When the bell rang to end class, Jay shoved a handful of papers covered in idle doodles into his backpack, followed by a pencil and a tattered textbook. He stood up from his desk and joined the cluster of students making their way through the door and to the freedom of the hallway. It was the end of the school day, and a Friday at that, so the halls were crowded with teenagers rushing to their cars or buses. Jay took his time, allowing people to push past him and continue on their way.

Strolling down the hall, he overheard pieces of conversations. Plans for hanging out this weekend. Dates to the movies. Gatherings at the bowling alley. Jay listened without trying or wanting to. No one called out to him with invitations. No one even waved goodbye to him as he walked through the sturdy double doors and climbed onto his designated bus.

The ride home took less than ten minutes. Jay wished it would have been longer. He stepped off the bus without a word to anyone else, and the bus continued on as if he'd never been on it. He stood in his front yard for a few minutes and wondered, not for the first time, what would happen if he just started walking up the road and never came back. But Jay didn't have the courage to do something so dramatic. Instead, he slipped his backpack off his left shoulder and practically dragged it up onto the porch.

Jay hated Fridays. He hated weekends. Because as awkward and empty as school made him feel, home was worse.

He stepped through the front door and kicked off his shoes, stopped to straighten them into a neat position, then walked from the living room to the stairs. He made it halfway up to his room before a voice from the kitchen yelled, "Jay! Get in here!"

He froze mid-step and took a deep breath. He slowly walked back down, a sudden feeling of nausea forming in his stomach.

He stood in the doorway between the living room and kitchen. He clutched the handle of his backpack in both hands and asked, "Yeah?"

Jay's mother was sitting at the kitchen table, a pile of papers scattered in front of her and a cigarette in one hand. She looked up at him with bleary eyes. "Do you have any idea what the cell phone bill is?"

Jay didn't say anything. He stood rooted to the spot, waiting for her to go on.

"Almost three hundred dollars," she said, her face all hard lines.

Jay hesitated, then cleared his throat. "But didn't you use my phone for two weeks this month?"

His mother suddenly wadded up the papers she'd been clenching in her hand and threw them at Jay, hitting the wall beside his face. "Don't you dare try to blame this on me! I barely even used it! I called three people at most! You're going to pay for this, Jay. If it takes you all winter, I'm holding it out of your allowance."

For a moment, Jay considered pulling out his phone and showing her the evidence, the call logs and text messages and data usage she had built up in the two weeks she'd borrowed his phone. But doing so would only make her angrier, so he remained silent while she continued to yell. He had figured out early on that arguing with her or fighting back only made the situation worse. It was much easier to just stand there and accept her rage.

This was nothing new. Taking the blame for every single financial crisis, no matter how big or how small, seemed to be his designated role in the family. It was his fault when she got fired. It was his fault when a check bounced. It was even his fault when her maxed out credit cards were declined.

After his mother had finished her rant, Jay quietly returned to the stairs and climbed up to his room. He flung his backpack onto his bed and collapsed beside it, draping one forearm over his face. His cell phone chimed from inside his backpack so he rolled over and pulled it out. A text message from his aunt Linda glowed from the screen: "Happy early birthday! Sweet 16 tomorrow lol! Invite me if you have a party!"

Jay smiled and replied, "No party. Too old for that now, but thanks. Stop by and see me tomorrow if you can."

A few seconds later, his phone chimed again. "Maybe we could meet up somewhere," Aunt Linda's new text said. "How about I treat you to a movie?"

Jay quickly began typing his response. "Great! Call you tomorrow and we'll pick a movie."

He dropped the phone on the bed beside him and laid back against the mattress. He waited for it to chime again, but nothing happened. When it became clear that the conversation was over, he felt empty again. He stared at his ceiling, counting the tiny stains or hairline cracks. Within minutes, his eyes slid closed as he fell asleep.

When Jay woke up, an unfamiliar sound assaulted his ears. It was a roaring sound, like the ocean or very strong winds. He blinked rapidly, realizing that his vision was blurry. He had a headache and his body was cold and sore. He sat up, rubbing his forehead and wincing. It took several minutes for his vision to clear enough for him to notice his surroundings.

