Need by Joelle Charbonneau Read Free Book Online

while she talks to Hannah. Hannah can balance her phone against her shoulder while doing almost anything, which is a skill Lynn hasn’t mastered. “What do you think I should ask for?”
    Hannah’s laugh comes over the speaker. “How about a date for New Year’s Eve so you can show Logan that you’re totally over him?”
    Lynn stares at the phone.
    â€œHey, are you there? I didn’t mean to upset you or anything. I mean, you’re over Logan, aren’t you?”
    â€œOf course I am,” says Lynn, though she’s not. Being dumped sucked. Having everyone at school know she had been dumped sucked even more. “But I don’t want to show up at the party with just anyone, or it’ll make me look desperate.”
    â€œYou’re right. So what are you going to ask for?”
    â€œI don’t know,” Lynn says. She still doesn’t know by the time Hannah hangs up, because Amanda is calling. What does she need? Not much. Making Logan regret breaking up with her would be nice, but how juvenile is that? If a guy doesn’t want her, well, she has enough self-respect not to want him anymore.
    Technically, she doesn’t need anything. But as she scrolls down the list of other people’s requests, Lynn sees something she wants too.
    I need a later curfew time on New Year’s Eve.
    If it’s later than Logan’s, so much the better. Although she doubts anyone can convince her father that a later curfew is a good idea. He believes in rules and regulations, and curfew falls into both those categories. Still, it would be nice if he changed his mind.
    Lynn smiles when she sees the message that her request has been accepted, but frowns as she keeps reading:
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TO OBTAIN YOUR REQUEST, TAKE A PHOTOGRAPH OF THE FIRST PAGE OF YOUR FATHER’S MILITARY MEDICAL RECORD AND HIS DOG TAGS AND POST IT ON THE MESSAGE BOARD TO CONFIRM YOU COMPLETED THE TASK.
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    Dad’s dog tags hang from a clip on the corkboard in his office. His medical records are probably in the filing cabinet along with everything else he needs when he goes to the VA hospital to have his leg adjusted. Lynn can hear Hannah tell her to go ahead and take the photograph. It’s no big deal. The only people seeing it are their friends. It’s not like everyone doesn’t already know that Lynn’s dad has a prosthetic leg.
    And maybe they do. But there’s no way she’s going to put her father’s personal information on the Internet for everyone to see. Those papers include his Social Security and driver’s license numbers. His blood type. No way. Her father trusts her. No website or curfew is worth screwing with that. So she shuts down her computer and forgets about the request. If her friends want to pull mindless pranks and screw around online, they can. Logan probably will. But Lynn . . . well, she has better things to do.
 
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    NETWORK MEMBERS—532
    NEEDS PENDING—520
    NEEDS FULFILLED—58

Kaylee
    I SIT UP IN BED . My heart is pounding hard as I fumble for the lamp switch and blink when the room floods with light.
    No one is here. Nothing makes a sound.
    The clock on the end table next to the photograph of my father reads 2:08 a.m. I must have had a bad dream, although normally I can remember whatever awakened me. DJ used to be the one plagued by nightmares. But something changed after he was diagnosed. Suddenly, the ghosts and goblins that haunted his dreams didn’t scare him anymore. DJ hasn’t had a nightmare since the doctor’s visit that changed our lives. I had one that very night.
    It was my father who came in to comfort me, explaining that I was having nightmares because I’d discovered monsters that were real. Disease and the prospect of death were far scarier than any boogeyman. After a while, I learned not to cry out when I woke up, and he thought the bad dreams had stopped. Or maybe he didn’t.