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    “Right, now where is it?” Serena said, turning about her room frantically, her eyes darting back and forth for Christian’s present.

    Serena’s room was a nice one, although it still had the pink, red, and white theme that it had had since she was a small girl, fifteen years ago. Everything was firmly set in its place, and Serena had the tidiest room of any teenage girl on the block. Despite this, she still lost things a lot.

    “Oh, there it is!” Serena said, spotting a small wooden box lying on the coffee table in the middle of her room. She breathed a sigh of relief, ambled over, and picked it up, opening it as she did so.

    Inside was a bracelet made of a silver chain. Attached to one of the links was a small grey charm, shaped like a rain cloud. It bothered Serena that there was only one charm, instead of a more even two, but she figured that Christian wasn’t likely to mind. Besides, it was probably the least of her worries.

    Serena carefully shut the box closed and picked up her bag from the table. She gently placed the present inside, along with her cellphone, notepad, camera, wallet, spare cash, old receipts, chapstick, iPod, keys, and sun tan lotion. After carefully counting over everything twice, Serena concluded that it was good enough, and then slung it over her shoulder, and went out the door, stopping only to kick off the high heels and replace them with grubby white ballerina flats.

    Serena strolled down the hall and down the staircase, ending up in the main room, where her Uncle was watching TV. Serena’s mother had had her illegitimately, and had shortly afterwards died of lung cancer, leaving Serena in the tender care of her Aunt and Uncle. Everybody always felt sorry for Serena when they found out, although Serena felt mainly indifferent about it. She hadn’t really known her mother.

    Serena’s uncle, Mr. Koffler, was very different in appearance to her. He was pale, almost as short as Serena, and built much more gracefully. He had silky, straight, midnight black hair, a beard and a mustache, and thick eyebrows situated above round green eyes. Serena’s aunt always bragged about how she had ‘caught a looker’ although it wasn’t like you could see much of his face beneath his facial hair.

    He briefly glanced up to give her a grunt in place of a ‘Good Morning’ then went back to watching the TV, which was currently playing some sort of soppy romantic drama. Mr. Koffler was taking notes for some reason.

    “What are you doing?” Serena asked curiously. Mr. Koffler shrugged. “Marcel Trippensee and Ji Conery have just started going out, so I’m running their names through a few tests to see if they’re going to stay a couple or break up.” He explained casually.

    “Oh, that’s interesting… How does it work?” Serena asked curiously. She wondered how compatible she and Christian would turn out to be through the test. Naturally they would be highly compatible but…

    “Don’t you have school?” Mr. Koffler said in an irritated tone. “Oh- Right. Maybe you can explain it after I get back from school?” Serena said hopefully, backing towards the front door. Mr. Koffler grunted and scribbled something on a piece of paper, and Serena scurried out the front door.

    The walk to school was uneventful. It was late May, and the weather was finally beginning to warm up. A cruise ship had pulled into the port earlier that week, and the tourists bustled about the downtown area, shivering in their shorts and light T-shirts. Serena’s hometown of Ashhill River was barely out of sweater weather.

    Serena’s high school, Saint Aurelia Secondary, had originally been a wharf and then they’d built the school on top of it. Part of the school was actually over the water, and some of the teachers and students would attempt to go fishing through the windows out back. The school was a very old building at this point, and despite the enthusiastic efforts of the students who’d volunteered, it remained behind on necessary repairs. If it ever collapsed into the river, not many people would be particularly surprised.

    Serena adjusted her bag nervously as she stared up at the school before her, working up the nerve to go inside. School always frustrated her. All of the other teenagers were slobs and the whole school always smelt faintly of low tide. At least Marcia Olivo hadn’t seen her yet…

    “SERA!!!” A shrill voice shrieked at Serena a few feet away from her.

    Serena instinctively skittered away from the source of the voice, but it was too late. Marcia had spotted her, and was dashing over with remarkable haste.

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