X

Three Days Before

It was a game, at least it was for the boys at Webchester high school. The more you got, the higher you were on the metaphorical food chain.

Nudes, or Noodles, as they were called when teacher's were within ear shot.

And it wasn't just any braless pic, or bare beaver shot that would send your soaring to the top, there were points.

Awkward, eager to please freshman = Half a point.

Popular girls = Two Point.

Foreign exchange students = Five Points.

Jesus Fanatics = Ten points.

Teachers = Twenty-five points.

Prudes = Fifty Points.

Tapping chewed eraser of his pencil on the open page of English book, Calum scanned the room.

He didn't know how many points he had, no one knew, but everyone knew that he was the clear and untouchable winner. He'd coaxed them out of two teachers, one of the Jesus fanatics, and three of the school's four foreign exchange students. The pool of popular was more or less dry, slurped up in the early months of school by Calum and his cunning ways. He had a hole folder on his phone for all the freshman photos he had, and another folder of their screenshotted texts pleading with him, begging him to never show their none existent breasts again. He'd even managed to pry pics from the prudes, all of them except one.

Maisie Clifford.

It could have been how the collars of her shirts never dipped beneath her collarbones, or how her perfectly pressed skirts never passed above her knees unless she sat down, revealing the band aides which covered the knicks from where she shaved clumsily.

It could have had something to do with her face and how it wasn't classically beautiful, but rather somewhat strange, her features, nose, lips, eyebrows, all too large and thick for her small face. It could also, have had something to do with the fact that her older brother, Michael Clifford, had nearly killed a kid in the cafeteria once and seriously injured another resulting in his swift expulsion.

But more than anything else, it had to do with the fact that not many people knew Masie Clifford existed. No one saw her, she was invisible, because no one took the time to look.

No one that is except Luke Hemmings.

An awkwardly tall, freakishly lanky boy with a crop of blonde wavy hair his Mother cut the first of every month on the front porch, he was Calum's opposite in every since of the word.

None athletic, pale as snow, awkward, and incredibly intelligent Luke at sixteen years old had yet to see a breast. He'd seen his Mother's of course as an infant, he'd drunk from them. And he'd seen his sister's once for a fleeting moment when he opened her bedroom door to ask if she wanted pickles on her sandwich and she'd been changing. But other than that, he was pure.

It wasn't that he didn't believe in the game of Noodles, he wasn't one of the Jesus fanatics, one of the seventeen out gay boys or one of the seven closeted, at Webchester. He simply didn't see the point in it.

What right did he have to pry private pictures from girls and expose them for his own sick entertainment? There were American Horror Story episodes to catch up on instead, books to read and movies to watch. Nudes didn't appeal to Luke.

Continuing to tap his pencil on his book, creating a dull, rhythmic tapping, Calum surveyed the room. He knew what was hidden beneath each and every shirt in the room and what dwelt under every skirt, all except one.

But not for long.