Hiding four books under your shirt and the waistline of your jeans isn't as easy as it sounds. It's especially irritating to know you could put the books in your backpack if it hadn't been mass produced to hold skinny picture books like the ones sitting in the K1 classroom. However, Kenny made the difficult task look effortless as she placed the books in positions that made them unnoticeable. She did appear to be a bit chunky, but if she walked with a slight limp and made up an excuse for the imaginary injury, Ms. Greenwood wouldn't notice. She never had before.

Kenny hobbled up the brick steps and rang the doorbell. The books shifted a bit, but they were still in place. She could hear the heavy steps of an irritated Ms. Greenwood nearing the door. It wasn't long before the dark, wooden pane was ripped open.

"Where have you been?" the woman snapped as she took a phone from her ear. She looked over Kenny disdainfully, and the young girl fidgeted uncomfortably under her glare.

Ms. Greenwood was not a very pretty woman. Her nose was incredibly large, and her eye right eye was slightly bigger than her left. The only thing Kenny really liked about her was her neon blue hair which made her facial asymmetry hard to focus on. Even now, as Kenny looked up at the young woman, her eyes kept glancing up to the blue mane on top of her head.

"Eh? Not going to talk today, either, huh?" Ms. Greenwood asked upon seeing that Kenny made no move to answer her. Kenny would have shaken her head, but the woman rolled her eyes, signaling that she already knew the answer.

The young girl itched to go inside and put her books away underneath her bed. She had no doubt that Ms. Greenwood had saved chores for her to do, and she wanted to get started on those as soon as possible. She took out a pile of index cards from one of her back pockets and searched through them until she found the one she was looking for.

I've got a lot of homework to do.

Ms. Greenwood laughed at this, but it was a harsh laugh that had no amusement. "Yeah right. You're in what, Pre-K?"

Kenny went back down to her cards to correct the woman, but Ms. Greenwood yanked the stack away from her. She looked up at her guardian, bewildered, and didn't dare take out any more cards.

"No more of these silly index cards. Talk to me. With your voice. Come on!"

Kenny kept her mouth shut and looked away from Ms. Greenwood. She clenched her little hands into fists when she realized the woman was smiling. Still looking away, she took a step towards the house, but Ms. Greenwood stepped to the side, blocking the only open entrance.

"No! I'm not going to let you into the house until you say something. Go on, speak!" the woman urged. "If those expensive therapy sessions didn't do anything, maybe--"

At that exact moment, as if Kenny's prayers were answered, a loud thump came from somewhere inside the house. Ms. Greenwood's head snapped toward the noise, and the young girl's heart stopped pounding so hard in her chest.

"What was that?" Ms. Greenwood shouted.

A boy of maybe ten years of age rushed down the stairs. "Oh, I just fell again. I'm sorry if I worried you, Miss."

Ms. Greenwood stiffened. "That's Missus to you." She raised her cell phone back to her ear and walked away from the door, allowing Kenny inside. The young girl let out a shaky breath.

"She's married?" the boy asked Kenny once Ms. Greenwood was out of hearing range.

"No," Kenny replied, her first words since morning, "and she hates being reminded of that. Just say Ms. rather than miss. It sounds more like you're at least trying to say missus."

The boy broke into a huge smile, and Kenny's lips twitched upward. He didn't smile as bright as Gabriel, but the fact that he could still smile in a life as bleak his own made Kenny want to smile back. He hopped down from the stairs and walked up next to her.

"Did she take your cards again?"

Kenny nodded. "Did you hurt yourself when you faked that fall? It sounded extremely believable."

"Faked? That wasn't necessary. I fell." The boy laughed at himself as he led Kenny to the stairs, but the girl noticed him wince as he stepped up.

"Thank you, Jackson," she murmured gratefully.

"Anything for you, sis. Now let's hurry up. Andrew's worried about you, and you know how that is."

