"What are you doing here?" a girl's voice said. "Hello, I'm talking to you. Do you speak English? Habla espanol?"
Samantha realized the girl was talking to her. She snapped out of her reverie to find a blonde girl in a pink T-shirt glaring at her. "I'm sorry," Samantha said. She backed away from the locker, pressing herself between a water fountain and a wall as the flow of children continued to roll by.
"Who was that?" one of the blonde girl's friends asked.
"I don't know, some freak," the blonde girl said. She snickered as she added, "Did you see what she was wearing? She must have got that out of the Goodwill or something."
"And what about her hair," another girl said. "She probably cut it herself."
"She's probably homeless. She probably lives in, you know, a Dumpster or under a bridge or something."
"Well, she obviously couldn't afford to buy any Clearasil for those zits." The girls broke into peals of laughter. Samantha took off running down the hall, shoving aside anyone who got in her way. "Watch it, you freak!" someone called out.
She burst through another set of doors and down a set of steps, cold air stinging her watery eyes. She kept running without any idea of where to go. She was homeless now. An ugly, homeless freak with a criminal past and a name that didn't belong to her.
She slammed into someone and bounced off, landing on her rear in the snow. "I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't see you."
"Samantha, there you are. I've been looking for you," a boy said. Samantha squinted up at him, but didn't recognize the burly young man she'd run into. "It's me, Joe Pryde."
"Joseph?" She squinted again and thought she could make out a vague resemblance in his eyes, although he no longer wore glasses. What had happened to him? Since she saw him last night his ropy muscles had expanded to the point where they seemed ready to burst through his clothes. His hair had grown longer than hers and a thick beard had sprouted along his jaw.
"That's right. What happened to you? Did someone hurt you? Give me his name and I'll kick his ass for you."
Samantha told him what the girls had said about her clothes, hair, and pimples. She couldn't bring herself to mention what Mrs. Milton had said at the Seafarer Bed and Breakfast. "They're right," she said. "I am ugly."
Joseph knelt down in the snow, caressing her cheek with one long finger. "You're not ugly. You're a beautiful girl."
"No I'm not. You're just trying to make me feel better."