“Hi,” I say, running my fingers through my brown hair that reaches my shoulders. Poppy tries to pass me a glass, and I shake my head, lightly pushing her hand away. “I’m not drinking.” I tried to get out of this event at least twenty times in the past week, but my mother wouldn’t hear of it. I’d rather not find a reason to ditch my sisters and dance with an eager guy.
“I’ll take it,” Daisy says with a coy smile. She wags her eyebrows.
“No,” the three of us tell her in unison. Even though I withheld the knowledge about the New Year’s debacle from our parents, I had to spill to Rose and Poppy. I expected Daisy to rampage and hate me afterwards for sharing the details of the night, but she acted mature about it. In retrospect, I think keeping the birth control secret has nullified blabbing about being slipped GHB.
“You shouldn’t want to drink ever again after what happened,” Rose tells her.
“Why? Are you going to drug me, Rose?” She gasps, mocking. “My very own sister. The betrayal. The scandal!”
Rose gives her a sharp glare. “I wish you’d be serious about what happened.”
Daisy sighs and slouches, crossing her arms. “I’m never going to drink hunch punch at a party again. Lesson learned.”
“Thank you.” Rose puts the rim of her glass to her red lips.
“You’re so much like Mom, it’s scary.”
Shit. Rose’s solidifies to stone. I see hurt coursing through her, even if no one else can. I don’t think Daisy realizes how much Rose is trying to avoid being like our mother. She fears that path more than any of us.
“So…” I say to break the tension. “…this is fun.” Way to spark a conversation, Lily.
The car bumps along the road towards the Ritz where the event will take place. Fizzle hasn’t created a new soda in five years, so the unveiling is a big deal. My father has even kept the new flavor pretty hush-hush from the media and us. It could be Dragon Fruit Fizz for all I know—which sounds incredibly disgusting.
I make a face.
“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 sudden outburst. 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 good at 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.