Dollhouse Read Online Free Page A

she seemed so fragile.
    Raif and his friends marched away down the hall.
    "You should report that." Lacey's pale blue eyes flicked over me with concern.
    Brianna nodded. "Yeah. He'd get kicked off the soccer team if the school knew he was bullying."
    "It's ok. I just want to let it go." There was no way I wanted to talk with the school principal, and have to lie if I was asked about Ethan.
    A moment of weird silence followed, where no one knew what to say. The twins, Lacey and I had all kind of inherited each other as friends. Aisha had been our common thread, the one who strung us together. Without Aisha, there was a vague awkwardness and a sense that all the spaces weren't being filled in.
    "Hey," said Caitlin finally. "You and Lace should come down to Ladies Well after school. You two haven't been anywhere since...."
    Lacey and I eyed each other. Neither of us had felt like being part of anything outside of school—not since the day of the hike. But Ladies Well was on the edge of the forests, and I felt a sudden urge to be close to the forest, closer to Ethan.
    "Why not?" I nodded. "Could be a good change."
    Lacey shrugged and nodded.
    I headed off for my ecology class.
    Walking into the classroom, I tried not to see the empty desk beside mine. Just like I did in every class of mine that Aisha used to be in. But of all those classrooms, this one was the worst. She haunted this room. People had pinned up the sketches Aisha had drawn on that day out there in the forest—the animals and the forest. There was even that sketch of Ethan, Lacey and I resting under the trees.
    Aisha had also taken scores of photographs that day, but the police had taken all of them in case there were any clues in them. I knew the photographs would have been amazing. She had the kind of talent with photography where even inanimate objects seemed to have a mood. Maybe she picked up moods in scenes so easily because her own moods changed so rapidly.
    Everyone had liked Aisha. Despite her mood-a-minute personality. She was kind of on the fringe and kind of friends with everyone at the same time. I guess she’d been one of the few kids who didn’t need a clique to merge into. That was how I became friends with her. She just walked up and talked to me. She didn’t stand back like the others—others who were either tossing up whether I’d be a good fit for their group or automatically shutting me out because they weren’t interested in adding any stragglers to their group, especially not an American straggler.
    I felt eyes on me, and turned to see a suggestive grin spreading across Dominic's face.
     
     

4. LADIES WELL
     
    Ben Paisley dive-bombed the jeweled-green pool of Ladies Well, sending a high spray of water over Lacey. Lacey shrieked, running from the edge of the rock platform.
    Brianna and Caitlin Denshaw wrapped towels around themselves as they pulled themselves onto the rock. Dripping, they padded over to Lacey and me. The four of us sat watching the boys jump from the higher rocks into the pools—the boys bellowing blue murder as their bodies hit the icy water. I was glad Raif wasn’t here with them—the boys were okay when he wasn’t around.
    Dominic stood shirtless on an outcrop of rocks. His back rippled as he dove into the water, and swam strong strokes to the platform's edge. Tossing his hair back, he spat water from his mouth.
    I tilted my face to the weak sun. This was the only moment of normality in the past few weeks. Life had operated in suspended animation ever since Aisha disappeared. But with the deep of winter on the way, it seemed life would stop, completely freeze over. Already, all around the tiny patch of sunlit sky, gray blankets of clouds massed.
    Caitlin squeezed water from her hair, her grayish-blue eyes alive with the exhilaration of cold—eyes that were almost the exact same color as her racer-back swimsuit.
    Brianna’s teeth chattered. “Last time for me this winter.”
    She was the quieter, more