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1140 Thoroughbred Way (The Block Estate)
3:30 PM
20 August 2014
Freshman Year
Claire gently closed the shiny black door of the Range Rover, never one to forget Westchester's principle rule, even when under stress. On the opposite side as her, Massie shut the door and headed towards the Main House without a word to Claire. The blonde shrugged, and went the opposite way towards the stony guesthouse.
It took a scarce thirty seconds to reach the heavy mahogany door, and Claire found that it was unlocked. She pushed her way through and nearly smacked into Todd, her redheaded 13-year-old brother.
"Watch out!" Todd smirked good-naturedly, making sure to lightly swipe her head with his lacrosse stick. Her brother was already four inches taller than Claire, and the blonde resented it. Their parents were both short, so Todd should stay that way along with Claire.
"Todd, get in the car now!" Judy appeared from around the corner, shoving a freshly baked chocolate chip cookie into her mouth as she ran. Claire wrinkled her nose in aversion. It was not a pretty sight. She shrugged the feeling off and opened her mouth to ask her mother if she had time to chat. Perhaps Judy would know just what to say to remedy Claire's disastrous first day of school.
"Hey, mom?" Claire started, but the stocky woman ran straight past her. "Mom?"
"Claire, I have got to go," her mom snapped. "Todd, get in the car now! Don't make me tell you again!" With that last screech, Judy Lyons disappeared from sight out the door.
Todd was already long gone, so Claire found herself alone in the entryway of her small house. With a deep sigh, the blonde wandered into the kitchen and found the abandoned tray of chocolate chip cookies. She picked up four of the larger ones and put them on a plate, aimlessly wandering throughout the kitchen until she reached the bay windows that faced out towards the main house.
She could reflect alone, if no one else was available. There were several basic facts about the day that she had to sort through. The most important was that the pretty committee was definitely not on top any longer. Aside from the disastrous entrance at the beginning of the day, no one gave the five girls a second glance. At the Westchester Conservatory for Higher Learning, people seemed to actually care about school on the first day.
Claire focused on the next fact: WCHL was hard. Her class schedule was insane: Algebra, American Literature, 16th Century European History, and Biology in a row. After a combined lunch and independent study period, she had Nature Ceramics, Catalan Spanish 1 and Human Health. No APs, because at WCHL everything was an AP.
She was momentarily broken out of her thoughts by movement outside of the window. The black Range Rover was pausing to let a flash of highlighted brown hair disappear into the vehicle. Claire watched, the last cookie half raised to her mouth, as the car rolled out of sight onto Thoroughbred Way.
Was Massie going somewhere without her? Had Claire forgotten a mandatory shopping excursion?
The blonde shoved the remainder of the cookie in her mouth and grabbed her phone from the table.
Claire (3:41 PM): hey, saw you leave?
Massie (3:42 PM): yep, private sale at Barney's card holders only
Massie (3:43 PM): sorry, ttyl
Claire (3:43 PM): ok, have fun
Claire sighed. She could really use a distraction right now. Was the private sale so that "outsiders" couldn't even browse? Ugh.
She turned away from the window and snatched three more cookies on her way up the stairs. Turning into the second door on her left, she shut the door and plunked down at her computer. There was a lot she could be doing. Selecting a poet for a American Lit project, ten pre-test Algebra problems, an (English, thank god) essay on the differences between Catalan Spanish and Mexican Spanish, or preliminary research on babies for Human Health.
Health. Cam was in that class, and luck have it his new beau, Olivia dumb-as-a-rock Ryan was too. Claire had been forced to endure their giggling the entire time. And luck have it, she had the same research topic as both of them. Not that either of the love birds cared about her.
Claire clicked on Google Chrome, and navigated to the Google home screen. Once there, she searched 'baby'. Over a billion pages. The internet truly was enormous.
She ignored her teacher's recommendation to avoid Wikipedia and double-tapped on the site.
As the white screen materialized before her eyes, her attention was drawn to a bright red ad to the right of the article. It showed a realistic young blonde avatar adjusting a birthday crown on her head and smiling brightly. The picture changed to an attractive brunet guy running with his golden doodle. Beneath, the words Wurld Social swirled invitingly in a rich navy. The ad was enticing and constantly changing, almost daring the viewer to click.
She clicked.