The bedroom door opened a crack, startling her. At first she worried Prudence or Wendell had found her, but it was Joseph's head that peeked into the room. "You're still awake?"
"I don't know what to do," she said. She glanced down at the bottle in her hands. "It doesn't matter if I'm pretty. I'm still an ugly person in here." She pointed to her heart.
"Samantha, you're a beautiful girl and I'm sure you're just as beautiful on the inside," Joseph said. He put an arm around her and guided her to sit on the bed. "When I saw you, you seemed so upset I thought maybe this would help, but you don't need it. I only thought you might want the rest of the world to see you in the way I do."
"You really think I'm beautiful?"
"From the very first moment I saw you."
"You don't mind my pimples or my hair or my clothes?"
"Of course not. You're perfect in every way." He slipped one of his wide, muscular hands around hers. "But wouldn't you like to go back and stick it to those girls? Show them how much more beautiful you can be?"
"I don't know-"
"Samantha, I know we only met last night, but I feel like I've known you all my life. I know you want the same things I do. You don't want to be ordinary. You want something more."
"I'm not sure what I want."
"If you look into your heart I'm sure you'll find I'm right." He squeezed her hand and smiled. "You and I can be extraordinary. This world is ours for the taking. You only have to reach out and grab it."
"I can't. What if-"
Joseph's other hand ripped the bottle from her grasp and in one fluid motion sprayed her twice in the face. The world around Samantha turned painfully bright and blurry. "You'll thank me in the morning," Joseph said, his voice sounding as if it came from a thousand miles away. He took Samantha by the shoulders and laid her out on the bed. She tried to get up, but the muscles in her limbs wouldn't move. She couldn't even open her mouth to scream as the world exploded in a nova of white light and then faded to darkness.
She woke up to find something tickling her nose. She swatted at it with one hand only to find a tress of hair lying across her face. She swept it back, following it all the way to her shoulders. What happened to me? she wondered. Then she saw the bottle on the nightstand and remembered.