Page 49 of One More Made Up Love Song
“How did this even work?” she asks, reaching for the phone. “Did the hotel staff just go buy one for you? They do crap like that?”
“People will do anything when there are enough dollar signs attached,” I say. I sit down on the foot of the bed and face her. “So I was thinking, to repay me?—”
“You mean Freddie,” she says saucily.
“To repay Freddie,” I say, amending my statement, “do you want to tell me how you wound up with Margot in the first place?”
She sighs and sets her latte on the nightstand before leaning back on her pillows, her unopened iPhone resting on her chest. “She texted me,” she finally says. “Offered to buy my plane ticket. She even sent a driver to pick me up at the house and drive me to the airport.”
I stare at her for a long moment before asking, “Honey, why didn’t you tell me?” I put all my effort into keeping my tone gentle instead of judgmental. “This is Margot we’re talking about.”
“That’s exactly why I didn’t tell you,” she says. “Because I knew that’s what you’d say. She was offering me a summer in her Malibu beach house. Who says no to that?”
“Mom said she got the sense you were running from something. She thought maybe it was the fruitless job hunting.”
Carina rolls her eyes. “Geez, it’s only been two months. And it hasn’t been entirely fruitless. I have an interview in a couple of weeks.”
I lift my eyebrows. “That you still would have gone to had I left you in Malibu?”
She doesn’t answer, but the shifty look that crosses over her expression tells me everything I need to know.
“You know you can be honest with me,” I say, and she gives her head a tiny shake. Like she thinks maybe shecan’tbe.
I reach forward and squeeze her ankle through the comforter covering the bed.
“I know it probably feels stressful just living with Mom and Dad, not knowing what you’re going to do next. And I even get wanting to get away for a little while, though Ireallywish you hadn’t chosen Margot. But…” I hesitate, because I don’t know how to say what I want to say without it sounding like I’m judging my sister, and that isn’t what I’m trying to do.
“But you wish I hadn’t been drinking?” Carina says, finishing for me, and I breathe out a sigh, relieved that she said the words for me.
“It was hard to see you like that,” I say.
She holds my gaze for a long moment, and something passes between us, some sisterly awareness that says far more than anything our words could cover. Carina’s expressionsoftens, and for a split second, it almost feels like Daphne is in the room with us—a whisper of air brushing against my cheek, an extra beat of blood pumping through my heart.
The logical side of me knows it’s possible to drink responsibly. But the emotional side can’t separate the smell of alcohol from the sound of the sirens responding to the scene of Daphne’s accident.
“I know,” Carina says, her voice small. “I knew you’d be disappointed. But…” She takes a deep breath. “Ivy, this wasn’t the first time I’ve had a drink.”
My heart squeezes tighter than I expect at her admission. I don’t want it to matter. Carina is twenty-one. She’s entitled to make her own decisions. I always knew she might drink, and I’ve told myself I wouldn’t judge her if she did.
But then, it’s never been about judgment. It’s been about fear.
I already lost one sister.
I can’t lose another.
And any choice she makes that increases her risk even a little bit is a choice I don’t want her to make.
“Okay,” I manage to say. “I guess that’s…”
I press my palms into my thighs, wishing I knew how to finish my sentence. Maybe I’m just drained from everything that happened with Freddie, but I feel completely incapable of processing my emotions. I definitely can’t turn them into words.
“I didn’t make good choices with Margot,” Carina says. “I’ll own that. I let her celebrity and her money go to my head. But I might still have a cocktail with my friends every once in a while. And I feel like Daphne would be okay with that.”
It takes me a long time to look up to meet my sister’s eyes. When I do, they’re wide and clear, her expression calm. Carina has always been my baby sister—someone I have to protect. Keep safe. But now, she looks all grown up. Like an adult.
Still, I can’t keep my voice from cracking when I say, “But you promised.”
“I know,” she says. “And I’m glad I did. I didn’t touch the stuff through all of high school, and trust me, I had so many opportunities. You did such a good job of making the world safe for me.” She sits up a little bit and reaches for my hand, giving it a quick squeeze. “But sometimes, it feels like staying in that box, it’s…keeping me from actually living.”
