Jessica was brought up in a wealthy family where she had all of the advantages one could have. She attended a great school, had nice things and was very bright. From the outside looking it, Jessica looked as if she had it all. She played soccer, basketball, and lacrosse and served on several school committees.

Jessica did not have a lot of friends and was always kind of a loner in school. When working on committees like student council, she was very cold with her peers. She just stuck to the task at hand and left no time for useless chatter.  One day she was at her classmate Tanya’s house working on their final project for science class when she was asked to sleepover in order to finish the project in time. Without a thought, she said that she could.

“Don’t you need to call your parents and ask their permission?” Sarah’s mother asked.

“No. They won’t care. I don’t even think they are home this weekend. They are never really home, but I am used to it.” She sounded defensive.

“Well, it would make me feel better if they knew where you were. Do they have a cell phone you could try?” Mrs. Johnson looked concerned.

“OK. I’ll leave them a message.” Jessica was not used to anyone making a big deal of her whereabouts.

Her parents never showed any interest or concern about anything that she did. From the time she was an infant Jessica had different live-in babysitters. Her parents were always out of town and never paid any attention to her. She just knew that they were busy with more important things. In order not to be alone all of the time she kept herself very busy too. Just being around people was enough for Jessica. It doesn’t matter to her who the people are.