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Chapter 2

Blair

    Don't look at him, I told myself as I listened to Erin tell me about her trip to Mexico. I could feel Carter's eyes on me, but I wasn't going to look at him. He needed to realize that what happened in summer was a mistake and that it would never happen again. No matter how hard he tried, I wasn't going to change my mind.

    "Blair, are you okay?" Erin suddenly asked, sounding concerned.

    "Yeah," I said, surprised she noticed something was wrong. "Sorry, I was just lost in thought. It wasn't because you're boring, I just tend to daydream."

    Erin stared at me, looking as if she wanted to figure me out. Since I didn't want to be figured out, I looked away and stared at my table. I still felt Carter's eyes on me, but I told myself to keep my eyes averted.

    "Is it because Claire is in this class?" Erin asked, lowering her voice. "Does her presence make you uneasy?"

    Surprised by what she said, I looked back and saw Claire sitting at the back of the class with her best friend, Tori. They were laughing about something, being the loudest people in the room, and I frowned as I wondered how I didn't realize my own twin sister was in my class. But knowing my thoughts had been preoccupied because of Carter, I understood.

    "No," I said, bringing my attention back to Erin. "Claire doesn't make me uneasy."

    "Really?" Erin said. "She makes me. Her entire clique is so judgemental and obnoxious. I hate being around any of them."

    I didn't say anything to that. Claire was my sister and even though she was far from perfect, I wasn't going to bash her. Even if what Erin said could be true, I wasn't about to agree or disagree to what she said.

    "Sorry," Erin suddenly said, looking apologetic. "She's your sister. I shouldn't be saying that."

    "It's fine," I said honestly. "But seriously, Claire isn't the reason. I'm shocked we're in the same class though. I thought siblings can't be together?"

    "That doesn't matter in high school. There's too many people in our school, so they can't keep track of everyone and make sure siblings aren't together. It only happened for the first time now since this is your first semester where you're not taking AP everything."

    That was true, I realized. Ever since freshman year I had taken AP courses because I enjoyed being challenged, but because it was senior year and our marks needed to be as high as possible to get into our choice university, I decided to take regular courses. That was probably why it was my first time being in Claire's class.

    "After three years we're in the same class as each other again," I said thoughtfully. "It's kind of strange, but I don't mind it. It's not like we talk to each other in school anyways, so there's no difference."

     Even though Claire was my sister, we didn't talk in school. We didn't even acknowledge each other in school because we were on separate ends of a social spectrum, meaning I was far from popular and Claire was very popular. When it came to school, we lived two different lives and I was pretty sure no one would have known we were related if we didn't look identical.

    "Why don't you guys talk in school?" Erin asked, frowning. "To be honest I would expect twins to hang out with each other."

    "I don't know," I said, even though I knew exactly why we stopped talking to each other in high school. "We just have separate lives in high school."

    Erin nodded, looking curious, and I looked away. I didn't like it when people knew things about me. I preferred to keep most of my life private, which was why I wasn't willing to tell Erin about my past with Claire. No one I talked to knew about it actually, and thinking of Claire I wondered if it was the same for her.

    "Mr. Lewis is finally here," Erin said, looking at the door.

    My eyes flew to the door, curious to see who our teacher was, and I regretted it immediately when I saw that Carter was staring at me from my peripheral vision. I whipped my head the other way, not wanting to look at him or vice versa. Looking at him brought back the memory of the stupidest thing I had ever done in my seventeen years of living, which was why I forced myself to stare straight ahead for the rest of the class.

*****

    I entered the house and went to the kitchen, feeling hungry. When I entered I was surprised to see that my whole family was already there, seated at the dining table. The fact that Claire was also there surprised me because she usually came home late since she usually hung out with her friends for a few hours before coming home.

    "Hey honey," Mom said, smiling at me. "Come join us. We were just about to start."

    I dropped my backpack at the side of the kitchen and went to the last remaining chair at the dining table, which was next to Claire. Feeling uncomfortable since we never acknowledged each other in the class we shared, I glanced at her and became surprised to see that she was already staring at me. But unlike what I expected, she smiled at me and I smiled back, remembering that our distant school selves weren't the real us. The real us weren't very close, but we did acknowledge each other at the very least.

    "How was the first day of senior year?" Dad asked, digging into his steak.

    "Great!" Claire exclaimed, grinning. "Me and Tori have all four classes together, so I know it's going to be a fun semester."

    "That's great," Mom said, smiling. "How are regular classes, Blair?"

    "Good, I guess," I said, shrugging because I really didn't have much to judge from yet. "I'm not really sure."

    "I think you'll really like it," Claire suddenly said, grinning at me. "Finally you'll see what a normal high school experience is like."

    Staring at my sister, I thought for a moment that she was beautiful when she grinned. Actually, she always looked beautiful. And even though we were identical, I knew I wasn't. Unlike my sister, I didn't radiate beauty, which left me looking down.

    "What are your plans for senior year?" Mom asked Claire.

    Claire launched into a tale about everything she would accomplish in her last year of high school. Mom and Dad listened attentively, laughing and enjoying everything Claire said. I was forgotten - as usual - and I quietly ate my food quickly. I then left without a word and as usual, no one noticed. No one said anything as I went upstairs and thought about how much I wished I was different.