This was not his bedroom, he realized with alarm. He was surrounded by rough wood on all sides and sitting on a simple cot with a thin mattress. He saw a window and hurried to stand up, but dizziness swept over him and he stumbled before falling back onto the cot. He took a few deep breaths then stood up again, slower this time, and carefully made his way to the window. Looking out, he immediately identified the noise he'd been hearing since he woke up. A blizzard raged outside the window, gusts of wind blowing snow with such force that the wood around him was creaking as if it was about to break.

Jay had seen snow before, was not a complete stranger to cold weather, but he'd never seen anything like this. Names of places ran through his mind, possible locations that could have weather like this: Michigan, Aspen, Alaska, Canada. But he couldn't even guess what he would be doing in any of them. He turned around and saw a door, made of wood like the rest of the room, and limped over to it. His vision was clearing up and the dizziness was nearly gone, but his body still felt sore from head to toe and his legs felt as if they were asleep. He glanced back at the cot and wondered how many hours he'd been lying on it. There was an eerie numbness that seemed to be coating his limbs and even his mind. Had he been drugged?

The door led to a hallway with several more doors on either side. He walked past them as he began to hear voices from further down the hall. Jay hesitated for a moment, a sudden rush of fear running through him. Were his kidnappers at the end of the hall? He was beginning to regain his senses, but being alert only made him more afraid. With trembling legs, he continued on.

At the end was a large room with a higher ceiling than the hallway. There were several other people, all around Jay's age, standing in the room. They stopped whatever conversation they were having to look up at him.

"He makes twelve," a boy with short dark hair said.

A tall black girl who reminded Jay of a model stepped toward him. "Hey, do you know anything? Do you know where we are?"

Jay shook his head. "I just woke up and I... I have no idea what's going on."

The boy who had spoken earlier sighed and sat down on one of four large couches arranged in a square, facing each other, in the middle of the room. "Welcome to the club then," he said.

"Is this all of us?" someone asked.

"I don't know," the tall girl answered, then quickly said, "Wait, there's number thirteen."

Jay turned to look back at the hallway, where a small, confused-looking girl with bright red hair emerged. She was asked the same questions, but she clearly knew nothing as well. Several people were talking at once, and Jay became dizzy again. He wavered, then leaned against the back of a couch for support. All of this was too much, too fast. Too many people, too many unfamiliar faces and too many voices.

"Where the hell are we?"

"Are we being pranked?"

"Is this a reality show?"

"No, stupid, this is a kidnapping!"

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"Maybe this is a camp for delinquents."

"I'm not a delinquent!"

Finally a clear voice rose up over the others as a broad-shouldered boy with sand-colored hair stepped into the center of the group. "Wait, let's all calm down and try to figure out what's going on," he said, and Jay was surprised that everyone did as he told them. "First of all, let's introduce ourselves. I'm Nolan."

The tall, model-like girl spoke next. "I'm Trinity."

The red-haired girl squeaked out the name "Ginger". A boy in a wheelchair called himself "Quentin", and the boy with the short dark hair sitting on the couch said his name was "Diego".

A girl with black hair in dozens of tiny braids was standing closest to a window. 'I'm Kyrie," she said, before returning her gaze to the snow swirling around outside.

Nolan looked at Jay expectantly and he realized he was next. "Oh, uh, I'm Jay."

Standing near the couch in front of Jay were two girls, one with mousey brown hair and a pallid complexion said her name was "Leah" and the other, a small-framed Asian girl who looked even younger than Ginger, called herself "Kat". Jay was immediately struck by the fact that Kat was the only person in the room who didn't look confused or slightly dazed. If he had to describe her expression, Jay would have called her "bored".

A pretty blonde girl who looked like she belonged in a mall sat down on one of the couches and crossed her legs. "I'm Harper," she said, Closest to Harper was a young man with platinum, neatly trimmed hair and glasses who called himself "Scott".