The two quickened their pace, hurrying up the steps and into the hall where Jackson's room was. A boy a bit older than Kenny waved at them as they passed, and another called out Jackson's name from his room. Kenny watched as her brother smiled and waved to his friends. He was a social butterfly which, the girl thought, was more of a curse than a blessing. After all, you never know who is (as the children say) a Ms. Greenwood-in-disguise.

Jackson and Kenny walked down the hall until they reached the second door on the left. The house they resided in was quite large; it was an inheritance from one of many uncles who had passed away with a reasonable amount of money. At least that was what their guardian had told them. Her word was never very trustworthy, though.

"Get ready," Jackson muttered as he opened the door. But Kenny had no time to prepare herself before she was embraced so hard she could barely breathe.

"Gosh, Kenny, where were you? You scared the sparkles out of me!"

The hug had come from Emily, Kenny's older sister and Jackson's twin. She giggled at the young girl after letting go of her, happy that she was alive rather than angry that she had disappeared. The embrace seemed too short to Kenny though it would have been much too long if it were any other occasion, even for Emily. Kenny felt the urge to smile at her sister's small attempt at stalling.

"Come on, Em," Jackson said to his sister after a long moment. They couldn't stall forever. "I have something to show you."

"Okay!" Emily went outside with Jackson, and the door clicked shut behind them.

No sooner the door had closed than a boy sitting on a bed across the room asked, "Where did you go, Kendall?" He was much older than Kenny, looking to be about fifteen years old. He sat with his arms crossed. There were traces of worry in his brown eyes, but his face was blank as he looked upon the young girl.

Kenny opened her mouth, planning to tell her oldest brother about Gabriel and his yellowing baseball, but instead, out came, "I went to the library, and I got distracted. I'm sorry." She pulled her books from her jeans as proof.

You see, in those few seconds Kenny had to think before she answered Andrew, she thought over everything that had happened that afternoon. Her brother wouldn't believe her if she told him the truth. Kenny? Make a friend? Andrew would more likely believe the "corrupt" government, as he called it, had found a way to stop the oceans from rising.

Andrew's face softened. "Oh." He sighed, relieved, and walked over the girl. "Well, okay. Just come through the back door next time so Jackson, Em, and I don't have to distract Mrs. Greenwood every time you walk in. I'll leave it open. Did you get any good books?"

"If you want to learn sign language, yeah. I've got several good books."

Andrew made a face and shook his head. "I'll leave the learning to you, little genius." He ruffled Kenny's hair and quickly escaped the room before the young girl could yell at him.

Kenny gasped in horror and ran to the door. "Andrew!"

The teen laughed and disappeared into another room down the hall. He knew Kenny hated it when he messed with her hair. She took her pigtails out and raked her fingers through the brown strands to try to flatten it out and put her pigtails back. However, Kenny knew nothing about hair other than that it was made of keratin and was the second fastest growing tissue in the body. She huffed in irritation and started towards the hallway where the girl's rooms were, when Ms. Greenwood called, "Dinner!"

Kenny quickly shoved her hair ties into her pocket and hurried down the stairs before everyone else could rush out of their rooms. None of them would ever forget the time Ms. Greenwood had thought they took too long to come for dinner. She had refused to feed any of the children, and when she was finally persuaded to let them eat, the food was cold, which made Ms. Greenwood's infamous cooking even worse. Ever since then, the children ran to the table when it was dinnertime.

But this evening, Kenny wasn't hurrying to get to dinner. She wanted to get a glimpse at the chore list, or the Punishment Chart, before everyone else was at the table. It was bad enough that she was the last one home, being the last one at the table would just add to the embarrassment. But apparently, things could get worse than that.

Kenny's name was on that chart more times than lightning strikes the earth per second.

Okay, that was an exaggeration. It was only up there four times. But that was four times more than Andrew's or Emily's name. Jackson was up there once, no doubt for the fall that had interrupted Ms. Greenwood's torment of the young girl. Kenny sighed, thinking back to the books in her brother's room. It would be a while before she could open any one of them.