A thin red head holding a bag of cheddar Goldfish crackers smiled at Alison. "Oh, so you're Alison! Hi! I'm Erin Flannery. Want some goldfish?" Erin held the bag out to Alison.

"No thanks, I'm not hungry," said Alison smiling and shaking her head. Erin shrugged and popped a cracker into her mouth.

"Your loss. Did you just get here?"

Alison nodded. "Yeah, about 20 minutes ago."

"And you already have Aaron following you around? Very good!" Erin smiled.

Alison looked confused and Aaron looked like he was going to kill Erin.

"Did I miss something?" asked Alison.

"No, Erin's just a little weird, that's all," replied Aaron, glaring at Erin.

"Yep, I'm just nuts," said Erin. "You'll have to excuse me. I'm in the middle of making a pizza. Nice meeting you Alison. Stop by later, k?"

Alison nodded and Erin shut the door. "She's making a pizza in her room?" she asked, turning to look at Aaron.

"EZ Bake Oven," clarified Aaron, heading to room 2. He rapped on the door, and a tall light brown-haired guy answered. He had a piece of an English Muffin hanging out of his mouth.

"Whaa?" asked the guy through the muffin.

Aaron gave the guy a look and turned to Alison. "And this is Christian, our resident garbage disposal."

"Heyyy!" complained Christian. He took the muffin out of his mouth. "I am not a garbage disposal! I'm just hungry! Tell him, Courtney."

A dark haired girl came up behind Christian and put her chin on his shoulder. "He's a garbage disposal all right. You should've seen him eat that pizza!" Christian made a face at her.

"One of Erin's?" asked Alison.

Courtney nodded. "Yeah. And it was good too. Are you Alison?"

Alison nodded. "How does everyone know who I am?" she asked, looking from Courtney to Aaron and back.

"Oh, we've known you were coming for weeks," said Courtney. "We're like a family around here, so we gotta keep tabs on everyone. I'm Courtney Carlington, and this is Christian Bale, the human garbage disposal."

Alison laughed as Christian looked at Courtney in disgust.

"I don't eat that much!" he said. "Welcome to Hanklin, Alison."

Aaron took Alison's arm. "I think we'd better get away from these two. They're almost as weird as Erin."

"Hey! I'm not even close to being as weird as her!" said Courtney. Aaron just laughed and took Alison over to room 3. The music had gone down, but Alison could still hear it. Aaron banged on the door. It opened a half inch.

"What?" came a voice.

"Trey, open the freakin' door," said Aaron. The door opened wider, exposing a shirtless, blond haired guy. Behind him, a girl with dark brown hair sat on his bed, flipping through a box of CD's and cassettes.

"What do ya want?" asked Trey.

"Alley, come here!" yelled Aaron into the room. The girl on the bed looked up, hopped off the bed, and came over to the door.

"Yes?" she asked in a mock-Southern accented voice.

"This is Alison," said Aaron.

The brunette smiled. "Hi Alison, I'm Alyson! But you can call me Alley."

"Nice to meet you," said Alison, grinning.

"Introduce yourself," prompted Alyson/Alley to Trey. She elbowed him in his side.

"Ow! Would you stop that? Hi, I'm Trey. Parker," said Trey, half smiling at Alison and half holding Alley's arms so she'd stop jabbing him.

"Hi," replied Alison. She held back an urge to laugh.

"You people are great conversationalists, aren't you?" commented Aaron. Trey smirked at him, said he'd see them later, and shut the door, all the while yelling at Alley to quit poking him. Alison looked at Aaron.

"Are Courtney and Christian a couple?" she asked.

Aaron nodded. "Yep, they've been together for, oh, a year, I think."

"What about Alley and Trey?"

"Well, no one's really sure about them. They're best friends, but they could be more than friends. They always hang out together, but I don't even think they what's up between them."

"Oh, okay," said Alison, as they skipped room 4 (Courtney's room) and walked over to number 5.

"Okay, this is Ele's room," explained Aaron before knocking. "She and I used to go out, and she's still obsessed with me. I don't like her that much. I'm just warning you."

Alison raised her eyebrows as Aaron knocked on the door. A dark haired girl wearing too much makeup answered.

"Aaron! Hi!" said Ele. Then she saw Alison. "Oh, hi. Who're you?"

"This is Alison Samborn," said Aaron. "She's new here."

"Oh. Well. Welcome to Hanklin, I guess." Ele seemed disappointed that Aaron hadn't come to see her. "I gotta go. Um, I'll see you later, I guess." She shut the door in Aaron and Alison's faces.

"Oh, well, she's friendly," said Alison.

"Wrong," said Aaron. "She's a bitch."

Alison raised her eyebrows. "I take it there's no love lost there?"

Aaron smirked. "Let's put it this way: I must've been temporarily out of my mind when I dated her."

"Temporarily?" asked a dark haired boy coming out of his room. "I'd say you're always out of your mind, Aaron."

Aaron grinned at the guy. "You're probably right. Alison, this is Dave. Dave, say hi to Alison Samborn."

Dave stuck out his hand and shook Alison's. "Hi Alison. Welcome to Hanklin." He shoved a baseball hat on his head. "Sorry I can't talk, but I gotta run. Aaron, tell Erin I'll be back at five."

"Why don't you tell her yourself?" asked Aaron. "She's in her room."

"Oh, she is? I thought she went to get pizza," said Dave.

"She's making it herself," said Alison, smiling. "Guess she didn't want to wait."

Dave laughed. "Yeah, she has a fit if the delivery guy doesn't bring it in 30 minutes. Oh well, I guess I'll go see her before I leave. I'll see you guys later."

Alison and Aaron watched as Dave walked down the hall to Erin's room and then disappeared through her doorway.

"They're a couple too?" asked Alison.

"Yep," answered Aaron. "And one of the weirdest, I might add. Erin's super-peppy and Dave's a little more laidback. They're interesting, to say the least."

Alison smiled and followed Aaron to Door Number 7.