From that point on, it seemed like all anyone could talk about at school was the fact that Conner Hawkins was now dating that girl Lanie Evans, who'd just came in out of nowhere and surprised everyone with her charm and her good looks. Heads in the hallways turned whenever they saw Conner and Lanie walking together. Both Conner and Lanie loved the attention and soaked it in. Neither of them had been particularly famous at school before, so it felt great to be treated like celebrities. Lanie had thought getting to hang out with Diana's clique felt great, but it was nothing compared to having a boyfriend. It was as if nothing could go wrong for her anymore.

Naturally, that meant something would end up going wrong for Lanie. It happened on Friday evening, just shy of a week after her first date with Conner. She was walking home from Conner's house, where she'd gone to have dinner and get to know the rest of his family. Conner's mom, and his two little brothers, and their cute little Chihuahua had all loved Lanie. They found Lanie to be very sweet and likeable. In turn, Lanie took great joy in meeting Conner's family. They were very hospitable to her, and they made a really tasty dinner of pasta and vegetables. It had been a great evening for Lanie, but it was about to get ruined big-time.

Lanie entered the Orphanage For All Ages and ran into Jenny in the foyer. "Hey Lanie," said Jenny. "Where have you been?"

"At Conner Hawkins' house," Lanie answered. "His family wanted to meet me, so I went over for dinner."

"That's great," said Jenny. "Where's Rachel?"

"I think she's still here. Why..." Lanie trailed off when she noticed that Jenny's eyes were red-rimmed, and there were tear marks on her cheeks. She'd just been crying.

"I need to talk to you and Rachel," said Jenny. "Somewhere private."

Lanie sensed there was trouble afoot. "Of course," she said. "Let's go up to our bedroom."

Lanie took Jenny upstairs to her and Rachel's bedroom. There, they found Rachel lying on her bed reading a book. "Hi Lanie!" said Rachel. "How was dinner with the Hawkinses?"

"It was great," said Lanie. "But Jenny said she needs to talk to us."

Rachel's smile faded when she saw how miserable Jenny was. "What's wrong?" she asked. "More trouble at school?"

Jenny nodded. "It's getting worse," she said. "You know that boy I told you about, Ben Snipes-he beat me up today at lunch. He called me bad names, and he...and he..."

"He did what?"

"He said no one would notice if I just disappeared tomorrow."

Lanie was dumbstruck. "That's horrible," she said.

"Have you talked to any teachers about this?" Rachel asked.

"I did," Jenny answered, "But then Ben Snipes called me a snitch."

"I've got to tell you, Jenny, I don't think you should keep going to that middle school," said Lanie. "You should talk to Mr. Ryan about transferring to another school."

"I can't," said Jenny. "Even if I did find some other middle school, it wouldn't be any different."

"You don't know that!" said Rachel.

"Yes I do! I just..." Jenny started to cry again. "I didn't ask for any of this! I didn't want my family to be killed, or Angelina to turn me into a girl, or to be ran out of Nashville, or..."

"Neither did we," said Lanie. "But just because it looks bad now, doesn't mean it'll be this way forever. If you give it time, then things might get better."

"No, it won't," Jenny sobbed. "Lanie, Rachel...you guys are amazing. You've been really nice to me, and really brave, and...I'm so glad you tried to help me. But I just don't think there's anything else I can do."

"Yes you can," said Rachel. "You just have to..."

"Goodbye, guys," said Jenny. And then she turned and left the room.

Rachel looked at Lanie for support. "What did I do?" she asked.

"Nothing," said Lanie. She looked at the dorm's door where Jenny had gone. She was getting a bad feeling. "Come on," she said.

Lanie and Rachel went out into the hallway and looked for Jenny. "There she is!" Rachel said, pointing. Lanie and Rachel took off down the hall after Jenny.

"Jenny, wait!" Lanie called. "Where are you going?"

Jenny ignored Lanie. She came to the building's ladder onto the roof at started climbing.

"What's she doing?" Rachel asked. "Is she going on the roof..."

Lanie and Rachel both froze in their tracks when they realized what Jenny was really doing. "NO!" Lanie cried. She and Rachel took off at a run for the ladder, where Jenny had already reached the top. "JENNY, NO!"

"I'm sorry," said Jenny. "I have no choice." She climbed up through the roof's trapdoor and onto the roof itself. She climbed up onto the edge of the roof and looked down below her. It was quite the sight to see-the street below her and the buildings and city blocks that went out as far as the eye could see. Jenny would never have thought this would be the last thing she ever saw, but it would have to suffice.

"Jenny, no, don't!" Lanie said as she scrambled up through the trapdoor and onto the roof. "Get down from there!"

Jenny turned to take one last look at Lanie and Rachel (who was just poking her head out the trapdoor). "Goodbye, friends," she said. And with that, Jenny jumped off the edge of the building.

Lanie's heart stopped. She'd done it! Jenny had actually jumped off the roof of the building! Lanie ran up to the edge and looked down below. She saw Jenny land hard onto the sidewalk below with a sickening crack! "Oh, shit..."

"She actually jumped," said Rachel.

"Get Mr. Ryan!" said Lanie. "We've gotta call 911!"

Lanie and Rachel rushed downstairs to the front office. "Mr. Ryan!" they said when they burst through the door. "Mr. Ryan, there's a-"

"Whoa, calm down!" Mr. Ryan said when he saw the two girls who'd barged into his office. "What's going on?"

"Jenny just jumped off the roof," said Lanie.

Mr. Ryan's eyes widened. "She jumped off the roof?"

