Jen and Lisa bolted off the bus, eager to escape from the looming eyes on them, and hurried into the house. Carol was taking their backpacks within seconds, her daughter's rather fuzzy face not slipping past her.
"So, how did school go?" she asked in as casual a manner as she could.
"Fine," Jen replied. "I just wish that the other students would quite staring."
"But, they were all very kind and sympathetic, to the point where it got annoying," Lisa quickly added.
Carol hugged each girl in turn, gently pressing her cheek against theirs. "At least the students are sympathetic. It could be a lot worse, and then the principal would wind up dealing with me!"
Jen knew that if either of them starting recieving any crap from anyone, Carol would jump right in - she moved to a whole new town for Lisa's sake when she was being teased!
Carol then smiled at the two of them. "Lisa, Andy's here from college for a week. I filled her in on all that's happened and she feels that she needs to be there for you, even if she can't stay long." She saw the confused look on Jen's face. "Oh, Andy is Lisa's older sister. She's in college right now studying film and photography."
"So that's your sister!" Jen exclaimed. She looked at Lisa, whose cheeks had turned bright red under the slight shadow.
Carol left to due a load of laundry and Jen could see that Lisa was taken well out of her comfort zone. She was wringing her fuzzy little hands together - something Lisa was just not prone to - and bit her bottom lip.
"I take it you're not happy about this. Don't you ilke your sister?"
Lisa sat down, keeping her voice low. "It's not that. We've always been particularly close, but I look up to her. I really care what she thinks of me." Lisa's voice began to quiver unusually. "I don't want her to see me like this."
Jen put her arm around Lisa's shoulders and pulled her close. "If she's anything like you and your mom, she'll probably find you just as attractive as ever!"
"The biggest problem that I have with it is that she'll be sharing our bathroom," Lisa explained. "The upstairs bathroom is shared by both myself and her. I can't hide from her."
Jen gave Lisa a quick squeeze and let go. "What we need to do now is call a meeting for those of us who are afflicted to meet. Right now, it sounds like Kelly needs some support as well. I mean, going so far as to homeschool? She can't possibly be worse off than us!"
Lisa thought on that for a second. Kelly had gotten double doses, but she hadn't been ingesting the hormones nearly as long as she and Jennifer had. Then again, Kelly freaked out if her hair fell out of place during practice, so this could be a severe overreaction. Even Jen wasn't as bad as her, in Lisa's opinion.
Lisa had just pulled her homework out of her backpack, resigning herself to catch herself, and her GPA, back up to her stellar standards when in walked Andy, a tall Greek girl with hair just as dark as Lisa's.