Just 6 years after finishing uni, Claire landed a job in marketing that paid just enough to afford the rent on a one-bedroom shithole with views of the scenic Mitchell Freeway – the millennial dream.
She had freed herself from her suburban cocoon and was now living a hip, inner-city chic-style that she decided was very much her new “brand”. A brand that she worked very hard to shove down her friend’s gullets.
It wasn’t always like that though. Her past experience with Leedy was very much a place for vomiting up half-priced Siena’s pasta on a Wednesday night while cage dancing at the old Leedy Hotel.
Nevertheless, people can change and change she did. After just 6 months of living in Leedy, her perceived tastes have changed. She no longer watches movies like a pleb, she wears a beret to Lunar and takes in “films”.
She is now a self-professed conti roll expert after going to Re Store twice. This is despite embracing inner-city vegetarianism so her conti rolls are pretty bloody sad. It should be noted this vegetarianism goes out of the window after approximately 6 Aperol Spritzes.
She no longer sticks her snout in the Coles produce trough with all the other bargain-hunting swine – she leeches off her friend’s lot in the West Leederville Community Gardens.
In fact, she is truly blessed to have found one of the few people in Perth who are a little social media-shy when it comes to what they’ve grown.
This gives Claire an excellent opportunity to post the veges her friend grew on Instagram and if her followers erroneously believe that she grew them herself then so be it. She’s not in the business of dispelling such myths.
Alas, there is trouble in paradise. Instead of installing air conditioning and security lighting to stem the build-up of used syringes in her apartment complex, she has been slugged with a $40pw increase.
This is way too much adulting for one day so she does what any good millennial would do when faced with life-stress and decides to smash an emotional bottomless brunch with the girls.
She dresses in the finest garbs Afterpay could offer her and she hit Oxford St like a gal on a mission. She does her best to turn heads but it’s surprisingly difficult to look sexy when you’re engrossed in the wafting aroma of public urination from the night before.
It isn’t long until her finely chiselled inner-city image is eroded in a sea of Prosecco. Bottomless brunch turns into boozy lunch and boozy lunch turns into threatening to report an Uber driver to immigration if he dares charge her the cleaning fee for her little parting present.
She has truly come full circle.
Documenting the Human Zoo is thirsty work, so if you enjoyed what you read how about buying Belle a beer, ay?