Standing with one hand pressed into the back of the couch that sat across the room from Jay was a girl with copper skin and long, straight dark hair. She had large dark eyes that seemed to be scanning the room as she said, "I'm Mickie."

Last was an Asian boy standing slightly apart from the rest of the group. He had a somewhat delicate, frail look to him, with pale skin and dark hair that Jay privately thought needed cutting. The boy smiled brightly, the first person in the room to do so, but there was something in the expression that Jay found alarming. "I'm Caden," the boy said.

"Alright, now that we know everyone's names," Nolan began, "Let's see what we know. Does anyone remember how they got here? Does anyone remember anything at all?"

The room was full of blank stares and hopeful glances. No one said anything, so Nolan continued.

"Is this building familiar to anyone? Do any of you recognize anything that might tell us where we are?"

Again, silence. Nolan sighed. "Does anyone have a cell phone with them?"

A couple of people checked their pockets but Diego stood up from the couch and frowned at Nolan. "If any of us had that, wouldn't we be calling the cops or our parents by now?"

Jay remembered having his phone just before he fell asleep, but it wasn't in his pockets. Actually, he just realized he hadn't checked the room he woke up in very carefully. Thinking back, he'd been so hazy that he couldn't remember much about the room at all. "Maybe we should search our rooms," he said in a quiet voice.

Nolan looked at him. "That's a good idea. Let's search the whole building. We might find something helpful."

There were numerous nods and agreements before everyone split up and began looking around. Jay saw Nolan approach Quentin and offer to push him, but Quentin gave an uneasy smile and said, "Thanks, but I'm used to pushing myself."

Jay took the time to look around the room he was in. Aside from the couches, there was a large fireplace with a roaring fire already lit, three wooden rocking chairs along one wall, several small tables with lamps on them, a coffee table in the middle of the ring of couches, and two doors.

Jay went to the first door and looked out through a round glass window. This door led outside, and Jay could see a porch covered in snow. Opening the second door, Jay found himself in a kitchen. It was old fashioned and simple but it had all the necessities. The refrigerator was well stocked with butter, cheese, milk, and various meats. There was a tall oak pantry full of bread, canned foods, pasta, and even some snack items like potato chips, soda, and candy. Regardless of what was going on, they were not going to starve to death, at least not for a while. On the other end of the room was yet another door that led to a dining room. There was a long table surrounded by thirteen chairs and a line of large windows along one wall.

The only other door in the dining room led to a tiny laundry room and one more door to the outside, so Jay returned to the living room area and headed back to the room he woke up in. Walking down the hall and trying to remember which room he came from, he was thankful that most of the doors were open and occupied. When he came to a closed door that looked like it might be his, he put his hand on the doorknob.

"That's my room," a voice said behind him.

He turned to see Mickie, the girl with copper skin and large eyes. Up close, Jay realized she was beautiful. He pulled away from the door. "Oh, sorry! I can't remember which room was mine."

Her eyes locked with his and he felt as if she were judging how honest he was being. Then her face softened and she smiled. "It's okay. I think we were all pretty confused when we woke up."

Jay smiled back, then stepped away and headed for the next closed door as Mickie disappeared behind hers. This room looked right, but he guessed all the rooms probably looked alike. He searched the room thoroughly, eventually finding his own backpack in the closet. When he opened it, he was surprised to find it full of clothes and other personal items like his toothbrush, rather than the books and papers that had been inside it just the day before.

When he returned to the living room, most of the others had already gathered there as well, sitting on the couches or standing near the fireplace. After everyone was back, Nolan called everyone's attention. "Okay, so it looks like we have plenty of food and water, and we have heat, so we're okay there. Did everyone have a bag of clothes in their rooms? Okay. Did anything look familiar to anyone?"

"Nothing is familiar. None of us have ever been here before," Trinity answered.

"Does anyone recognize anyone else, or are we all strangers?" Scott, the boy in glasses asked.

The pretty blonde mallrat Harper tapped her pink-booted foot impatiently. "I don't recognize any of you," she said.

Diego was standing with his arm's crossed. "So we still don't know anything."

