Lions Pride: Mean Girls Next Generation

3

Luckily for Clara, the announcement to release them back into the school came only minutes later. By that time, gym had concluded and the lunch period was in full swing.

"Dude, did you guys hear? The fire drill this morning...wasn't a drill at all! Turns out, one of the lunch ladies in the back accidentally caught the biscuits on fire!" Kenny mentioned as he slid into a chair.

"Pfftt! That's frickin' hilarious!" Charlotte cackled, "Whose knows, maybe she was to busy hoarding her packets of sour cream!"

"Charlie my dear, you're the only one she's ever yelled at about getting sour cream." Shepherd deadpanned repositioning his apple so it wasn't touching his mashed potatoes.

"All I wanted was one packet of freaking sour cream! But just because I didn't get it on my first time through the line...I was a spawn of satan for daring to ask!"

"You pushed Lily G to the side to cut your way into the line!" Shepherd snickered. "She had to go to the nurse for a sprained wrist!"

"Well either way, because of that day...she's forever going to be known as Mrs Sour Cream.." Charlotte declared resting her boots on the table.

Giggles were passed around the table until it reached Clara, who hadn't looked up from her food even once.

"Hey, who was that guy anyway?" Charlotte asked causing her friend to look up startled.

"Oh..n-no one. He's no one."

"Uh huh, good lie, now tell us who he really is." Shepherd mumbled with crossed arms.

"He really is no one! I mean, he is clearly someone but...he's no one to me!"

"His frantic waving is telling a different story, Miss Clarabelle~" Shepherd eyed her knowingly.

"What's going on?" Kenny asked coming back into reality after seeing how high his burnt biscuit can bounce.

"Miss innocent Clarabelle Heron-George has a secret backstory!" Charlotte teased swinging fork around with deliberate intensity.

"There was this guy outside during the fire drill who was frantically waving her down." Shepherd explained

"Frantically? What exactly does that mean? How frantic is frantically?" Kenny questioned

"The dude was waving at her so hard, he might as well have been lights on a runway trying to guide a plane back to the ground." Shepherd raised an eyebrow.

"Ooo~! So he's like...an old fling?" Kenny smirked at the redheaded girl who was now hunched over her food as if she felt the need to protect it.

"No! No! It's nothing like that!" Clara gasped

"I didn't know you were so scandalous! Girl, you have to tell us how you know him!" Shepherd begged

"For the last time...it's nothing! If you're expecting some big story about how I used to be the town slut...I'm sorry to disappoint but..I'm completely and utterly average."

Clara stood from her seat hastily making sure to grab her backpack, lunch tray, and history textbook and one swoop and marched away before the tears of embarrassment and realization how her friends seemed to think of her started.

Is that how they really looked at her? They are so distrusting that they won't take her word that there isn't a story behind that mystery guy. Okay, so maybe there actually is a story but...the fact they wouldn't take her word for it that there's not...really bothered her.

Now here she is, eating lunch in the one place people come to either use the restroom, have sex, do drugs...or cry over their lack of friends.

The bathroom. What a magical place.

Clara's lunch was starting to turn her stomach just by the mere sight of it. It's funny how you can go from starving, to feeling just the opposite in the span of seconds.

At least she didn't have a breakdown in front of everyone. Clara's done that way to many times and getting forced to go to the guidance counselor's office by a teacher was far more embarrassing than she ever thought possible.

Pulling her cell phone from her backpack pocket, Clara contemplated if calling one of her moms was an option. Was this situation big enough to convince one of them to allow her to go home?

Clara sat there for a long time pondering this. If she wanted to go home, she'd have a better chance with Regina. With enough begging, her Mom would come to her rescue. Cady on the other hand was a firm believer that education is vitally important.

Cady allowing one of her children to stay home was like pissing in the wind, or jumping in the middle of a frozen lake, it will come back to bite them later.

Her logic, if you're home for any reason besides being sick or having a life crisis, then you can do every single house chore imaginable, to the point you would've rather have just gone to school in the first place.

Long story short, Regina's the push over parent. Just as she was about to press call, a knock on the stall startled her.

"Excuse me, you've been in there a very long time! You're either doing drugs and extremely constipated from doing drugs!"

"Shepherd. It's not funny..." Clara whined opening the stall of her two friends.

"Hey, look. We're sorry. We didn't mean to..to push you or anything..." Charlotte apologized.

Clara sighed through her nose. She never could stay mad at those two. Plus, they looked to have been really sorry.

"It's...fine. I've just been all over the place with my thoughts recently...and I'm at the point where one extra thing is enough to send me into a full on downward spiral to my demise."

"Yikes....that bad, huh?" Charlotte crinkled her eyebrows in worry.

"Yeah...but like I said, I'm fine! I'll..get over it."

Shepherd took the initiative to gently pull her into a hug. "Look, I know we were being pretty big dumpster fires back there but...seriously, who was that kid?"

"Yeah, jokes aside." Charlotte clarified

The redheaded girl hugged herself close once again. It seemed to be her own defense mechanism before she completely lost her mind.

"So...I guess I can't lie anymore, can I? As I'm sure you guessed...I do know him...and he is someone to me. I know, shocker, my outburst at the table totally didn't give that away....". She stopped to take a sigh, gathering all the confidence she needed for the next sentence. "He's an old friend I made at a summer camp..."

"Summer camp? Since when did you go to summer camp?" Charlotte questioned with squinted brows.

"Last summer. Remember how I said I was 'going on vacation'? Yeah, well...this summer camp was...that vacation."

"Okay? So what? I went to summer camp before. For musical theater." Shepherd explained skeptically.

"I met him there. At the camp." Clara rubbed her eyes tiredly. This was far to much excitement for the day. "Guys I...have to tell you something..."

"Okay? What?" Charlotte asked with edging intensity.

"I...used to be a mean girl."