. Its large round eyes fixed upon her. Once she looked, she was paralyzed. Her mouth hung open, but she couldn't scream. Her heart skittered like a scurrying mouse.

Then, the dogs on the balcony went silent. The horses quieted outside. The tree frogs and crickets went dead. Everything had gone completely silent. An odd energy filled the room. A buzzing sound filled Kaila's ears.

The owl's orange eyes loomed two inches from hers, staring at her above a thin, pointed beak. Though terrified, Kaila could not move or scream. She could not break gaze with the owl, who commanded sleep.

She tried to struggle, to fight, but could not. She fell back on her pillow, unconscious.

Chapter 4.

The owl's fiery orange eyes locked her, carrying Kaila from the outer world to another. Now that she was unconscious and floating in another realm, Kaila realized that the owl's eyes were actually Jordyn's and that it was he floating in this darkness before her. His silver bodysuit clung like a second skin to his body. They floated in vast s.p.a.ce. A far-off star twinkled. They traveled toward that star.

Jordyn took Kaila's hand with his three long fingers. His hand transmitted a strange but exhilarating charge. Now, she felt no fear. She had dropped off a precipice into another place and time.

"It's unnatural you sleep with this wrap on your head. Take it off, you will feel more like yourself," Jordyn said.