Brie pulled the sun-faded pink and white curtain aside and peeked out the frosted window. A thick layer of snow covered the front yard, stealing the color from the landscape, fading everything to black and white.

She swallowed hard around the lump in her throat. Turning her back to the wall, she slid down until her butt hit the pink shag carpet. Why couldn't she just catch a break? Hugging her knees to her chest, she wiped a tear away with her shirtsleeve. Starting Piedmont High two months into the term was bad enough, but now she'd have to take the school bus. Pops' old Red Rover pickup would never make it. To make matters worse, she had spent the night tossing and turning, sleep never managing to win the battle over the hollow feeling in her stomach, and this morning she woke with dark circles under her eyes making her look like a zombie on The Walking Dead.

Her vision blurred. She wished she were back in San Francisco with her mom in their little apartment. It wasn't much, but it was home. She had done her best to take care of her mother, to make sure she was home at night, that she was fed and tucked in. But in the end it hadn't been enough. Guilt chomped its teeth at Brie like a rabid dog. It was her fault her mom had gone over the edge. And now her mother spent her time in a sterile, white room in Napa, all alone, and Brie was stuck with Pops in Montana.

Looking around at the faded rosebud wallpaper, the bed's white wicker headboard, and old fashioned vanity with the pink ruffled skirt, the same dressing table her mom had used every morning getting ready for school, Brie felt doomed to repeat the past.

This was exactly what her mother warned her would happen when she turned seventeen.

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