As Marnie Fitzpatrick stood under a stream of water, she looked down at her hands and saw that her fingers were starting to prune. She usually took extra-long showers on Sunday mornings, but never this long. Then again, Marnie had never a Saturday night as bad as the evening before, so she was hoping that she could prune herself into oblivion. But she knew that in about five more minutes the water temperature was going to leap from lukewarm to bone-chilling cold, which meant the odds of shriveling up into nothingness were slim at best.

Marnie turned the shower off with a slippery wet hand, opened the door, and reached for the green plush towel that was hanging on a hook on the bathroom wall. After she dried off, she wrapped the towel around herself, tucking a small flap of fabric near her chest so it would stay put. Marnie approached the bathroom mirror and wiped off the fog. When she caught her reflection, she practically jumped back in horror.

Oh, my god, what happened to my eyes?

Marnie touched the puffy skin near her eyelids and winced. She figured that they’d swollen up because of the five-hour crying jag she’d had last night after Weston Briggs had escorted her home post inauguration party-fracas. As she grabbed a washcloth and ran tepid water over it in the sink, Marnie felt the tears coming on again. She could still hear the pinched, sour voice of that insufferable monster Brynne Callaway, telling her that she was “oh-ver.” She could still picture how enraged Marnie’s best friend and veritable icon, Lizette Levin, had looked when she accused Marnie of hooking up with skateboard stud Sawyer Lee behind her back. And she could still feel the strong wind that almost knocked her on her butt once Grier Hopkins slammed the door to her exquisite house right in Marnie’s face.

When Marnie dabbed the damp washcloth around her blue eyes, her mind was cluttered with angst-ridden questions. Was there a way to convince Lizette that Brynne was a detestable liar who would do anything to see that Marnie bit the dust? Could Marnie hire someone to run Brynne down with a speeding steamroller? Would she be able to go to school tomorrow and walk the halls knowing that everyone, especially the revered Majors, perceived her to be a dirty, conniving traitor who dared deceive the Almighty Lizette Levin?

Marnie leaned over the sink as her stomach clenched tightly.

I’m screwed. Totally, completely screwed.

“Honey, I’m about to take off,” Marnie’s mother called out from behind the bathroom door.

Marnie had managed to sneak into the house yesterday without running into her mom, so Mrs. Fitzpatrick had no idea that her daughter had been recently punted into the far reaches of the socially ostracized section of the popularity playing field.

“Okay,” Marnie replied weakly.

“Did you need anything from the outside world?” her mom asked.

A new life would be nice.

“No, I’m fine.” Marnie glanced at her face and saw that she still appeared as though she’d narrowly escaped a dogfight.

“All right then. I guess I’ll just bring Erin straight home after I pick her up from the train station.”

A sharp pain shot up from Marnie’s stomach and lodged in the back of her head. She had forgotten that her sister would be coming to stay for a while during Penn State’s midsemester break. Erin would be there so she could MC the crowning ceremony and distribute tiaras to lucky winners at the Poughkeepsie Central Homecoming dance, among other duties the former senior class queen was expected to perform. How the hell was Marnie supposed to deal with her deity of a sister when a freaking million-ton asteroid had just struck her once-perfect world?