Hi everybody, Sherri is taking it easy today, so I thought I'd drop by. My name is Kirsten Chalmers, from Blurry, and I'm here to set the record straight. I know there's a lot of talk about "things" between me and Danny. I think a lot of people misunderstand things - completely.

I'm not after Danny for a relationship or to "hook up." Please, just because I'm a cheerleader doesn't mean I'm shallow! Actually, I've been trying to establish a better peace between Danny and Rachel. This "truce" of theirs is barely a truce at all. In fact, it feels more like a silent war. Sure, they agreed not to talk - but do you realize what kind of situation that puts their mutual friends in? It forces us to take sides, and that's just not fair.

I tried to talk to Rachel about this all summer and got nowhere. Then she had her big 18th birthday party over Labor Day weekend. Yea, pretty much most of the senior and junior classes were invited - except Danny. That was SO majorly awkward, especially since those two were glued together all of last year! It was such a shock! When we asked and she said they came up with this "you leave me alone, I leave you alone" kind of "truce," most of us were floored. We just couldn't believe they would cut off each other that completely. Couldn't they at least act friendly? Rachel said no, that Danny shot that down and she was doing what he asked. She said she was willing to try to be friends, or at least civil, but he said no, he had his own friends and would keep to them.

So the day after the party, I saw Danny at the Pizza Parlor and decided to ask him about it myself. He said that yes, this not talking truce was his idea. He said he simply couldn't be friends with Rachel after their messy breakup. I didn't think it was that messy. It seemed like a clean break to me. They were together one day and apart the next - but whatever. He also said something about Rachel not being able to accept who he really was and his other friends, and he couldn't deal with her judging him all the time.

I get it - I really do. Rachel doesn't mean to be judgemental, but her life is black and white. She's such a good girl, and she's really smart - but she's in her own little perfect world sometimes and that can be a hard thing to break through. I know. I've been friends with her my whole life. She just can't handle the shades of grey. Heck, she can't even see them! But this whole thing between her and Danny is making things pretty tough for the rest of us, and that's not fair. It seems that they could budge, at least a little, for us. I spent all summer trying to get Rachel to do that. She claimed she tried and he wouldn't budge.Fine, so I decided to try working on him. I thought that maybe if I could get one of them to back down, then the other might be willing to establish more civil terms. Rachel seemed willing to budge if Danny would - so I'm trying to get him to do his part now.

So no, I'm not "after"  him. All I'm trying to do is make our senior year less awkward. Don't we deserve that? These are supposed to be the best days of our lives! I'm just trying help - really!

Marielle, my friend on the cheerleading squad, said to let them both go and do my own thing. She said there's no way this can get any better and in fact, it's probably going to come to the point of a break sometime soon. I know it seems it would be easier to let the whole thing go and do my own thing - but I've been friends with Rachel, Sasha, and the gang my whole life. I can't just walk away from them. I'm not going to abandon all of my friends just because one of them had a messy breakup. Heck, that could happen to any of us! I just have a bad feeling that Marielle has a point, and I'm so afraid it might come to that. I hope it doesn't. I'd hate that. I can't imagine life without Rachel, Sasha, and Natalie in it.

God, why does life have to be so complicated? Why did Danny have to get so entrenched in our lives, then screw things up with Rachel? Why couldn't Rachel give Danny more of a chance to change? Why, why, why?

I don't know, but I'm going to do whatever it takes to make things better - for myself and for all of us.

That's all for today. Take care.

Author's note: We see exactly where this went for Kirsten from the sample Prologue on the front page. What happened? Find out in Blurry!

Hi everybody, Sherri is taking it easy today, so I thought I'd drop by. My name is Kirsten Chalmers, from Blurry, and I'm here to set the record straight. I know there's a lot of talk about "things" between me and Danny. I think a lot of people misunderstand things - completely.

