So... drum roll please... the members of the Witty Commitee are Alexia Smythe, submitted by KatKat972, Mikayla Manser, submitted my Mikky-good-luck-charlie-lover, and Maeve DeLuca, submitted by Boycrazy1025. Thank you for all the applicants!

Heart ya,
Joy

P.S. Mikky-good-luck-charlie-lover and I are co-writing a story. It's called Alpha Games: Attack of the Alphas and will be pulished later this weekend. :) Tell us what you think!

OCTAVIAN COUNTRY DAY
CAFE
10:56 AM
DECEMBER 10, 2012

Up until two minutes ago, the cafe had been ringing with the sounds of more than 100 girls chatting, giggling, and eating lunch. But as Kristen and Claire strolled in as though they didn't have a care in the world, the room became deathly quiet.

Finally, a small girl with eerie violet eyes broke the silence. "Do you have the list?" she asked excitedly.

"We do." Kristen smiled and waved a sheet of paper around tantalizingly.

They took their sweet time purchasing their lunches: a slice of pizza and water for Kristen; a bland salad and apple cider for Claire. Finally, they sat down at their table.

"Okay, our Gamma is Alexia Smythe."

A girl with wavy blonde hair down to her hips and entrancing blue eyes walked over. She was wearing tight straight-leg Citizens of Humanity jeans with silver slingback sandals. She'd paired it with a cerulean lace cami and an Alice&Olivia floral-print blouse.

She earned a grin from Kristen and a thumbs-up from Claire.

"Our Delta," Kristen proclaimed slowly. "Is Mikayla Manser!"

She strutted over, her auburn tresses flowing behind her. In skinny white Seven jeans, a tight blue Fendi tube top, and a leather jacket, she was eye-catching and seemingly invincible.

"Congratulations," Claire said warmly.

"Thanks." Mikayla plopped down and stared out at the sea of eager girls.

Kristen snatched a tomato from Claire's salad, popped it in her mouth, and continued. "And last but not least, our Epsilon is..."

"Maeve DeLuca!" Claire finished.

A cheer erupted from a table in the corner, and about five hands pushed a girl towards their table. There were shouts of, "Yeah, Maeve!" and "Good going, girl!"

"Loyal friends. Probably an Alpha in her own group," Kristen noted. She didn't have time to say anything else before the girl was upon them.

"I'm Maeve," she said, adding a blinding smile.

"No kidding," Kristen couldn't help shooting back. She took in the Epsilon's outfit: a gray pleated Ralph Lauren miniskirt with a buttoned-to-the-top white Miu Miu cardigan. On her feet were classic white Chanel flats.

"Climb up," Claire hissed.

Everyone hurried to stand on the table. They raised their hands, fingers entwined, and shouted, "To the Witty Commitee!"

"The Witty Commit..." The girls' voices trailed off as everyone turned to look at the door.

Because marching into the cafeteria were Alicia Rivera, Dylan Marvil, and the former leader of them all, Massie Block.

OCTAVIAN COUNTRY DAY
CAFE
11:09 AM
DECEMBER 10, 2012

Kristen didn't know what to tell her clique, but she figured she couldn't say anything until she knew what Massie's intentions were. So she marched the group toward her old Alpha. While she was deciding on what level of formality was called for, Claire took charge.

"Hi, Massie." She smirked coolly.

"Who's this?" was the first thing out of the brunette's mouth.

Kristen regained control. "This is the Witty Commitee. Me, the Alpha, Claire, the Beta, Lexi, the Gamma, Mikayla, the Delta, and Maeve, the Epsilon."

"I see." Massie's eyes flashed, but she couldn't tell whether it was from anger, fear, sadness, or a mixture of the three. "Nice to meet you."

"We've only been going to school together for four months. And you know me." Mikayla rolled her eyes and stepped closer to the other girls.

"Whatevs." Massie dismissed her with a wave of a ring-encrusted hand.

"I thought you said she wasn't coming back," Maeve hissed.

"I was obviously wrong." Then Kristen looked at Massie head-on. "Why are you back anyway?"

"We'd had enough of Hollywood," she stated simply. She raised her arms to the crowd. "The Pretty Commitee is back!"

A chorus of hoots and hollers filled the cafeteria, but they came only from the table by the garbage cans.

"Layme?" Massie spat.

"I guess that's the best you can do." Alexia gave her a sickly-sweet smile and tossed her hair, remembering back to the moment at PMS where she'd lost her best friend Massie Block to the Ahnnabees. She hadn't looked back since, and neither had Massie. But now she was on top, and God knew she'd use that to her advantage, starting by making the girl's life miserable.

With matching victorious smiles, Kristen led Claire, Alexia, Mikayla, and Maeve into the hall.

Finally, score one for Kristen and the Witty Commitee.

OCTAVIAN COUNTRY DAY
CAFE
11:14 AM
DECEMBER 10, 2012

"Come on, Mass, let's get out of here." Alicia tugged on her friend's arm. She felt awkwardly big-boobed and over-developed compared to those tiny, muscular girls.

And that was nothing compared to Dylan's overwhelming fat hang-up. In her mind, she was a giant balloon, just about ready to pop. She felt so bloated, so disgusting... The sight of all this food was making her sick. "Yeah," she agreed.

"Fine." Massie spun on her heel and stomped away, leaving the others to follow.

"What happened?" Alicia wondered.

"Kristen made a new clique, that's what happened," Dylan snorted.

"No shit. I mean, why is everyone so loyal to them?"

"I don't know!"

Massie shook her head. "We need a plan."

"Do you have one?" Alicia asked craftily.

"Almost."

OCTAVIAN COUNTRY DAY
SCIENCE
11:46 AM
DECEMBER 10, 2012

Dylan glared out the window at the lightly falling snow, effectively tuning her teacher out.

