Claire Standish showered every morning and every night, with almost exactly 12 hours between each wash. She had read in a Cosmo magazine that this ensured that hair prone to greasiness, as hers was, would become softer and fuller overtime. To anyone else a routine like this may have been a chore, but Claire felt like she needed little delights like that in life to make herself feel better about herself.
Once she went into the girls bathroom and saw someone had smeared the word 'pristine princess' next to her name on a toilet wall.
She preferred the word 'clean.'
She had grown up in a Catholic household, with both of her parents as advocates to the importance of attending Church every Sunday. Perhaps it made them feel better for the sins they committed on the other six days of the week, because she often felt like the only one in her family that paid attention to any of the messages written in the bible. Her older brother, Christoper, had left for the west coast for college, far far away from Chicago or Illinois, some five years ago, and although the phone calls shared between the siblings were little and not very often, Claire knew that he threw all of the hours of Sunday school down the toilet every Friday night during happy hour. Her mother drank nightly, usually with girlfriends at the country club though it was beginning to become a worrying solo activity, and she was sure that her dad had slept around at least once since getting married.
Claire didn't approve of any of their actions.
One of the burners at her school had once chucked a wad of paper at her back while she walked along the hall with the word 'tease' inscribed on it, and she was sure she once overheard her best friends gossiping about her being a prude.
And though she never liked to miss out on the parties that they all got invited to, or the nights driving around as boy girl into the city, she couldn't help but push Patrick Stubbins—or simply 'Stubby'—away whenever he attempted to put his hands up her shirt while intoxicated. She didn't think it was bad of her to want to wait until she found someone who knew what the meaning of 'no' was.
She'd been called a bitch before, a brat, even a wuss for not getting into an argument when trying to avoid the former title. But there was one name that she couldn't really get rid of, or shake, because it was quite simply true.
'Rich.'
She came from money, was first introduced to designer clothing as soon as she'd taken an interest in dressing well. She had her nails done regularly, though she still liked to paint them herself occasionally, and whenever her parents got bored they had two villas in two different European countries to visit if they so desired. She'd been raised for most of her life with the help of a nanny, was fluent in French thanks to private tutoring, and for her 16th birthday her dad had taken her to a BMW garage and told her to "ignore the prices, just pick the one you like the best."
And when she got caught sneaking out to go shopping by her school's principal, her dad came into school wearing his work suit and she was able to get out of her punishment.
Perhaps the title wasn't too bad, as long as it prevented her from having to attend forced weekend detention sessions.