Welcome to Constance...

[Devon Wood]

First days at a new school were always the best, especially when you came after the year had already started. First there was the confusion at having absolutely no idea where any of the classes were, the other students taking interest in you just because you were new and obviously had no sense of time whatsoever, the awkward conversations with guidance counselors about how, while the A average he'd received in the previous years in school showed promise, this school was completely different than the others...

Now there was a laugh. It didn't matter what you called it or where you put it, high school was always the same.

After being escorted to his locker by a very peppy, chatty girl whose name he'd forgotten well into her rant and, frankly, didn't care to remember, Devon sighed, staring up at the thing while she continued to ramble on about this club or another until (finally!) she left him at piece to open the rectangle that was to be his closest friend in the year to come.

'Welcome to Constance,' the guidance counselor had said, 'I'm sure you'll love it.'

Devon begged to differ.

tag;; open

[Riley Bass]

Riley rolled her eyes as she made her way through the school crowd, her books in one hand, her morning Starbucks late in the other. She was tired and very annoyed, Mondays were definitely was not her favorite day after a weekend of partying and socializing and Riley definitely wasn't concentrating. Smiling as a few people stepped out of her way she became more educed in her daydreaming.

Riley sighed as she kept walking she suddenly found herself on the ground with some late spilt down her white top. She instantly snapped out of her daze and assumed she had bumped into someone. Sighing as she looked down Riley threw her cup next to her, to let out her frustration, she had basically finished anyway. Riley looked up to be greeted by a new face, a cute new guy's face.

[Devon Wood]

Devon pulled off his jacket, some unidentified coffee-type drink now dripping down his sleeve. "Sorry," he muttered even though he knew it wasn't his fault. What was he talking about? Of course it was his fault. She was probably too self-involved to notice that he'd been standing there. He should really have been paying more attention.

He knew that he was being a bit ridiculous; not everyone at this school was going to be just like everyone at his last. For some reason, however, he couldn't get past the stereotype he'd set up in his head for how schools like this worked. He wasn't bottom of the food chain, of course, but he was somewhere in the middle, and it was best just to lay low and not cause any trouble. The school board was going to be far less lenient with him than with most of the other students.

So, in the spirit of not getting himself into trouble on the very first day, he even offered the girl a small smile.

[Riley Bass]

Riley stood up starting to pick up her belongings and her now empty cup of coffee. She sighed and fixed her clothing that was now crumpled and creased. "Oh, don't be sorry it's my fault I'm in a post weekend daze as usual, hence the coffee." Riley said with a small smile, she noticed with his tone that he probably wasn't too impressed to be here.

Riley raised her eyebrows at the coffee dripping off his sleeve. "Well on the bright side I guess we'll smell appealing to anyone who enjoys coffee." She joked with a small laugh hoping to break the ice. Even though Riley was a Bass she put all expectations aside when meeting new people. Her theory was unless people backstabbed you or were horrible to you than there was no need to judge.

She noticed he gave her a small smile which she reciprocated before needing to know who he was. "Oh by the way, I'm Riley." She said with a friendly grin

[Devon Wood]

Post-weekend daze... Devon recognized that one. Not from his own experience, of course, but people tended to be much more bearable on Mondays when they were all too tired and sluggish to put those self-centered minds to work at torturing everyone who wasn't invited to that weekend's big bashes (as if it really mattered).

Still, his mother said to give it a chance, so he would. After all, this girl was civil, and maybe her hangover was keeping her from noticing his Brooklyn accent or lack of designer clothing, but it was still nice while it lasted. It didn't hurt that she was hot, of course, but these girls normally were.

"Devon," he said with a nod, brushing off the sleeve of his jacket with his hand before placing it in his locker.

[Riley Bass]

Devon.. a name that Riley would definitely not forget in fact she could stand there all day looking at him, there was no denying he was hot. Shifting the weight of her books to her hip she smiled. "So, you're new, is it your first day?" She inquired sincerely, Riley remembered how hard it was to find her freshman classes with Alexis when they first started high school. She figured Devon would be in a similar situation to what they were all those years ago.

