Oblivious

2: The Helpful Stranger

Elain's POV

  A ray of light found the gap between my curtains and shone down on my face, waking me up on that beautiful Sunday morning. Crap, that pestering sunlight.

  I waved my hands in the air, as if doing that would somehow swat the thing away. Finally waking up enough to realize that my attempts were nothing but futile, I sat up, stretched, and yawned to no end. I rubbed my right eye as I checked the time on my alarm clock. 6:02 AM, it said.

  I knew that I couldn't possibly fall asleep again after being woken up like that, so I decided to do what I always did every morning during the weekends: Go on a bike ride.

  I walked to the bathroom to take a shower.

  You might be shocked why I'm not moping around anymore. Well, yesterday, when we were having snack time, I struck a deal with Mom. I told her that I wanted my room to be decorated my way, and in exchange for that I would atleast try to like London. I guess that was fine, since I had no choice but to do that anyway. And because Mom and I shook on it yesterday, I'm now getting the room I've always wanted.

  I changed into a white shirt and black shorts before opening a yet unpacked bag to look for a little piece of home to bring along with me. After rummaging for a minute, I found what I was looking for. My yingyang necklace. Ashton, one of my bestfriends, gave it to me for my birthday last year. I put it over my neck before putting on my socks and black Converse.

  When I came out of my room, it was still 6:30, which meant nobody in the house was awake yet. Breakfast usually starts at around 7:30, so I'll just make sure to be back by then.

  I made my way to the garage at the back of the house and found my bike leaning against the wall. I wheeled it to the front yard and breathed in the foreign smell of London. Our yard smelled like trees, whereas our house at Doncaster smelled like the flowers my mother gardened. I really hope she would get around to that, 'cause that was a trademark of any Clark household. Birds were singing merrily on our tree branches, and leaves were swaying like arms holding lighters at a rock concert. The sun was shining up high, and the breeze picked up, sending fallen leaves scurrying over our driveway.

  Silly as it sounded, I actually forgot about Doncaster for a few moments. All I could think about was how perfect the day was for a bike ride.

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Blair's POV

  It's crazy how much this family tolerates Elain. A part of me knew that she was mom's favorite the moment I saw her at the hospital. Even though I was still a year old, I could see that mom's smile shone down at her in a way it never did to me, or Aaron, or Jamie. Her birthdays always had the best food, and she always got what she wished for during the Holidays. When she wanted something, she got it. And if she didn't get it right away, she would throw the world's most epic tantrums. You'd think she'd have grown out of it by now, but no, she hasn't. And it's killing me. I mean, if I did what she's been doing, mom would've probably screamed at me and left me alone to realize my own mistake. But she bent over backwards for Elain, God knows why.

  I excuse Mom for that parental mistake, since Dad has always talked to me about that whenever I wanted to. Like my 5th birthday, when I wanted this red dress, and my mom didn't want Elain to get left out, so she bought her a blue version of the dress. Lil sis was so happy that she got to look like me that day, and at first I thought it was adorable. But then we got to the party and guess what? Everybody liked the blue one better. She stole the show...on my own birthday.

  I cried in dad's arms when everybody left, and I guess that was when I established that I was a Daddy's girl. That fact continued on even when Elain turned out to be the more boyish one, and I became "a total girl" as she said.