All of a sudden, the lights shut off. And then, with a whir, the SmartBoard powered down. That was when the heat decided to stop working.

Dylan rubbed her hands over her bare arms. She was already freezing. The snow fell harder and harder. Flakes were starting to blanket the ground.

"Stay calm," ordered Ms. Lora unnecessarily. Most of the class had taken out iPhones, Droids, Motorolas, or Nokias and commenced to take pictures to post to their Facebooks and Instagrams. Not one person had bothered to ask what was going on. Fifth period Science wasn't full of froofy idiots like most of Dylan's classes.

She paged the office, but the intercom wasn't working either. Then the loudspeaker crackled to life and a static-y message played through the school. "Good afternoon, OCD. As you know, a power outage has occured. We advise classes to continue their work if possible and to not panic. If we cannot solve this problem in one hour, we will hold early dismissal." There was more, but no one heard it because, just then, the prinicipal's voice died off.

"Okay, phones away," Ms. Lora ordered. "We're going to play an interactive game."

"Oh, goody," Dylan muttered, sliding her phone into the pocket of her satin Tommy Hilfiger t-shirt dress.

"Everyone stand on their desk."

Uncertainly, the girls clambered up.

"We are going to say the alphabet. You may not communicate. If two or more of you talk at the same time, you're out. If you say the wrong letter, you're out. If it takes longer than four seconds between letters, the last person to go wins. Ready, go."

"Uh, A," Dylan said.

"B." "C." They got to M before three girls spoke at once. Then the game fell apart.

In a few minutes, the lights started to slowly blink back on.

"No," Dylan whispered. "No..." She crossed her fingers, her toes, her knees. "No!"

Then they went back off. The sky outside was completely dark. "Yes!"

A hall moniter came down the corridor to tell the sixth grade that they'd be in Gym A to wait for their parents or guardians to pick them up.

HOLAGURRL: My mom can take us all home.
MASSIEKUR: So can mine.
HOLAGURRL: But Kuh-laire's at ur house.
MASSIEKUR: Whatevs. She's nawt keeping my room, tho.
BIGREDHEAD: U tell her, Mass!

OCTAVIAN COUNTRY DAY
GYM A
12:53 PM
DECEMBER 10, 2012

The Witty Commitee made sure they sat as far as they possibly could from their hated counterpart.

"Why can't we all be friends?" Claire whined.

"Because we can't." Kristen was now the sixth-grade OCD Alpha, and if that job came with the responsibility of making sure they were every bit as nasty to the Pretty Commitee as they possibly could be, so be it.

Claire's eyes drooped, as did the corners of her lips.

"Cheer up," soothed Maeve. "We're popular, pretty, smart, what could you want?"

Claire sighed. "I dunno. I guess I just can't stand the fighting."

The doors swung open, but in the pitch-black, no one could see who the intruders were.

"It's just Briarwood!" a voice shouted. "Sixth grade, right?"

"Yes," replied their class advisor, Mrs. Thomas.

The overhead lights finally clicked back on. Through the floor-to-ceiling glass, the students could see the snow careening toward the ground. They could also see the group of too-cute-to-be-true boys that headed up the group entering the gym.

"Look at him," Claire hissed, turning Kristen's head to the right. "Look! Omigod, he's adorable."

"He is?" Kristen asked skeptically.

"Um, yes." She smoothed back her hair and rattled her bracelets slightly. In the quiet, all heads turned toward her. But she kept her voice to a whisper. "Look at his eyes." One blue, one green, both beautiful.

The Briarwood hotties walked over to sit next to the Witty Commitee.

"Hey," greeted a boy with shaggy, medium-blonde hair and chocolate eyes. "I'm Derrick."

"Josh." Spanish with just a hint of accent.

"Chris Plovert."

"Kemp."

"Cameron Fisher. Call me Cam."

THE RANGE ROVER
BACKSEAT
1:29 PM
DECEMBER 10, 2012

The girls huddled together, Massie in the middle, pretending it was because they were cold, but truthfully, they wanted to hear Massie's revenge plan.

"All we have to do is remind OCD that we're in charge. Nawt them." Massie shook her caramel-highlighted mane out of her face. "Easy."

"And how do we do that?" Alicia wondered, wrapping her Gucci parka over her chest.

"Still working." Massie tapped her manicured nails on her lap for a few seconds before exclaiming, "Got it! I'm sure some of those girls who tried out for the Witty Commitee aren't so happy that they didn't get picked. All we have to do is take the next-best."

"Since when has Massie Block settled for "next-best?" Dylan demanded. "We need a way to snatch whatever-their-names-are back from the Witty Commitee. If we have them, we're golden."

"We won't get them." An Alpha always needed to know when something wasn't worth it. "We'll be wasting our time."

"So who do we take?" Dylan inquired.

"We'll hunt around," Massie instructed. "Stay low, and be on the lookout for someone with PP."

"Done," Alicia said.

"Done," Dylan added.

"And done." Massie smiled. Being an Alpha was easier than it looked.

"So, anyway, what do you want to do this afternoon?" Alicia asked.

"Snowball fight?" suggested Dylan hopefully.

"No way. Spa?"

"Yes!" Alicia smiled brightly, shaking out her fingers as though they were on fire. "I need to exfoliate."

"Please never do that again," Massie begged.

"Why?"

"It reminds me of the Ahnnabees."

Dylan liked makeup and nail polish, but she wasn't obsessed the way her friends were. But instead of speaking her mind, she mustered up a grin. "That sounds great." She figured Massie had enough problems.

"Good." Massie beamed back, but her eyes didn't twinkle as they normally did.

Maybe they were all a little stressed out.

Pretty Commitee or Witty Commitee? Review!

Heart ya,
Joy