"This is what she had become."
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Cleopatra Banks' last week in the small town of New Chelsea is nothing like she would have imagined it, but nothing could have prepared her for the stinging betrayal she's faced with and suddenly the prospect of...
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Gasps.
Loud, irritating, fruity gasps.
"What the..." "OH MY GUCCI!"
"It's not her I'm telling you,"
"It's totally her...just with rolls."
Cackles.
Evil, shrill cackles.
"It's definitely her, Valeria saw her yesterday,"
"Isn't she supposed to be dead or something?"
"Attention seeker, how pathetic."
Flashes.
Bright, blinding flashes.
All eyes on me as I trudge through the halls of St. McLeod Learning Institute.
Because I'm on a mission to reinvent and rediscover myself I had taken up mom's advice and decided to "switch things up" this morning. I discarded my dark clothing and in their place I decided to wear a bright red top with poofy off shoulder sleeves and a bow tied beneath the bust area. With that a simple pair of blue washed out boyfriend jeans, high waist of course and white Chuck Taylors.
My hair? Let's just say I finally discovered the benefits of straighteners and now my hair falls down in rivulets around my face and runs past my shoulders.
I thought I looked pretty this morning. Mom thought I looked pretty this morning. I felt pretty this morning. I even put on makeup.
Maybe I shouldn't have experimented so much with the eyeliner.
I pull my bag closer to my side and the heavy textbooks a little closer to my chest. I crumple up the brochure in one of my hands. I've been deceived. The smiling sunny faces of the simply dressed students at the back of the brochure (which boasted the best student experience ever) had been misleading.
Instead of walking into a school of welcoming non-judgmental eyes (as per the brochure), here I am.
The washed up whale on a shoreline of flamingos.
I kid you not when I say they resemble flamingos. Perfect skinny girls clad in tight pink shorts and dresses. Model-like boys with pouty lips and perfectly arched eyebrows dressed impeccably in chino pants and pink polo shirts (pink polo shirts?). The air is saturated with sweet smelling perfumes and hair products.
They all point and stare at me, whispering through microphones.
Of course they point and stare at me. I stick out like a sore thumb, like a giant red zit at the center of an otherwise flawless peachy face.
The little confidence I had managed to acquire this morning when slipping into my new red top vanishes. I bow my head and try to ignore all the eyes following me and I walk on until I find my locker.
