Page 97 of Sour Lollipops and Sweet Nightmares
I ducked and slapped her hand away. “Get those away from me.”
“Oh, calm down,” she said. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m just curling your eyelashes.”
With those things? No way. I had already stuck my finger in my eyes to put in contacts, which I only had for lab work, and that was only because contacts were cheaper than prescription safety glasses. Nothing else was going near my eyes.
“Keep that torture device away from me.” I was perfectly happy with my straight eyelashes.
“Oh my god, you’re such a drama queen,”
I was not a drama queen, but I was happy when she dropped the eyelash torture device into her purse.
“Well, come on.” Rachel stood and waved at me to follow. “Let’s go party.”
While I was ecstatic to be done with my unwanted makeover, I was dreading this party. Not only did I have no clue about what to expect or proper party etiquette, but I also did not want to be around that many people.
The last party I attended was for a girl named Lacy’s birthday, which my stepdad took me to. The cake was horrible, the bouncy house deflated, and the sweet odor in the basement clung to me for months. To this day, sour apple lollipops made me nauseous.
Sighing, I got up and shuffled out the bedroom door. When I passed by the mirror in the hall, I froze.
The girl staring back at me looked like… a girl. The glimmering sheen on my eyelids made my eyes look bigger. The same sheen swept up my cheeks, highlighting the light blush underneath, and my lips somehow looked fuller than they were. I looked good, and I didn’t like it.
“I can’t go out like this.” I shook my head. “This is too much, I need to?—”
“Nope,” Rachel grabbed my hand.
“Okay, but…” I looked back at the comfort of my house as she pulled me out the door. “I should at least…”
“No, you shouldn’t,” she cut me off.
“You don’t know what I was going to say.”
“You were going to wash your face.”
Well, pin a rose on her nose.
The thought of anyone seeing me like this terrified me. “What if I’m allergic?”
“You’re not.”
“But I might be.”
“But you’re not. Now come on.” She looped her arm in mine. “You are going to have fun for once in your life.”
“I have fun.” Baking cookies and watching documentaries was fun.
“Spending time in the library is not fun.”
Says her.
“You need to learn to relax and let go.”
I was trying, but she had a tight grip on my arm. “Taking me to a house full of people is not going to make me relax.”
The thought of all those eyes watching me had my heart thumping against my ribs, and that was before we walked up to the house with music blaring out from the windows. The Greek letters above the door made my heart stop altogether.
Alpha, Lambda, Theta.
Georgia
