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have the open, engaging relationship that I’d like. What can I do to let her know it’s safe to confide in me
?
    Feeling Unloved
    Dear Unloved,
    Your friend may have nothing to confide. Not everyone find their dreams as gripping as you evidently find yours. Maybe she’s just trying not to bore everyone. Why don’t you return the favor
?
    Annie

T HREE
    M r. Mitchell said
I had to tell my parents. Because of my being a minor and all. Which I didn’t really get, since it wasn’t like Luke and I would be
dating
or anything. I mean, I was just going to be showing him where the gym was and not to take the glazed carrots in the caf. But whatever.
    Mr. Mitchell offered to do it himself—talk to my parents—but I told him I’d do it. I knew if he did it, my parents would blow the whole thing out of proportion. Like the Ask Annie thing.
    I waited until after dinner to do it, when my brothers went off to do their homework. I have two little brothers—Cal and Rick, in eighth and sixth grade. Cal’s a jock—he plays every sport except football, which my mom won’t let him play, because she thinks it’s too dangerous. Because of this, of course, Cal’s goal is to pursue a career in law enforcement, preferably the SWAT team. Rick, in contrast, hates sports. He wants to be a child star like Luke Striker used to be. He doesn’t understand why our parents won’t get him an agent. They've tried explaining to him that there are no agents in Clayton, Indiana, but Rick doesn’t care. He says his time is running out and pretty soon he won’t be cute anymore so somebody better discover him, quick.
    Like me, my brothers get along with pretty much everybody . . . even with me and with each other, except for the occasional burst of acrimony over possession of the remote or the last chocolate fudge Pop-Tart or whatever.
    Still, I decided it was probably best to keep them in the dark about the Luke Striker thing, because they might not be able to keep it to themselves. Cal’s got an old Luke Striker—aka Tarzan—action figure, after all. And Rick would probably try to get his agent’s phone number.
    Because I was so casual about it—"There’s this actor and he’s coming to town to research a role and they want me to show him around school"—my parents both just sort of shrugged when they heard the news. Only my dad looked alarmed, and that was just for a minute—and not even, as I initially thought, because he’d heard about the Angelique-tattoo thing.
    "He’s not staying with us, is he?" he asked, looking over the top of the paper he was reading—the
Clayton Gazette
, which comes in the afternoon, not morning, so the reporters don’t have to go to work too early. My town’s really small. Did I mention that already?
    "No, Dad," I said. "He’s renting a condo at the lake."
    "Thank God," my dad said, and disappeared back behind the paper. My dad can’t stand houseguests.
    "Who is this boy again?" my mom wanted to know.
    "Luke Striker," I said. "He used to be on
Heaven Help Us
. He played the oldest son."
    My mom smiled. "Oh, that sweet blond one?"
    I wondered if my mom would still think Luke was sweet if she’d seen him in the lagoon scene in
Tarzan
. The one where his loin pelt had kind of floated away, thrilling Jane—and Trina—very much.
    "That’s the one," I said.
    "Well," my mom said, as she turned back to her sketch pad. "I hope you don’t get a crush on him. Because you know, he lives all the way out in Hollywood. I doubt you two will see all that much of each other after he leaves."
    "No worries, Mom," I said, thinking about the commitment ceremony tattoos. "Luke Striker really isn’t my type."
    "Well, Trina, then," my mom said. "You know how Trina is."
    "Yeah," I said. I knew exactly how Trina was. "But he’s supposed to be wearing glasses the whole time or something. Nobody’s supposed to be able to recognize him."
    "That’s ridiculous," Mom said.
    "I don’t see why." My dad turned to the homes