Writing about the aftermath of Saturday detention has proved to be a larger task than previously planned, so this won't be the final chapter. Profuse thanks to all who have reviewed and I'm grateful for your kind encouragement. As always, continue reviewing!
All standard disclaimers apply.
There's a lot of disbelief going on right now. A lot of...I don't know what to call it. Shit, I hate this.
For one thing, it's raining, but I'm out in the parking lot of the mall, soaked to the bone, and you know what? I don't want to go back inside.
Yeah, I just heard myself. Claire doesn't want to be in the mall. An earthshaking event, go grab the paparazzi. Wanna know why I'm not in that place?
Well, who normally hangs out at the mall?
That's right, my friends. Soon to be former friends, if I predict correctly. And I do, because I'm the leader. I know them, how they operate. Hell, I'm the one who led by example. Fucking queen bitch, that's me. They're inside right now, ooh-ing and ahh-ing over the latest perfume that came in. I don't even like perfume, but guess who led the charge over to the cosmetics department? Yeah, me. All part of the image. The fucking image.
They think I'm in the bathroom, retouching my makeup. Or else I might have told them it was that time of month, I don't remember. I wasn't thinking too clearly when I bolted out of there. All I knew was that I had to get OUT. Away from the pressure to be the perfect prom queen candidate. The princess. The pinup girl for all the eligible jocks in school...well, Shannon is probably more of their fantasy, everyone knows she's not a cherry and she's got the most amazing boobs in Shermer, even jealous girls admit it. The point is – was there a point? I don't remember. It's cold out here, and I probably look like a lunatic, soaked and walking feverishly around the parking lot looking like I might implode any minute.
Yeah, it doesn't take a genius to figure out this isn't usually how I spend my Sunday evenings. I'm not one to be struck by panic attacks the day before Monday. I'm the fucking queen of Shermer High, what do I have to worry about?
Except I won't be royalty for much longer. Not if I'm seen in the company of a geek or a basketcase. Or...or...John.
It's funny, how less than two days ago, to me John was nothing but the premier criminal of Shermer High. Rumors had him doing everything wild you could imagine, drugs, booze, sex, whatever. I didn't have any reason to disbelieve the stories...you're more ready to believe anything of someone you already think the worst of, right? And anyway, I didn't care. All I cared about was myself and my little gang, clothes and cosmetics, maintaining my status at the school.
God, I hate myself so much.
Anyway, it's been 27 hours since I saw anyone from the Breakfast Club. Since I saw John. And I don't see him as a criminal anymore, or at least not so much. I see him as the one who...who...I can't even express it. He made fun of me. He called me cherry, richie, bitch, he yelled at me, he did his best to rip me to shreds.
He told me the truth.
So there I was, standing at the cosmetics counter, gushing something idiotic to all my girlfriends (habit is so hard to break, isn't it? Seventeen years of habit, of brainwashing...) when John's words flashed across my mind, clear as if he were spitting them at me all over again.
"You don't know any of my friends, you don't look at any of my friends and you certainly wouldn't condescend to speak to any of my friends so you just stick to the things you know, shopping, nail polish, your father's BMW and your poor rich drunk mother in the Caribbean!"
"YOU ARE A BITCH!"
And then I had to get out of there. They were all too much like me. I was too much like them. Poor little group of empty airheads, princesses with nothing but shopping and nail polish to fill up their time. I don't even like perfume and anyway, I have enough at home. And fifty pairs of shoes. Hundreds of skirts and tops and cute outfits, the latest cosmetics to come down the line. And conceited little me, content to think of nothing else, except when I snubbed the social outcasts and scorned everyone else.
I panicked. I didn't even grab all the stuff I'd bought already, I just ran out of there with my purse and jacket, tossing some excuse or other over my shoulder as I left. I was suffocating on my own group...my own group, that I helped create. That I reigned over. If it was so easy for me to slip back into the old routines, the old mindsets, how am I ever going to break away from them if I want to stay friends with the Breakfast Club? Brittney, Ashley, Shannon, Jackie, Chelsey, the rest of them...they're my world. We've known each other since grade school, our mothers know each other, I've always run with them and they've always been in my circle.
But it's John, Allison, Andy, and Brian who know me.
I don't think I'm worth their time.
"Claire? Claire? Oh my god, Claire, what are you doing out here? It's freezing! Oh my god, you're soaked! Come on back inside, the girls are waiting, we just saw this new guy, oh my god he's so cute..."
Fuck. FUCK.
And that ends Chapter 3. I hope I managed to make all this angst somewhat believable. Not getting my hopes up, though.
As always, review! Heavy criticism needed.
