Page 23 of Surviving You, Scotch and Sammy 1

“Oh.” She carelessly flicks her hand in the air between us. “Call me Meg. My dad’s weird about that, but what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

“Umm…”

“So…” She bounces her brows. “Is he cute?”

“Who? Your dad?”

She snickers. “No. You freak. I meant the guy you’re pretending not to text.”

“I’m not texting anyone.”

She winks obnoxiously. “Okay. So, this guy you’re not texting… Is he hot?”

“Megan--”

“Meg.” She repeats. “Please, for the love of god, call me Meg. My dad named me after my mom, cause I killed her from the womb, and now I’m the new her. I don’t hate my name, but I hate the pressure to be someone I’m not.”

“Your mom died when you were a baby?”

Why did I even ask that? Apart from the fact it’s insanely rude and inappropriate, I thought I wasn’t making friends with her. Why ask something so personal if she’s not even my friend? “Jesus, Meg. I’m sorry--”

She brushes me off again, then she turns and continues walking. “Yeah, she had an aneurysm when she was giving birth. Guess my fat head wouldn’t move the way it was supposed to.”

I grab her forearm with my right hand, even as my left hand vibrates with new texts. “You don’t blame yourself, right? You were just a baby.”

She scoffs. “No, I don’t blame myself. It was just one of those things. Shitty luck. Bad timing. Her timing. The universe spoke. Whatever. No, it wasn’t my fault, but, my dad sure wishes she was still around.”

“It must be hard to lose your wife so unexpectedly.”

She shrugs casually as we continue to walk. We approach the edge of the sidewalk, step into the quiet street and cross over. “He definitely struggles. Even now. It’s been almost eighteen years, and he still talks to her picture at bedtime every night.”

“Jesus.” My stomach hurts at the very thought. “That’s awful.”

We step onto the pavement on the other side of the street, then she turns and smirks at me. She doesn’t look fourteen anymore – her eyes are different. Her smirk is pure mischief. “You’re definitely a lawyer’s daughter though.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I asked you about the boy you’re not texting, and you deflected like a pro. Instead you got my life story. I know you probably think I’ll snitch, but I won’t.”

“I don’t think you’d snitch.” I’m a big fat liar.

She continues to smirk, but she doesn’t call my lie. “Girls like me and you – we have to look out for each other. If your daddy’s anything like mine, you and I could actually have an amazing friendship.”

I frown. “How so?”

“As in, your daddy thinks you’re an angel. My daddy think’s I’m an angel. Put us together, and they won’t say no to a single thing. They’ll never question us.”

“This sounds like a prequel to us both getting arrested.”

She laughs. “No. I don’t mean like that. I just mean, if we have each other’s backs, we might find just a tiny bit more freedom in our ridiculously strict lives. So…”

“So what?”

“Your phone keeps vibrating. You gonna answer it?”

My eyes snap down to my ringing phone, and my belly drops. Answer it and let her know about Sam? Ignore it, and let Sam freak about why I suddenly went missing? What if she’s full of it? What if she throws me under the bus?

I have less than a year left here. Not that long until I turn eighteen. If she snitches, I guess it’s not the end of the world. Just a sneaky senior year…

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