I'm not after Danny for a relationship or to "hook up." Please, just because I'm a cheerleader doesn't mean I'm shallow! Actually, I've been trying to establish a better peace between Danny and Rachel. This "truce" of theirs is barely a truce at all. In fact, it feels more like a silent war. Sure, they agreed not to talk - but do you realize what kind of situation that puts their mutual friends in? It forces us to take sides, and that's just not fair.

I tried to talk to Rachel about this all summer and got nowhere. Then she had her big 18th birthday party over Labor Day weekend. Yea, pretty much most of the senior and junior classes were invited - except Danny. That was SO majorly awkward, especially since those two were glued together all of last year! It was such a shock! When we asked and she said they came up with this "you leave me alone, I leave you alone" kind of "truce," most of us were floored. We just couldn't believe they would cut off each other that completely. Couldn't they at least act friendly? Rachel said no, that Danny shot that down and she was doing what he asked. She said she was willing to try to be friends, or at least civil, but he said no, he had his own friends and would keep to them.

So the day after the party, I saw Danny at the Pizza Parlor and decided to ask him about it myself. He said that yes, this not talking truce was his idea. He said he simply couldn't be friends with Rachel after their messy breakup. I didn't think it was that messy. It seemed like a clean break to me. They were together one day and apart the next - but whatever. He also said something about Rachel not being able to accept who he really was and his other friends, and he couldn't deal with her judging him all the time.

I get it - I really do. Rachel doesn't mean to be judgemental, but her life is black and white. She's such a good girl, and she's really smart - but she's in her own little perfect world sometimes and that can be a hard thing to break through. I know. I've been friends with her my whole life. She just can't handle the shades of grey. Heck, she can't even see them! But this whole thing between her and Danny is making things pretty tough for the rest of us, and that's not fair. It seems that they could budge, at least a little, for us. I spent all summer trying to get Rachel to do that. She claimed she tried and he wouldn't budge.Fine, so I decided to try working on him. I thought that maybe if I could get one of them to back down, then the other might be willing to establish more civil terms. Rachel seemed willing to budge if Danny would - so I'm trying to get him to do his part now.

So no, I'm not "after"  him. All I'm trying to do is make our senior year less awkward. Don't we deserve that? These are supposed to be the best days of our lives! I'm just trying help - really!

Marielle, my friend on the cheerleading squad, said to let them both go and do my own thing. She said there's no way this can get any better and in fact, it's probably going to come to the point of a break sometime soon. I know it seems it would be easier to let the whole thing go and do my own thing - but I've been friends with Rachel, Sasha, and the gang my whole life. I can't just walk away from them. I'm not going to abandon all of my friends just because one of them had a messy breakup. Heck, that could happen to any of us! I just have a bad feeling that Marielle has a point, and I'm so afraid it might come to that. I hope it doesn't. I'd hate that. I can't imagine life without Rachel, Sasha, and Natalie in it.

God, why does life have to be so complicated? Why did Danny have to get so entrenched in our lives, then screw things up with Rachel? Why couldn't Rachel give Danny more of a chance to change? Why, why, why?

I don't know, but I'm going to do whatever it takes to make things better - for myself and for all of us.

That's all for today. Take care.

Author's note: We see exactly where this went for Kirsten from the sample Prologue on the front page. What happened? Find out in Blurry!

Hi everybody, this is Jana Lanning from Sherri's upcoming novel Anywhere But Here. I got a text message from Rachel (from Blurry) saying that Sherri is letting her characters contribute to her blog every now and then. Well, since all the kids from Woodland are tied up with a football game tonight, I figured it would be nice and quiet and I could stop by tonight.

I've never had a blog myself before, so I hope I do this right. In fact, I usually don't get online much at all. I'm so busy with school and work - I'm a senior at the Coastal University in Palmetto Beach, SC and work part time at Dixion Financial, an accounting firm in town - that I don't have much free time. I spend most of it with my boyfriend, Darren, or my best friend, Amanda.

