By the time Genesis and Megan got to the witches' headquarters, they'd already gone over their plan. Even so, Genesis felt like she was on the verge of a panic attack. She was about to break and enter. And since it was a witches' place that she was breaking and entering into, she might face some very serious consequences.

The following Monday, Genesis met up with Charlotte at school to tell her what had happened.

"You've got to be kidding me," Charlotte said when Genesis had finished explaining what had went down at the party. "You actually turned Jesse into a girl?"

"Yes, I did," said Genesis.

Charlotte shook her head. "Well, I'll bet Jessie's gonna have a tough time adjusting to being a girl," she said. "Did he-or she-text you at all after you changed her?"

"No," said Genesis. "She said we were breaking up. And now I'm starting to regret turning him into a girl."

Grounded for a week.

It wasn't the first time Genesis had been grounded. When Genesis was Gene, he'd been grounded a few times by his father Reginald. But she'd almost forgotten how much it sucked. Her parents only let her leave the house so she could go to school, but not to meet up with any friends or extended family. She couldn't even go out to do something fun by herself.

For the next couple weeks, Genesis continued to visit Megan's house after school to practice magic. Since finals were coming up, and Genesis still had cheerleading practice to go to, she couldn't train with Megan every day. She only went to her house on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays. She'd have either Jesse or Ramona drive her to Megan's house.

All of this made for a busy schedule for Genesis. But it wasn't until one Thursday at lunch when she realized there might be something else she should be doing.

After the phone call with the Council Of Witches, Ramona and Genesis both drove home. As they drove, Ramona couldn't seem to stop thinking about how she'd smoked her first cigarette. "Wow," said Ramona. "I can't believe I actually smoked!"

"Neither can I," said Genesis.

"It felt so good," said Ramona. "Are you sure you didn't like it?"

"Of course I'm sure," said Genesis. "The cigarettes tasted awful, and they made me cough like crazy. Plus, I knew that if my dad found out I was smoking, I'd be grounded for life. So I stopped."

"One, two, three, four, we're the tigers, do the roar!" Genesis cried as she and her fellow cheerleaders shook their pom-poms. In response, all the spectators in the bleachers cheered. The cheerleaders watched as Eastern Plains High's star batter Rupert Lacey hit a home run and ran all three bases before skidding onto home plate. There was another round of cheering as Rupert beamed with pride.

"Yeah, Rupert!" said the cheer captain and Genesis' stepsister Ramona said. "You're the man!"

"And look at that!" Rupert said, looking at the scoreboard. "We won!"

It didn't take long for Genesis to find Jesse. Right when she stepped out of the Orphanage For All Ages, she saw Jesse just standing there on the edge of the sidewalk. His head was hung, and he was staring off into space, as if he didn't even care where he was or where he was going.

"Hey!" said Genesis.

Jesse turned and saw Genesis. "Hey," he said.

"Jesse, I'm so sorry," said Genesis. "I didn't know that she'd..."

"It's not your fault," said Jesse. "I shouldn't have even come here."

"Don't say that."

Jesse drove until 11:00 AM the next day. By that point, Ramona had woken up. "We should probably stop for a while," said Ramona. "Let the car rest."

"Rest?" Genesis asked.

"Yeah, we've been driving it literally all night long," said Ramona. "That might not be good for it."

"I did stop a little while ago," said Jesse. "So I could top off the gas."

"That's good," said Ramona. "But we should take another stop."

"Okay," said Jesse. "But...what are we gonna do while we let the car rest?"

"So you quit the internship," said Reginald.

"Yes, I did," said Genesis. She was sitting at the dinner table with her dad Reginald, stepmom Paulette, and stepsister Ramona, having just told them about what had happened with Lucas at Pride Laboratories.

"You know, most people don't quit jobs or internships without putting in a 2-week notice," said Reginald. "That would be the professional thing to do."

"I know," said Genesis. "But now that Lucas Jacobson has shown his true colors..."

Genesis' first day at the internship was Monday, January 22, 2024. After school got out, Ramona gave her a lift right from the school to the Pride Laboratories building. The building was located at the edge of the city, right where the freeway went out into the countryside. It was two stories high, with two smokestacks sticking out of the top and a billboard sign with a big rainbow on it.

"Wow," Genesis said when she saw it. "That's...some building."