While she was waiting for a reply she glanced around only to see one of the 'welcoming committee' give her a envious look before Riley tore her eyes away from the girl and looked back at Devon. "I'm guessing you've had the grand tour by miss chatter box over." Riley said with an understanding look, all the girls on the committee were overenthusiastic wannabees who bored everyone to death without even realizing.

"So do you live locally?" She inquired whilst brushing flyaway bits of hair from her face. There was still ages until class anyway so Riley figured she should at least take the time to have a conversation with him.

[Devon Wood]

Rubbing the back of his neck. Devon answered, "Yeah..." in response to both questions, laughing slightly at the name she'd given the other girl. He was definitely used to being new to school, and at schools like this, it meant dealing with welcoming committees. By now, he was good enough at turning them off, but it did make things a bit difficult as far as knowing the important things. Still, he'd rather have to find out the hard way than listen to her gossip about everyone.

Honestly, anyone who said that people in small towns knew everyone's business did had obviously never gone to a New York prep school; it was pretty ridiculous. The worst of it all was that few people cared about good things that happened to anyone else. The things they loved to gossip about was always malicious and harmful... who really cared whose father was sleeping with what supermodel on the side?

"So do you live locally?"

And, there it was - the big winner. He wouldn't lie and say that he did because it was bound to come out eventually, but he didn't really want to make it painfully obvious that he was a scholarship kid either. Needing to be at the school gave you a weakness when so many of the other kids had parents who donated a great deal of money to it.

"Not really, no," he said, deciding to keep it to the basics for the moment, closing the locker and turning to face her yet again. "What about you?"

[Riley Bass]

Finally placing her bag and books on the ground she stood back up. Riley and Alexis had a name for nearly every clique in the school, but somehow she knew he couldn't care less about cliques and stuff and clearyly seemed unfazed by the atmosphere of the school.
She had grown up around all of the gossip, scandals, lies and such and she knew the place like the back of her hand. It was second nature her coming to school, even on their first day Alexis and her were worshiped and immediately accepted in the queen bee clique without any hesitation. Sometimes Riley wished she could be on the other end of the school hierarchy just to see what it was like.

Looking at Devon's body language shouted to her that he was avoiding telling her where because it obviously wasn't in the heart of the city. "Look if you come from Brooklyn or something I couldn't care less. I have a cousin from there." She said with a reassuring smile. Riley wondered if Devon avoided the direct answer because he assumed that she might act all stuck up and everything.

"I'm 10 minutes walk or 5 minutes limo." She said before mentally telling herself to shut up. Riley was sick of trying to tiptoe around this guy. "Look to be honest with you I am Riley Bass, you have probably heard of my family and yes we have money and stuff but that makes me no better than anyone else and hopefully you won't judge me like I'm doing for you. There i said it." She blabbed, slightly out of breath from her long fast sentence, which resulted with her looking down at her feet awkwardly.

[Devon Wood]

Devon laughed slightly at how forward she was. Was he really that obvious. He wasn't ashamed of being from Brooklyn, of course; there was absolutely nothing wrong with it. It was a hell of alot better than some other places. He just preferred to avoid awkward moments on the first day of school.

"Being from Brooklyn isn't exactly something you can hide," Devon joked with a smile. There was a very distinct accent that came with the territory, one that didn't even make it this far into the city. "I just moved back from Long Island, though," he explained for no reason in particular.

[Riley Bass]

Riley looked back up at him with a bit of a smirk, glad she had gotten the embarrassing bit out of the way. Of course she realized that there was nothing wrong with Brooklyn although she herself couldn't see herself living there permanently. But it was probably because of the lifestyle and environment she had been raised in. "Sorry about being so forward but sometimes that's just how i am." She said with a lopsided smile. "Supposedly it is both a hinderance and a credit, but at least you know where i stand." She said seriously.

A laugh escaped from Riley's lips, "I suppose It isn't" She said nodding in agreement "But neither is hiding that you are the daughter of Charles Bass." She said with a smile. Her face lit up once Devon mentioned Long Island, "Really, I like long Island it's really pretty.Do you move around a lot?" She inquired playing with the tips of her hair.

