Excerpt:

As it turned out, there were about ten minutes before the alarm went off, which meant ten minutes she could beat her brother into the bathroom. Good. The slob got way too much time to shower, as far as katie was concerned. A second later, the light on her nightstand was on, and she was sitting with her legs dangling over the edge of the bed and shading her eyes. Light hurt this early in the morning. When she pulled away her hand finally and glanced at the clock--Good. Another seven minutes--her eyes did a quick, automatic sweep of the room.
Only to stop at her nightstand. Right where the creature had put his gift for her there was a small, black, velvet bag. Katie was sure it had not been there last night. In fact, she was sure she had never seen it before in her life. It was a little ... strange. In fact, scratch that; it was a lot strange, especially after her dream. She kept staring at it for--the clock's numbers said 4:56 now; she really had to get moving--several minutes. Then she realized what was going on. I'm actually scared of this little bag! I have some stupid dream and wake up scared of a bag? Fearless. Always before, she had been utterly unafraid of anything like that. Or anything at all. Or if she was afraid, she did not let it affect her actions. Cowardice was for others.
Steeled by that thought, she was reaching for the bag when her alarm actually did go off, making her jump, fall off the bed, and swear. Now she had to hurry, or her stupid brother would get the shower first! She grabbed her clothes (she always put them out the night before), smashed the alarm clock to make it stop that awful racket, and gave a final glare ("You haven't won! I'll be back in twenty minutes!") to the bag sitting innocently by her bed.