"Yeah," Ramona agreed.

Genesis barely remembered going home from the mall. All she remembered was the shock she was in. Mirna had been murdered. She wouldn't be able to reset everything to the way it was. Genesis would be stuck as a woman for the rest of her life. By the time she got home, she was right on the verge of crying. She didn't even bother talking to her dad or stepmom. She just went straight to her room, flopped down on her bed, and started crying. She cried nonstop for half an hour, feeling really sorry for herself. Her life had hit a low point that she doubted she could get up from.

A month ago, Genesis would've scoffed at the idea of being on good terms with Ramona. But after Genesis covered for Ramona, Ramona started acting a lot more civil with Genesis. She helped her out with a homework assignment, she sat down to watch TV with Genesis one night, and she went for five straight days without insulting Genesis at all. It almost seemed unthinkable. It was as if they were putting their longtime rivalry behind them.

The next morning, Genesis woke to the sound of her phone buzzing. She opened her eyes and sat up. After Charlotte and Modesty had left last night, Genesis had simply felt too tired to go back to her bedroom, so she just crashed onto the couch to sleep. But when she opened the notification on her phone, she got a nasty surprise. It was a text message from her father, and it read:

My conference for today was cancelled at the last minute, so Paulette and I are gonna come home. We'll be there in an hour and a half.

The next few cheerleading practices went better. Determined not to get in another fight with Ramona, Genesis tried her best to perform the cheer stunts and routines as Mrs. Wilson instructed. By the end of the first week, Genesis had gotten the hang of the basic routines. It helped that the other cheerleaders, especially Charlotte, were very supportive of her. Which made sense, considering that the whole point of cheerleaders was to be supportive.

On the first day of school, Genesis rode with Ramona to school. Unlike Genesis, Ramona had her own car that her mother had helped pay for. Genesis had never thought she'd be riding in the school bully's car, but here she was now.

"Listen," Ramona said as they pulled into the school's parking lot, "My mom told me she and your dad signed you up for the cheerleading squad-"

"Yes, I know," said Genesis. "First practice is after school today, right?"

For the next few weeks of the summer, Genesis took some lessons in being a girl. Paulette sat down with her and taught her how to braid her hair and do her makeup. It all felt really uncomfortable to Genesis. Being a girl was supposed to be a temporary thing, but everyone was acting like it was a permanent one. And it didn't help that her room didn't even feel the same.

Gene Rookwood slammed the front door of his house behind him. He was not in a very good mood right now, and he knew things were gonna get even worse now that he was home.

"Gene? You're home?" Gene heard his father Reginald say.

"Yeah," said Gene.

"What happened?" Reginald asked. "Did you get off work early?"

Gene went into the living room, where his dad Reginald and stepmom Paulette were sitting on the couch. "No," said Gene. "I got fired."

Reginald's jaw dropped. "You were fired?"

The next morning, Ruth came to Rachel's dorm to oversee Maddie and Hattie pack their things. The twins would be sent to Pretty And Pink's Virginia building, which happened to be the company's first establishment. The whole time Maddie and Hattie were packing, they cast dirty looks in Rachel's direction.

"I hope you're happy, bitch," Maddie said to Rachel. "Now we're getting yanked out of our lives here."

"Yeah, well, I didn't want to get yanked out of my old life, either," Rachel said coldly.

"Where did you live, in another orphanage?" Hattie asked.

For the next few days, Rachel kept going to school and working with Jesse as her lab partner. It felt weird, since she knew him so well and he didn't know her (or so he thought), but their interactions were mostly good. There was one incident where Rachel felt like she'd slightly annoyed Jesse, but he seemed to have gotten over it by the end of class.

The next week, however, things were different. When Rachel got to her Science class, the teacher Mrs. McLain had an announcement. "Okay, everyone," she said, "Today's the first day of our Sex Ed unit. And you know what that means."

Ruth took Rachel down to her foster home building, called Pretty And Pink Foster Care. Rachel had heard of the place before, but she'd never seen it in person. It was a lot bigger than she expected-four stories high. "This is your foster home?" Rachel asked.

"Well, it's not really 'my' foster home," said Ruth. "Pretty And Pink Foster Care has establishments in Virginia and Pennsylvania, too. The company is owned by Angelina Aguilar-our founder. But our Nashville location is the one that I'm in charge of managing."