“What?” Poppy says with a short laugh. My oldest sister looks like a California native with a golden tan year-round. A fish-tail braid lies against her shoulder. “You look like Maria when I try to dress her in pants.” Her three-year-old daughter is a mini-fashionista. It’s kind of frightening.
I share her smile—about to tell her my thought.
“No, no, no!” Rose shouts, typing furiously in her phone. “I cannot believe this.”
My stomach knots, hoping, praying that her outburst has nothing to do with me.
Daisy pops a piece of gum in her mouth and offers it to the rest of us, as though Rose did not just have a suddenoutburst. I suppose she’s overly dramatic a lot. We kinda all are. I take a piece, but Poppy shakes her head.
“What is it?” Poppy asks.
Rose puts her hand to her forehead and then glares at the window. “Our mother has taken it upon herself to wrangle us dates for the evening.”
I choke on my gum and start coughing.
Daisy groans. “Not really.”
Poppy pats my back, but I seriously think I inhaled the gum straight into my lungs.
“She does this every time we go out. It shouldn’t be that surprising,” Poppy exclaims, putting the rim of her champagne glass beneath my lips, “mothering” me. Gratefully, I take a small sip, the bubbles tingling my throat.
“I specifically told her that Lily doesn’t want to be seen with another man while Lo is in rehab.”
I slump in my seat and put my hand to my forehead, shielding my eyes. This is not good. This is not goodat all. “Who did she call?” I ask Rose. This has happened before. Only, I wasn’t in a relationship with Lo. I would actually fuck whoever my mother picked for me at the end of the night. What if she called someone I’ve already slept with? The bottom of my stomach drops.
“I don’t know,” Rose says, pounding her fingers on her phone’s screen, texting our mother rapidly. “She won’t tell me.”
Daisy blows a bubble and it pops against her face. “I don’t see what the big deal is,” she says, using her tongue to bring the gum back in her mouth. “I mean, it sucks, yeah, but Lo isn’t here, and it’s just for appearances. Plus, you can always ditch him. Mom set me up with Adam Colefinger last year.” She grimaces. “He smelled like he showered in Axe. I was about to hurl the whole night, so I took Mom’s perfume and doused myself in it to give him a taste of his own medicine.” She nods proudly.
Rose kicks Daisy’s leg. “You’re forgetting the part where he threw up on your heels.”
“That’s the price you have to pay for retribution.”
Poppy holds up her hands before the tension rips all of us in half and explodes. Rose is seething enough to cause a category five tornado. I just want to disintegrate and flutter away.
“There’s nothing to worry about,” Poppy tells all of us.
I exchange a hesitant glance with Rose.Nothing to worry about?There is a huge possibility that this guy is one I’ve met—that he’s back for round two. What if he’s expecting Lily 1.0: the girl who dragged guys into the bathroom and drowned them in pleasure? What then?
I put my head between my knees, trying to breathe normally.
Wait for me, Lo said.
I’m trying! God, I’m trying. I wish everyone could see that.
It’s not so easy when my whole family believes my only problem surrounds Lo’s absence. They only understand his addiction, and I know—deep in my heart—that they’ll never understand mine.
Rose dials a number and rests the phone to her ear “Mother?—”
My mother’s high-pitched voice cuts through the receiver. “Don’t you dare argue with me, Rose!” I raise my head and see Rose holding the receiver away from her ear. “I have done so much for you in the past week. And I ask you to do one thing,one thing, and you put up a fight! Can’t you do something for me without disagreeing? Is that at all possible?!”
Her screaming rakes my insides like nails bloodying my back.
Rose inhales deeply through her nose, taking a calculated, measured breath. A perk to being completely off my mother’s radar—I never have to deal with her coarse personality. She can be in your corner one second and then completely victimize herself the next just to guilt you.
“Let us pick our own dates then,” Rose says. “I can call Ryke to come escort Lily. He’ll be happy to be there.”Happy?That is a very strong adjective.
Daisy crawls over the seat to pick up a remote. “Don’t torture the guy.”
