We blew past the receptionist at the studio, my dad in the lead, looking like Mr. Big Time, and me double-stepping to keep up. Cassie was waiting in the lobby and got swept up with us.

"How you doing?" she asked me.

I shrugged. "Great."

"Really?"

"Yep."

"Nervous?"

"No."

"Excited?"

"No."

"Scared."

"Definitely not."

She leaned close and whispered. "Do we have a plan? I mean, what exactly are we doing about Jeremy Jason?"

I shrugged. "We're stopping him."

"How?"

I grinned. "We're improvising."

"Uh-oh."

Suddenly, a llama came tearing past. Its

dainty hooves skittered crazily on the waxed linoleum. It turned a corner and was gone.

"What the. . ." my dad said.

"Cool," Cassie said. Her eyes lit up the way they do when she sees any animal. "It's a llama. They're really neat animals, you know. They-"

Suddenly two people dressed in khaki raced up and shoved past us. They turned the corner after the llama and were gone.

The three of us just stood there staring at each other. Then a third person, a woman with a clipboard, ran up breathlessly. "Did you see a llama?"

I pointed. "That way."

"Hey, what's the deal?" my dad asked.

The woman shook her head like the world was coming to an end. "Bart Jacobs's on the show with his animals. The llama made a run for it.

Smart animal."

"Bart Jacobs?" The name sounded familiar. "Isn't he that guy who takes animals on the talk shows?"

Cassie made a disapproving look. "That's him, all right. I hate seeing wild animals dragged into studios and treated like -"

"Well. If there are no more wild animals," my dad interrupted, "we have to keep moving." He started off again and we fell into step behind

him. He swept us in his wake toward the makeup room. The door was open. A woman with weird hair and black lipstick looked at my dad and gave a little leer. Then she looked at me and Cassie, like she was trying to figure out what to do with our faces.

"She's the one," my father said, pointing at me. "Rachel, meet Tai. Tai, my daughter Rachel. She's on the show."

"The skin is beautiful," Tai said. "But I think we want more body in the hair." She grabbed a handful of my hair and sort of threw it disdainfully. "What do you use on your hair?"

I told her the brand. She sneered. My dad took off to schmooze with some people he knew. And Tai shoved me into a barbershop-style chair, whipped a sheet over me, and began doing things with brushes.

I hate being shoved around like that.

It really kind of made me mad.

"This hair! This hair!" Tai complained. Then she yanked. Way too hard.

I hate being yanked.

Suddenly, Tai backed away. "What is happening to your hair? It's . . .

it's turning gray!"

I looked past her to the mirror. I saw two things. I saw Cassie's horrified expression. And I saw my hair turning gray. Gray and shaggy.

Like a wolf.

It was happening! I'd gotten mad at Tai and I was morphing. Into a wolf! I shot a desperate glance at Cassie. Cassie acted instantly.

"Look!" she cried. "Out in the hallway! It's ... urn ... it's Kevin Costner! And Tom Cruise, too!"

Tai screamed, "Where? Where?" dropped her brush and ran for the door.

I focused. Calm . . . calm . . . no emotion . . .

But Cassie wasn't helping. At all. "You lied! To me! Again! You didn't do that hereth illint thing at all! You're still allergic!"

"I'm trying to be calm, Cassie," I warned. "I'm trying to demorph."

"You can't do this stupid show while you're still this way!"

"I'm doing the show. It's the only way! I'm not letting this creep . . .

now look! You're just making me upset!"

The gray fur was beginning to grow on the back of my arms and hands. I shut my eyes. No anger. No anger. No anger.

"I didn't see Kevin Costner out there," Tai said suspiciously when she returned.

"I was sure that was him," Cassie said. "Sorry."

"Now what was going on with your hair?" Tai asked, staring baffled at my now-normal head.

"Dm ... not enough conditioning?" I suggested.

And that's when I suffered my second emotional jolt. Because that's when the cutest boy on the planet walked into the makeup room.

"Jeremy Jason," I heard Cassie whisper in awestruck tones.

No emotion . . . no emotion . . . , I told myself.

But you have no idea just how massively cute he was up close like that.

And then he smiled at Cassie, and gave her a little half-hug. Like he'd probably done with a million fans before.

I saw Cassie's knees buckle. She actually wobbled.

"Hi, I'm Jeremy Jason McCole," he said to me. "Are you on the show, too?"

"Yes," I said, trying to sound like a robot. "Yes, I am on the show, too."

I didn't get up from the makeup chair. And I didn't shake his hand.

Because I have to tell you the truth: Even knowing what he was now, even knowing what kind of person he was, even knowing that inside his head there lived an evil gray Yeerk slug, if he'd hugged me like he had Cassie, I would have morphed.

I would have morphed big time.

?Hey," Jeremy Jason said, giving me his famous squinty, skeptical look.

"Don't I know you from somewhere?"

I shook my head. "No. Definitely not."