So today is my birthday! Mom and Dad came from Westwind Mountain to visit me today. They're staying the night in the beach house - they still can't believe I won't sleep in the master bedroom, but even after 4 years of living in the house while I'm in college, it still doesn't really feel like "my house." They would stay the whole weekend, but their church is contributing to a big community event tomorrow night, so they have to head back in the morning. (Whew! I don't miss that stuff! Being a Pastor's daughter meant I got plenty of that while I lived at home). It might work out for the best. Darren has to work until closing tonight, so he said we'd go out to celebrate my birthday tomorrow night. In fact, he has reservations at that resturant by the ocean that I love so much. He rarely gets a Saturday off, so I'm pretty excited.

Darren did give me my gift this morning before class - an opal necklass. It's very pretty. He said he knows it pales next to the three quarter carat diamond that Andrew gave Amanda for her birthday last month. I have to admit that it would be nice to have a diamond - after all, we have been together over three years. But we agreed not to rush things. We both are hoping to get in the MBA program at the University of South Carolina next fall, so there's probably a few more years of school ahead of us. Andrew and Amanda made it clear they're done with school once they get their degrees in May, so they're ready to move on. We aren't. But still, it would be nice. We could be engaged as long as we want. It's not like engagements expire or anything.

Oh, there I go again, rambling. I know I should be happy with what I have. It's like Darren says - we just want different things from life than Andrew and Amanda. There's nothing wrong with that.

Anyway, Mom and Dad got me an E-reader for my birthday. That will be nice. They also took me out shopping and out to lunch. We've had a pretty good day together. I hate that Darren didn't get to see them, but I understand how that is. It's hard when you work and go to school - time is pretty limited. 

So that's what's happening in Palmetto Beach, SC today. So far, it's been a pretty good 22nd birthday. I hope the continued celebrations over the weekend are good as well!

Take care all. See you around.

What's in store for Jana and Darren? Watch for updates in this blog leading up to the release of Anywhere But Here in April 2012 through Whiskey Creek Press!

Hi everybody, pleasure to meet you. No, this isn't Sherri. Sherri's been a bit under the weather this week. She's been trying to find ways to simplify her life SO we FINALLY got her to agree to turn her blog over to the good folks from her writing from time to time. So who am I? This is Rachel Shull in Woodland, SC. You might know me from Blurry. I'm an 18 year old senior at Woodland High School. 

Maybe you folks can help me. My friend, Kirsten, has been acting weird since last weekend. When I see her she's fine and acts normal, but I swear it seems like she's avoiding me. We usually talk on Tuesdays because my band practice and her cheerleading practice end at the same time on those days, but she rushed outwithout speaking to me or Sasha this week. Then today she didn't have lunch with us - she claimed she had to go to the library, but Josh ran into her coming out of his shop class and she gave him the brush off too. Then today she came up to me before band practice and asked me - get this - how I feel about Danny.

How do I feel about Danny? Um, hello? He's my ex-boyfriend. How do you think I feel? That's odd. I mean, we talked about that break up all summer. And it comes back up now, after all these months? What the ...?

Sasha and Josh think she wants to hook up with Danny but I don't think so. I mean, she knows why I left him and she was never that fond of him while we were dating last year. Surly, she saw my mistakes with him. You can't change guys mixed up in rough crowds like that. The "bad boy" boyfriend was fun for a while but - yea, we've had that conversation a million times, it's not fun forever. She gets it.

Still, I wonder what this is about? Maybe I'll get to talk to her after the football game tomorrow night. I'm sure it's probably nothing.

Well, I better shove off. I have trigonometry homework (why am I taking that? I want to be a writer and a teacher, not a design professional! Oh well, stupid requirements) and a chapter of Psychology to read that didn't get done in study hall today. I hope all is well in your world.

Bye!

What's going on with Rachel's best friend and her ex-boyfriend? Find out in Blurry, available at www.wingsepress.com !