Lucky shifts. “Mountfort High.”
“Yes, but I mean college.”
A tiny beat. Barely perceptible.
“I… didn’t go,” she says.
Charlotte tilts her head, studying her. “And what is it you do again?”
“I write music,” Lucky answers, her voice calm, but I catch the tension in her shoulders.
“You don’t look like a musician,” Charlotte observes, almost clinical. “Except for the leather jacket, giving you a kind of rocker chic aesthetic.”
Lucky exhales a soft laugh, her hands fidgeting in her lap. I notice her thumb brushing over the seam of her sleeve. Small, contained, careful.
Before I can step in, Lily snaps upright, shoulders squared like a tiny guard dog.
“She teaches guitar to kids,” Lily says firmly. “Back in LA. She’s really good.”
Lucky shoots her a grateful look and nods. “Yeah. I… teach sometimes.”
Lily beams.
Charlotte lifts an eyebrow but lets it drop.
Mum, bless her, moves back to Lily. “So, Florida it is! Sorted.”
“It is not sorted,” I mutter.
Lily tugs my sleeve. “Dad.”
Damn it.
I don’t say yes.
But I don’t say no.
And Lucky—quiet, watching—gives Lily a soft smile and gives me a look I can’t quite read.
Approval. Sadness. Understanding. Something in between.
But behind that, another flicker.
A question.
Because now she’s wondering the same thing I’ve been avoiding:
Who exactly is Lucky Vale?
Why did she run?
And why does it matter to me that I don’t know?
The rest of dinner dissolves into exactly the sort of chaos my family thrives on.
Dad gets started on a story about the time he and Mum accidentally crashed a wedding in Tuscany. Mum corrects every detail. Charlotte snipes at both of them with dry commentary, which only she finds amusing. Lily asks ten questions in a row. And Lucky—poor, brave Lucky—keeps getting pulled into the conversation like a small boat caught in a family-sized whirlpool.
She handles it better than I do.
