Family Portrait

Summary: Clare's family is falling apart.

Warnings: Based off of spoilers about Clare, for the first few season ten episodes.

Part One

Clare Edwards sighed as she laid snug in her bed, in the darkness of her bedroom. Pretty, bright blue eyes stared off into space as she listened to her parents' angry voices get louder and louder. It was almost as if they were trying to compete with one another on who could be the loudest. And the she had to guess, she'd say that they'd forgotten all about her even being in the same house as them. And it made sense. Her older sister, Darcy was her parent perfect little angel. No one ever forgot about her. Not the way that they did Clare. Of course she knew that her parents loved her. She was their youngest daughter after all. It was just that, at times it didn't feel like they did. And she wasn't even talking about their fighting or the fact that they could get divorced. It was because she was always being compared to her older sister. In their eyes, nothing that Clare did, compared to what Darcy had done.

In a way, she resented her sister. Of course she loved Darcy. How could she not? Darcy was her family. But still. Darcy wasn't here and because of that, Clare had to suffer through her mom and dad's fighting, alone with no one to talk to.

She couldn't tell her friends about it. Alli, Connor, Dave, and Wesley wouldn't understand. Their families were all still whole. And besides, she wasn't one to ask for help, even when she needed it. She didn't want to bother her friends with her problems and get all angsty about it. Besides, it wasn't like they would understand anyway. Their families were perfect. All three of her friends' parents were still together. Her's were on the verge of breaking apart, of divorcing.

She shut her eyes tight and covered her head with the pillow as the screaming got louder. She heard something get thrown into a wall and then clatter loudly onto the floor and she tried to ignore it, not wanting to hear it. Tears stung her eyes and slid down her cheeks as she tried to get some sleep.

Clare sighed, the next day at school as she walked down the halls with her best friend, Alli Bhandari. Alli was rambling on about the new kid, Drew and about how cute he was and how she was going to ask him out. She couldn't really find it in herself to listen, though. Her mind was elsewhere.

"Clare, are you listening to me?" Alli asked her, snapping her fingers infront of her friends face as they stopped at their lockers.

The tiny brunette jumped at the sound of her friend's voice, and turned her head ever so slightly to look at her dark haired, best friend. She tried to smile, a fake happy look immediatly plastering onto her face. "Uh-huh. You're interested in that Drew guy." She lied.

Alli frowned at her and stamped her foot. "No, you weren't, Clare. I know you and I know when you lie. What's with you today?" She asked of her.

Clare looked away quickly and began to pull her books from her locker haphazardely. She needed to get away from here. Needed to get away from the question before she spilled her guts about her family problems. "Nothing, nothing. I just...I just wanna get a good seat in my English class." She replies, giving her a quick smile that didn't reach her eyes.

The black haired girl rolled her eyes and shook her head at her friend. "Oh Clare." She said with an affectionate sigh. "What am I going to do with you?"

Clare arrived in English class moments later and looked around for a seat. Seeing a seat near the front, she took it. She didn't have this class with any of her friends. It was eleventh grade English class. A few weeks before school had started, she'd been called into the school to discuss her grades in English and it was determined that eleventh grade English suited her perfectly, since it was her best subject. It had taken some getting used to, of course. She wasn't quite used to having a class with atleast Alli, if not the rest of her friends.

Mrs. Kwan stepped inside the room, with a smile on her face. She had an armful of books that she smiled at them over, before she stacked the books on her already quite messy desk. Slowly, she turned to face the eyes of the class and said, "We're going to do a little project. I'm going to put you all into groups of two and I'm also going to give you a book. Your job, is to perform a scene from the book and to write a short essay on what you thought the book meant. The first group, is going to be Clare Edwards and Eli Goldsworthy." She walked torwards Clare's desk and sat a book down on the solid wood. Her eyes went to the person sitting next to Clare and she gave a small smile.

Clare heard a chuckle beside her and saw a long fingered hand reach out to grab the book. "Atonement. Of course she'd have us read that."

"You've read the book before?" She asked in suprise, turning in her seat to look at him. She took in his straight, dark hair, black t-shirt with the blue logo and the black pants, before looking into his green eyes.

He laughed and smiled at her, showing off a set of white teeth. "No. But I know what it's about. So how should we do this?" He asked of her.

Clare blinked at him in confusion and tilted her head to the side. "Do about what?" She questioned.

"This project. Where should we meet up, after school?" Eli asked.

Clare turned away and bit her lip, fiddling with the things on her desk nervously. "Um...how about your place? I'm...not supposed to have boys over when my parents aren't home." She turned to look at him again and saw him staring at her with something like concern in his eyes.

He shrugged a shoulder and nodded. "Sure. Just meet me outside at the end of school today." He told her quietly, studying her closely, wondering why this girl seemed so sad. He promised himself that he'd get to the bottom of it. After all, it was a shame when a girl as pretty as Clare Edwards didn't smile.

To be continued...

Next Chapter: We learn more about Eli, projects, reveals, and rumors.