The Teenage Guide To Popularity [COMPLETE]

Chapter 1: State Of Mind.

Carter Vance was bored. It wasn't an ordinary boredom; the kind that creeps up on you when you're alone in your room, ruffling through papers of homework and wondering why you're home on a Saturday night. It was different. New. It had started a few weeks ago, and with each day it had grown stronger. Carter wasn't sure what brought it on, or how to make it stop.

All she knew was that it was making her restless and agitated. Her life was at a stand-still, and she needed something, anything, to carry her out of the tediousness of her current reality.

The hallways of Newton High were filled with laziness and groans, as summer vacation had just ended and many were simply not ready to dive back into studies. Junior year was an important year - it was when everyone began deciding which universities were worth applying to, which to avoid, which were the best party schools, and which would pave the way for the best jobs with the highest salaries.

Carter had her entire being set on first back-packing across Europe, and then attending Princeton.

On the third day of the first semester of junior year, an opportunity to rid herself of the boredom presented itself. It was a typical high school opportunity, but an opportunity nonetheless. It was also a chance to temporarily forget the impending future after high school. Carter had always been the kind to grab at every good chance, even if sometimes it led her down a path of semi-destruction.

Leigh Brighton, Carter's partner in all things mayhem, thought up an idea that would surely send them both through a whirlwind of beautiful high school chaos. Though like for many Leigh's bright ideas, Carter would brush it off at first.

"Just look at them," said Leigh, eyeing the Populars in the cafeteria.

The Populars were a group of elite students; the most beautiful, the most athletic, and the most untouchable. They were a scene out of any high school movie in history. If you took their faces out, their personalities, style and entire existence could be applied to the popular crowd at any high school. Predictable, enviable and almost royal.

Carter was too busy eating chocolate pudding to notice them at the moment. Though when Leigh insisted that she pay attention, she looked up from the table and glanced in their direction. There they were, The Populars of Newton High. The so-called untouchable ones.

"What about them?" Carter asked, focusing on her pudding again.

"Ashton Rhodes is all over Aiden. It's gross. He can do better. And all her followers are watching like she's Queen of the World," Leigh said, then pouted and crossed her arms over her chest.

Leigh often resembled a 10-year-old girl. The clothes she wore were fashion disasters; frilly skirts, puffy sleeves, too many colours. One time she wore overalls. Carter had given up trying to talk her into dressing her age, or at least with the decade. Leigh was headstrong and unaltered by what the media would tell her was proper fashion, even though she was well-versed in every brand, and knew exactly what worked and what didn't. She just liked to pave her own way.