[Devon Wood]

"A bit, yeah," he said, nodding. "Parents and jobs and all," he added, unsure whether or not that would even make any sense to her, whose father probably went away for business all the time without needing to move her kids. He was also pretty sure that her experiences in Long Island and his were quite different... but maybe he shouldn't hold that against her.

He'd heard about the Bass family, of course, on many an occasion the last time he'd been in the area. Everybody knew about the Basses, but Devon had never taken a personal interest in them himself. Until now, they never really came up in any way other than mindless gossip.

"What about you? Born and raised in the Upper East Side?" he asked, keeping the mocking tone out of his voice. If she didn't care that he lived in Brooklyn, why should it bother him that she was New York royalty?

[Riley Bass]

"Oh, ok, is it hard starting new schools often?" She asked quietly attempting to empathize with him. Riley nodded, she understood a lot of families moved around the country often but in a way she couldn't imagine herself in that position. It would be totally weird for her dad to turn up one day and say ' i have a new job. We're moving.' She wondered if her life would make any sense to him, making page 6 in fashion weekly or catching a limo to school. Although she loved her life she always yearned to be like normal kids who lived in a cosy house and who caught the bus to school. Just thinking about it made her just appreciate she had a loving family and good friends.

"Yeah I'm a true blue Manhattan socialite who parties until she's paralytic, does stuff with any boy who comes her way and has a never ending credit card." SHe said with a tad of sarcasm. She liked to think that she wasn't the stereotypical Upper East Sider who went to rehab once she became out of control. She wasn't trying to be rude, but to show that she too could critique her type. Riley wanted to show him that i a lot of ways yes she was an Upper East sider but in other ways she wasn't.

[Devon Wood]

"Is it hard starting new schools often?"

"Not really... I mean, it doesn't bother me that much," he said with a shrug. Devon made very few friends in school that he would actually miss, so it became pretty easy, dropping everything to pick up somewhere else. Well, maybe it wasn't exactly easy as far as schoolwork went, but it was routine enough. He was just hoping things would slow down by the time his siblings were in high school so they could have some semblance of a normal life.

"Yeah I'm a true blue Manhattan socialite who parties until she's paralytic, does stuff with any boy who comes her way and has a never ending credit card."

"But at least you're honest," he added as a slight joke, smiling. It was probably a bad thing that he couldn't decide whether or not he thought he was telling the truth, but the tone of her voice suggested that it was sarcasm, so he would just take that at face value. After all, if it was the truth, she probably wouldn't have told him.

[Riley Bass]

"I don't reckon i'd be able to cope." She said with a small smile. Riley enjoyed meeting new people but felt most content when she was surrounded by her friends and family, she couldn't imagine life without them. Secretly Riley enjoyed coming to school each day as she loved being surrounded by people, even if she wasn't really close to them.

Riley laughed "For the record i was being sarcastic, i'm not entirely like that, so don't worry i am relatively normal." Riley definitely was a member of one of Manhattan's richest families and had inherited the Bass gene of a love for parties. Yet she liked to think she had various other qualities that helped define who she was. Not just the amount in her trust fund.

Somehow Riley had really taken a liking to Devon, even though they came from different worlds in a weird way she felt like she was able to connect with him. "Most of the stuff you hear is rumors, never forget that." She added, unbuttoning her jacket.

[Devon Wood]

"That's good to know... I'll keep that in mind," he said, nodding. The gossip could be really vicious in these circles. In all honesty, he might've preferred just going to a public school if he didn't know that this was what his mother wanted. It wasn't that he thought there wasn't gossip in the public schools, he just imagined they weren't nearly as involved or inventive when there wasn't as much of the media's influence.

Paparazzi stalkers could not be helpful in the life of a teenager.

He didn't envy them teir lives, but he also didn't think that that was an excuse to be so vicious. Everyone went through hard times... why should they be taken at a higher regard? Because they were spoiled and their parents never taught them not to deal with their problems through tantrums?

Looking around, he said, "It was nice meeting you, but I should probably find my class..." he imagined it was going to take him a little while in a school like this, and he really didn't want to walk in late on his first day.