I ignored Amber because she read Seventeen. She wanted to do a makeover on me. Showed me the Before and After page. After, the girls smiled; they looked stupid and saved. Amber did everything Seventeen told her to do. Cucumbers on her eyes, lemon juice in her hair. She had a very round face, and her skin was so shiny. I’ve never seen a girl with such shiny skin. I think she wanted to look more exotic because she tweezed her eyebrows till they were thin black arches and she always wore this incredibly dark, violet lipstick. I’m making her sound freakish, but she was really beautiful and she didn’t seem disturbed at all. She was taller than me, taller than Dirk Wallace, but unlike him, she didn’t seem at all awkward with the length of her body. I don’t know why, but whenever I’d look at Amber, all determined and long-legged, I’d imagine her climbing out of a car wreck while the slow, sluggish passengers burned inside.

After I told her to go away, Amber wouldn’t leave me alone.

Then I found out she was the B & E queen.

Sometimes she needed a crowbar; other times all it took was a dime. Once, she turned a combination lock with her tongue. It was funny because she didn’t even want to steal. All she wanted to do was get inside. In April, she broke into every locker at Oak Bay High School. By May, she was hitting mansions in Uplands. Last week, she’d been busted after she broke into eight offices at some insurance place.

I’m not going to stop, she told the judge.

Why not?

Because I’m good at it, you dickhead.

I’m skilled, I’ve got the gift. I’m a motherfucking Houdini!

The judge didn’t want to send her to juvie. She thought Amber would enjoy being in a place with thirty-two locked doors. So they put her in White Oaks, the temporary shelter for troubled girls, and that’s how she ended up sharing a room with me.

I told Amber I’d let her do a makeover if she taught me how to break and enter.

Just the basics, I said, I don’t need anything fancy.

My gift is not a basic, she said. And besides, Sara, you just got here. You ain’t ready to escape.

I fell asleep during a rerun of Charlie’s Angels. I remember Charlie’s voice. Girls argued over Bosley: Isn’t that the guy from Happy Days? No, that’s the Garbage Bag Man.