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I nodded although I felt I would be the biggest target for everyone else's critical arrows.

"Misty?"

"It's okay with me. I don't mind what anyone says about me," she added.

"There! That's a lie," Jade accused, her forefinger in her face. "Well?"

"Okay, it's a lie. What I meant is I won't mind what anyone here says about me. I mean, I'll mind, but I'll take it. Is that all right?"

"It's better," Jade conceded, "but it's not quite enough honesty yet. Anyway," she continued, turning away from Misty, who released a breath and shook her head at me. "My father found all these toy-like things and made me my own dollhouse up here. Sometimes, I felt like a doll in it myself. There are even small lamps and tables, small bookcases, and of course, little dishes, glasses, and cups.

"But I have other things in there, things that have had some special meaning for me and they're not all small things. I keep the room under lock and key. The maid doesn't even get in there to clean, which my mother hates. I take care of that room by myself."

"Wow," Star said, exaggerating her surprise as we con- tinned down the upstairs hallway, "you actually clean one room yourself?"

"Okay," Jade admitted, "I'm a spoiled brat." She smiled. "But I won't deny that I've enjoyed it."

"Don't you just hate all this truth?" Star asked Misty and me.

With some hesitation, we both laughed.

As we passed Jade's mother's bedroom, we gazed through the double doors and saw an enormous bed with a headboard made out of what looked like pearls. It rose halfway to the ceiling. It was a fourposter bed, too. I could see there was a whole other room, a living room, just off to the right, with a television set. I asked about it, but Jade wasn't going to stop to show us anything at the moment.

At the end of the hallway there was a narrow stairway that took us up to the attic, Jade's dollhouse to the right and a storage area to the left. She took a key from her pocket, unlocked the padlock, and then she opened the door and stepped back for all of us to enter.

We all paused inside the doorway. It was as if we had fallen down a well into Oz or some other make-believe world. The one small window was draped in a candy red-and-white curtain. The floor was covered with a thick, cream tinted rug that also had some red streaking through it. As she had described, the room was furnished with small milk white chairs and tables, a sofa, and short pole lamps. There was even a small television set in a miniature cabinet. There were little pictures of clowns and horses, scenic views, and some cartoon characters on the white and candy apple red wallpaper. I, especially, felt like Gulliver in Lilliput, a giant among tiny people. I was afraid to move, afraid I might step on something or shatter something with a clumsy gesture.

"We don't have to sit on furniture," Jade said, as she saw us lingering in the doorway. "We can sit on the floor. That's what I usually do when I'm up here."

She closed the door behind her and went to the small area where there was a dining room table all set with toy dishes and silverware. Behind it was a miniature kitchen with cabinets, a sink, and a stove. None of us, not even M

isty, could fit on those tiny kitchen table chairs, I thought. A beautiful doll with long flowing golden hair was seated at the head of the table. On the other chairs were characters from various children's stories. I recognized Pinocchio of course, and Dorothy from Oz, as well as Pocahontas.

Jade opened one of the small cabinet doors, reached in, and then turned back to us with a long, black candle in her hand. I saw her look to Star who nodded. Then Jade pulled down the shade over the small window to darken the room. She set a candle holder down on the floor and squatted beside it, inviting us to do the same. We gathered in a small circle and Jade set the candle in the holder.

"I don't mean to be so dramatic about all this, but I've been thinking about us and I've done some research on different rituals designed to bind people the way I think we all want to be bound."

"What do you mean by bound?" Misty asked.

Jade looked very thoughtful for a moment. It was very quiet. All I could hear was the tiny ticking of a small clock on a shelf behind me.

"We've all got to feel we're part of something much greater than ourselves. If you put a teaspoon of water into a bottle of wine, the water would lose its identity. It would take on the smell and the taste of the wine. We've got to dissolve ourselves like that into each other."

"How do we do that?" Misty asked. Without realizing she was doing it, she was whispering.

Instead of answering right away, Jade lit the candle.

"We have to pledge ourselves to each other, to the sisterhood, and swear to put the interests of all of us above our own personal interests."

Misty still looked troubled and confused.

"Don't you want to do that?" Jade asked her.

Misty looked at me and then nodded.

"Sure. That's why we're here, I guess."

"We've all been brought together because people who were or are supposed to be responsible for us were more interested in their own happiness. That's why we have to be unselfish when it comes to each other," Jade said.