Choking on Diamonds

Forty One

"I'm going to get out and smash that Masshole's car with a bat if he keeps staring at his phone!"

Remover when I said I didn't give a shit about Mckenna's baby? That feeling quickly faded as reality and vindication punched me in the face.

My fists balled in my lap as my jaw flexed, tension shooting through my muscles. "You've got to be fucking kidding me! It should not take half an hour to go from Exit 41 to 44 when there isn't even a 43!" All I could see for hundreds of feet was pitch black marred with a glowing single file of red brake lights. "It's ten o'clock at night! Where did they all fucking come from?"

"They're fixing every bridge on the Merrit from Norwalk to Fairfield, Kyra. Rush hour is 4-8. Turn that to a single lane through some of the biggest cities between New York and Boston and it takes a long ass time. This usually takes half an hour anyway."

"They're sisters aren't giving damn birth as we speak!" I retorted bitterly.

"I thought you didn't care about Kenna," Hunter quipped in response, his cocky 'I told you so' tone glaringly obvious.

"I don't. I want to be there when she ruins her life once and for all. That, and my parents would murder me if I missed it because apparels we suddenly care about family values," I snorted. It was pathetic of my parents to think that they could suddenly act like they weren't absent for most of our lives. My dad would probably be in the city again by tomorrow morning, bright and early for surgery where he could forget about his failure of a daughter.

This would be my damnation and my salvation. Every choice I made form here on out was better in my parents eyes than a teenage pregnancy with their twins boyfriend. I'd essentially have to overdose not to be a prodigal child anymore. But consequently, while the bar of morality had been lowered, that now meant every single expectation my parents ever had rested solely on me now. There was no do over; the pressure would be too immense to handle. Not only had my sister secured her place as a free loader, but now I had to deal with already overbearing parents on an entirely new level. Our value was measured in grades and dollars signs and we were compensating in 'love' accordingly.

My parents were frothing at the mouth for their next dinner or gala where they could flaunt our family. Teenage relationships meant nothing to people of status until all the sudden they meant everything. A chance to show off a member of the Khan family as a potential son in law. He was the richest boy to grace our families vaginas, an odd comparison but a seemingly important one. Luke had money but his family was much more well known for their brains in the community and his parents professor jobs at Yale. David too came from money but in Darien, real money was anything over the fifty million marker. The 'commoners' alone has an average annual income over three times the United States average. There were seventeen billionaires in this small state and all but two were from this county. One in ten people were from millionaire households. Connecticut had the biggest wealth gap in the nation. The porters town in the country like Bridgeport were mere miles from the richest. Fairfield country was a castle upon a hill, and the people here acted accordingly. Upper class meant nothing here and that was just statistics.

It was impossible to grow up in this environment of watches worth more than a majority of people's houses and still think money didn't matter. I'd be a fucking liar if I said I didn't care about my finances, as long as I was happy. I fucking wanted money and I wanted a lot of it. It was the human condition, or a Fairfield county condition at least.

That was the thing about the uber rich; they acted like the humbles people in the world. Driving only multi million dollar cars was a sign that you were overcompensating for your 'lack' of funds. Wealth was best stated in watches, properties, alcohol, and private aviation. All designed clothes meant nothing; the 'common' folk could get that with enough money. What really mattered was looking out together. Branding was tacky, no matter how classic. Old money had its rules, and even new money followed them.