When Via and I get into my car, I take out my phone, and there’s a text message waiting for me from Penn.
Talk.
I try to tuck it back into my bag, but Via catches it and lifts an eyebrow.
“I hope it’s not what I think it is,” she says dryly, taking out her (no, my) makeup bag and reapplying her lipstick.
“And what would that be?” I snap, starting to lose my patience.
“If you think you have a shot with my brother, for as long as I have a breath in me, you’re about to be proven otherwise, Lovebug.”
I wish I could rewrite you out of my life
But all your pages are highlighted
Dog-eared and thumbed to death
I can no longer read you
But you are still my favorite poem
That evening, my two public enemies both raise the white flag.
The first one is Mel, who summons all of us in the garage after dinner and after taking Via to the dentist to fix that missing tooth of hers. In the garage is a vehicle clothed in bright pink parked next to Dad’s Tesla. I’m standing with my arms folded. My face suggests a hostile terrorist organization has kidnapped me when Melody, with her fake enthusiasm and mental pompoms, unveils the vehicle and presents it with her arms outstretched like Vanna White on The Wheel of Fortune. It’s a bright pink Hummer Jeep.
“I know we said no presents and no celebrations—you only wanted a party—but I just couldn’t help myself.” Melody squeals and claps her hands. Via and Bailey gush right along with her. Dad and Penn are silent next to me. After the female excitement dies down, and the garage goes silent, I react.
“Wow.” I walk around it, deliberate and placid. “That is horrifyingly ugly.”
I raise my eyes to meet hers, and I’m smirking. I’m smirking because, as it turns out, she doesn’t know me after all. If she thinks she can buy her way into my heart with fancy things, she obviously misread me. Sure, I like my designer collection of dresses, shoes, and bags, and I have expensive tastes—maybe not as expensive as Knight’s, but definitely more upmarket than Vaughn’s and Luna’s—but I don’t need it. Materialistic things don’t excite me. I like them because they’re there and available. Because they’re a calorie-free treat.
Melody’s smile collapses like a straw house in the wind, and she blinks back at me. I think she is about to cry but find it hard to care. She brought my nightmare into my house without even warning me. She made it so perfectly clear that she is not half as impressed with me as she is with my sister.
“I think it’s amazing, Mom.” Bailey rushes to console our mother, hugging her tight. “Don’t worry. It’ll grow on Daria.”
Via looks around and tentatively joins Mel and Bailey, rubbing Mel’s back the same way she did mine this afternoon.
“Yes, Mrs. Followhill. I’m sure she is just shocked.”
“I’m not shocked. I’m a little offended she’d think I’d voluntarily drive this thing. It looks like a giant clitoris.”
Penn bursts out laughing, and Dad reluctantly joins him even though he tries to cover his mouth with his fist. They elbow each other to stop, but it does nothing more than throw them into a rowdier version of hysterics.
Bailey’s eyes widen, and Via somehow manages to fake a blush. Great. I’m uniting them against me. Via must be thrilled. She is probably inwardly dancing the cha-cha.
Mel looks up at me, her eyes glistening. She pays no attention to Via and Bailey, who are fussing around her, but it’s too late. The damage has been done.
“What do you want from me, Daria?” she asks, so quiet I can barely hear her.
“Nothing.”
Everything.
“What can I do to make you happy? To get to you?” The plea in her voice is so shrill, it’s tearing me apart. And for a moment, I actually believe her. Until I remember she put me in a school where she screwed her student, brought me a brooding, angry, hot foster brother, then his even angrier, batshit crazy sister, who is my enemy, then ignored and belittled my existence for four years to a point where, at times, I wondered if I was even real anymore.
“Is my party still on for this weekend?” I pretend not to catch the true meaning of her words. I can’t break down in front of all those people.
“Yes, but that’s not what I…”
“Thanks, Mel! Good luck selling this thing. Don’t they say that a vehicle loses half its worth the minute it rolls off the lot?”
I bounce out of the garage, leaving them behind. I close the door to my room, shoving back the bitterness at not being able to go downstairs to the studio and cry myself to sleep privately because Via’s got the entire place to herself. I fling myself onto my bed, grab my phone, and message Principal Prichard, who is saved under “Prince” on my phone. I have a feeling I’m going back to tri-weekly meetings with him at this rate.