Chapter One
Mr. Milling's voice droned on and on, discussing the causes of the Columbian Exchange. A fan feebly tried to cool off the room from the hot September air coming through the window. Most of the high school students embarking on a trip to dreamland, if they weren't already there. Almost no one moved muscle, even though notes were "required".
The one exception to this rule was the girl sitting in the seat two rows over and three rows back from the door. Her legs were supported by the balls of her feet going up and down over and over again. If someone had looked in Mr. Milling's room just then the difference between her and her classmates would have been comical. Her green eyes were bright and wide open, while the boy sitting to her right was drooling forcefully onto his open notebook. These forest green eyes frequently went to the watch on her wrist, as if she could make the seconds speed up by staring them down.
When her eyes were not focused on her watch, the arm it was encircling went up every so often to brush the chestnut colored bangs out of the way. Why was she so excited? She obviously wasn't listening anymore than the drooling wonder, as evidence of the empty loose leaf page in front of her that bore nothing but the date and the name Taryn Woods, but something was compelling her to stay awake.
Three months previously, something had come to Taryn's house in the mail for her. Taryn was astonished when inside of it there was an invitation to play the popular new game show "Behind the Doors". Taryn had watched the game on TV a few times, but she couldn't recall ever subscribing to the game, or expressing her desire to play it to anyone. She would have told her friends her insane desire to play the game, but even she couldn't pin down the reason she wanted to play. It was as if she was drawn to the game like a positive and a negative. Only she wasn't sure if she was the positive or the negative. All she knew was that somehow the impossible had happened in her receiving an invitation to play this new game she was inclined to love.
All summer Taryn had been the envy of her friends, and anyone else that heard about her recent rise to fame. Everyone said hi to her, and raved about how cool she was, or how funny she was, or how she totally needed to hang out with whoever was vying for her attention. People she had been in school with since elementary school, but had never spoken to her were saying hello to her in the store. Taryn couldn't quite adjust to the new popularity. She was shy and quiet, not one to talk for no reason. She was the one who would pull out a book at the pointless school assemblies, just so she could do something productive with her time rather than listen to the boring and repetitive speeches given by teachers and administrators about why the school needed