"Yes! She landed on the sidewalk in front of the building!"

"Where'd she land?"

"Come on, we'll show you," said Lanie. She and Rachel took Mr. Ryan outside to where Jenny had landed spread-eagled. "See, there she is!"

Mr. Ryan ran up to Jenny, rolled her onto her back, and started performing CPR on her. "Come on, Jenny," he said. "Stay with us, please."

"Here, I'll call 911," said Rachel. She got out her phone and dialed the emergency hotline. "Hello...yes, we've got a girl who just jumped off a building...Orphanage For All Ages. It's an emergency. Yes, thank you so much." She hung up her phone and said "They're coming."

It only took ten minutes for the ambulance to show up, but it felt like much longer. Lanie and Rachel both watched tensely as Mr. Ryan kept trying to get Jenny's heart beating again and resuscitate her, but to no avail. When the ambulance and the EMT people did come, Mr. Ryan stepped aside to let them put Jenny onto a stretcher and load her into the ambulance.

"Will she be okay?" Lanie asked.

"I don't know," Mr. Ryan answered. "I don't know."

***

Lanie and Rachel stayed up for several hours waiting for an update from the hospital. They waited right outside Mr. Ryan's office, since they knew he'd be the one to get a call from the hospital.

The call finally came at 11:30. Lanie and Rachel listened in as hard as they could, but all they heard was indiscriminate conversation from inside the office. After a few minutes, Mr. Ryan came out with a solemn expression. "Well?" Lanie asked. "Is Jenny okay?"

Mr. Ryan shook his head. "I'm afraid not," he answered. "Jenny broke every bone in her body. She was pronounced dead just twenty minutes ago."

Lanie's heart sank. "I don't believe it," she said.

"Do either of you know?" Mr. Ryan asked. "What drove her to do this terrible thing?"

"Yes," Rachel answered. "Did she tell you about that boy Ben Snipes at her school?"

"Yes, she did," said Mr. Ryan. "I don't like that boy...what did he do?"

"He told Jenny no one would care if she was gone," said Rachel. "And that was the last straw. That was what made her want to kill herself."

"We tried to stop her," said Lanie. "But she wouldn't listen. She just went up to the roof and jumped off."

Mr. Ryan sighed. "Well, you did what you could," he said.

"What now?" Rachel asked. "Are we gonna have a funeral for her?"

"I'm afraid so," said Mr. Ryan.

***

The funeral service was held the very next day. It didn't take very long to arrange, since it was a small gathering of people who'd known Jenny. Mr. Ryan, Mrs. Sierra, and some of the other orphanage staff members were there, as were a couple of Jenny's teachers from school. Various kids from the orphanage were there, such as Aaron, Trevor, and Brianna. And, of course, Lanie and Rachel were there, too. They both helped carry Jenny's casket and watched as it was lowered into its grave in the cemetery.

Even after the rest of the funeral guests had gone, Lanie and Rachel stayed in the cemetery looking down on Jenny's grave. "I'm so sorry, Jenny," Lanie said, tears streaming down her cheeks. "I should never have dragged you into this. I...I shouldn't have made you come down into the Pretty And Pink bunker with me."

"It's not your fault," said Rachel. "It was Jenny's choice to commit suicide."

"I know," Lanie admitted. She turned to Rachel and said "We have to stop her."

"Who?"

"Angelina. All of this, everything that's happened-it can all be traced back to her. She turned us all into girls and set up that fake foster home. And she sent us into exile when we found out what she was really doing."

Rachel nodded slowly. "Yes," she said. "We'll find Angelina. And we'll make her pay for what she's done."

***

Angelina lay in her lounge chair at the Washington D. C. establishment of Pretty And Pink Foster Care-the original place where the organization had been founded. Her assistant Bea was hard at work, manicuring Angelina's feet while Angelina read a fashion magazine. It was one of Angelina's favorite activities-just hanging out and chilling while her non-witch servant worked for her.

"Angelina!" a voice called. Angelina looked up to see her fellow witch Anna coming into the room, followed by the other Pretty And Pink witch Elena. "We have some great news!"

"What news?" Angelina asked.

"We found this news article," said Anna. She opened something on her phone and handed it to Angelina. Angelina saw the headline "Orphan Girl Commits Suicide" and read the article with intrigue. The article told the story of a girl named Jenny Nunez who'd been living in the Orphanage For All Ages in Atlanta, Georgia and experienced bullying at school. It had all come to a head the night before when she went onto the top of her orphanage and jumped off in a successful suicide attempt.

"Wait a minute," said Angelina. "Jenny Nunez...that's the same girl we admitted to our Nashville location right before Lanie and her roommates went poking around in our bunker."

"Yes," said Elena. "And wait till you see who's in the article's picture."

Angelina scrolled back up to the top of the article, where it had a picture of a broken Jenny Nunez being loaded into the back of an ambulance. In the background of the picture, there were two teenage girls watching alongside the orphanage's owner. Angelina looked closer and saw that those girls were...could it be? Lanie Evans and Rachel Miller? The other two girls Angelina, Anna, and Elena had been spent the last several weeks looking for?

"This is it," Angelina said triumphantly. "We've found them."

"I knew we'd find them eventually," said Elena.

"Bea!" Angelina ordered. "Prepare my car. We've got to pay a visit to Atlanta, Georgia."

"Yes, my lady," Bea said reluctantly.

Angelina grinned wickedly. Those foolish girls, she thought. They thought they could hide from her, but they were wrong. Angelina would now get her hands on Lanie, and it would be game over.

To be continued...