"Well, we know a few things," Nolan said. "We know someone brought us here. We know whoever it was wants to keep us alive, at least for a while. They did leave us plenty of food. We know they took our cell phones and there are no land lines here, so they didn't want us to be able to call for help. There are no tv's or radios either. Whoever brought us here wants us isolated."

Diego narrowed his eyes. "So we've been kidnapped. Great work figuring that out, Sherlock."

Trinity stepped into the space between Diego and Nolan. "Hey, we're just going over information. No need to get hostile." Without waiting for either of them to respond, she looked around the room. "Did anyone look outside yet?"

Mickie spoke up this time. "I walked out on both of the porches. The weather is way too bad to go any farther. There's a big stack of firewood just outside the front door, under a tarp. I didn't see anything else but when the weather lets up, we should search outside and see if there are any houses nearby."

Diego made a sound that resembled a snort. "You think they put us anywhere near other people after they went to so much trouble to isolate us?"

Jay shot Diego a glare. "Probably not, but it would be pretty stupid not to look around outside," he told him.

Nolan walked over to a window and looked out. "Guess we've got no choice but to wait out the blizzard. It's getting dark already. We can't do anything til morning."

Harper stretched her arms above her head. "God, this place is boring. Would it have killed them to leave a magazine lying around?"

"I saw some books over there," Quentin said, pointing to a small table near the rocking chairs that had three drawers.

"What kind?" Jay asked.

"Nothing good," Quentin replied, "A few trashy romance novels and a couple of old mystery books."

"They're trying to torture us," Harper said, sighing dramatically.

Jay heard sniffling and turned to see the little redhead, Ginger curling up on one of the couches. Kyrie, the girl with braids, sat down beside her and patted her back, then leaned in and said something Jay couldn't hear. Ginger nodded and wiped at her eyes. 

Nolan and Trinity stood at one of the windows for several minutes, talking to each other in quiet voices, then they approached the group. "Looks like we can't do anything until morning," Nolan said. "It wouldn't be safe to go out in that weather while it's dark. We'll have to wait out the storm."

"Are you guys serious?" Diego asked. "We've been kidnapped and probably drugged and trapped in some deserted camp in the middle of a blizzard and you guys wanna sit around waiting?"

Trinity was quick to answer him. "What do you want us to do, Diego? Wander around out there all night? We can't do a damn thing until the snow lets up. If you want to go out there yourself, no one is stopping you."

Jay could actually see Diego's jaw clenching, but the boy said nothing.

With the tension dissipating, the group separated. Kat, the girl who had looked bored, had moved to one of the rocking chairs and was thumbing through one of the books. Scott was talking to Harper, the mallrat, by the window. The frail looking boy named Caden was standing near the fireplace, half his face nearly covered by black hair.

An hour later, it was completely dark outside, and despite having been asleep for who knows how long before this afternoon, despite generous amounts of soda and snacks, everyone was getting drowsy. Jay wondered if it was an aftereffect of whatever drug they'd been given to knock them out for the trip to the camp.

Suddenly the lights went out, and a couple of people screamed in surprise. Nolan stood up quickly. "Everyone stay calm! The lights are probably set up on a timer. Apparently we have a bedtime."

The fireplace provided enough light for them to see each other and make their way to the hallway, where tiny dim lights could be seen above each door, just barely illuminating the path to their rooms. As they were all walking down the hall, a loud, piercing howl rose up over the sound of the raging winds outside. Everyone froze. Ginger whimpered. Someone asked, "What is that?"

In the darkness, Jay couldn't see Nolan's face as he answered, "Probably just a wolf or a coyote. Don't worry, it can't get inside. Let's go to bed."

Jay entered his room and felt his way to the bed, then collapsed across it as he did at home, draping one arm over his face. The howling sound rang out again, and a strange shiver crept over Jay's body. He wasn't particularly afraid of a wolf or a coyote if they were outside and he was inside, but somehow, he just couldn't associate that sound with any animal he knew of. He rolled over and looked at the faint outline of his window. "Some birthday this turned out to be," he muttered before falling asleep.