Natasha goes into the bathroom, locks the door to the closest stall and takes Tina out once more to explain the situation to her. "Look, I'm just going to take you home. To my home, that is," she says.

"I can't let you stay in my pencil box, because you'd probably run out of oxygen at some point during the day. And I can't leave you in my locker, either, since it's full of books and folders. If they were to shift and crush you to death, I'd never forgive myself. It's just too dangerous for you here." Se smiles sympathetically down at her 3 inch "pet."

Tina smiles back. "You're a good person," the tiny teen says.

"I know," Natasha responds. "So, you ready?"

Tina nods her head and Natasha gently places her back into the pencil box. "I'll let you out as soon as possible," Natasha promises. Tina watches as the world around her grows dark, as Natasha zips her backpack up once more.

The three inch teen tried to get as comfortable as she could get over the next several minutes, even though her body was jostled around the inside of the pencil box every half second or so, keeping in tune with Natasha's footsteps.

Natasha had to go to the nearest pay phone in the school and call her mom to come pick her up. After convincing her mother that she was sick and that it really was an emergency, not just an attempt to skip school, the woman on the other end of the line agreed to come by and take her home.

Tina was thrown around again, as her new owner walked to the front of the school and took a seat in the principal's office to wait for her mom. The tiny girl groaned from inside the pencil box, as the contents of the backpack finally came to a stop, at least for now.

Nearly thirty minutes later, Natasha saw her mom come inside the office and take her out to the car. The conversation on the drive home was a little tense.

"Natasha, do you have any idea what I had to go through just to get here?" her mother began. "I had to notify my boss, who isn't the nicest person in the world to begin with. I mean, to make up for the lost time I'm missing, I now have to come in for the next two weekends and work. Thanks a lot for that, by the way."

"Sorry," Natasha meekly responded, her head down, as her mother continued.

"Then, I had to drive for thirty minutes through a construction area that only had one good lane of traffic open. My gas tank is practically empty now."

"I'll pay to fill it up,"Natasha offered.

"You'd better," her mom said, before sighing deeply in frustration. "Damn it, Natasha. You've always been a good girl. Why did you decide to do something like this now? You're only a few years away from graduating."

"Do what?"

"Fake being sick," her mom said simply.

"Mom, I'm not--"

"Oh, please," her mom interrupted her. "I knew from the second I walked into that principal's office that you were fine."

"Then why did you pick me up?"

"Because something's wrong. A mother can always tell when their children's having problems. So, what's up?"

Natasha hesitated for a moment. She didn't exactly want to tell her mother about the three inch girl sitting in her backpack. Not yet, anyway. Her mom was a good person and everything, but she didn't exactly handle surprises well. And with Tina, this was arguably the biggest surprise ever.

But then again, getting yelled at for doing the right thing, in saving Tina's life, didn't feel right, either.

She wanted to tell her mother at some point. What does she do?