A modern day retelling of "Snow White".
After tragedy befalls her mother, sixteen-year-old Chloe White is forced to live with her estranged father Henry and his new wife, Elizabeth, who was a former-famous actress. Out of spite and jealousy, Chloe...
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The outside wind blew a breeze so cold that it could be felt right into the bones. There were black puddles of mud from icy rains and little plastic bags in front of the doors for students to put on their feet to avoid dragging dirt into the halls. Surrounding the school campus there were just large spaces of trees and grass leading towards the woods beyond the looming walls.
In a coat of snow-white, Chloe waited in the winter cold by the tree of The Seven for a coat of deep violet to arrive.
The violet hood lowered to reveal the face of Charlotte.
"How did you know I'd come here?" Charlotte asked, but didn't look surprised.
Chloe shrugged her shoulders. "I didn't, I guessed you knew I was looking for you and this place is the only spot we've been in together."
Charlotte approached the tree and traced her fingers over the bark. There were some initials marked there. "When I first arrived at this school, I did like you. I didn't understand why I should mistreat the Scholarship kids and I didn't understand why I couldn't talk to the Climbers or the Elites. I saw a girl being laughed at, her name was Amber and she was a Scholarship student from Leeds. I helped her and offered to buy her lunch—you know scholarship kids can only afford a certain amount of food—and we talked."
Chloe joined Charlotte by the base of the tall shading tree. The initials were very small but seemed to say: C.T & A.K BFFs.
"At first, things seemed fine, then over time, other Money Misfit kids started to harass Amber, it got increasingly worse. They teased her for coming from a poor family; she couldn't attend any of the same activities as me because she couldn't afford them. Then students said she was only my friend to get my money, at that point even the Scholarship students were mean towards her." Charlotte struggled to get through her words without tears.
"Scholarship students share their bedrooms with three other students. There are random searches in all the rooms for illegal substances and contraband once a week. On the day they searched Amber's bed they found cocaine. It wasn't hers, but no one would believe her. Scholarship students can't make mistakes, for them it's expulsion." Charlotte scratched her nails against the letters.
Now Charlotte's gaze was much harder. She had on her emotional armor. The experience of seeing her best friend endure horrible treatment made Charlotte become a colder person.
"If you befriend anyone outside of your social level, that's how it ends, but for Scholarship students, it's worse. You can't be sure what you're sending them back home to. Their life back home could be worse than here. If you ignore them, they live well, in good conditions with only classes to focus on. They make lots of other scholarship friends. They graduate and go off with scholarships to ivy league schools and then get good jobs and lead good lives. I know you think I was wrong to not help that girl, but I helped her, by doing nothing. . ."
