“You should leave me alone.” They were toss-away words, empty of meaning and substance, meant for me to cast him off like secondhand shoes that never fit.
I reached for him again. “We have something here. Don’t tell me you didn’t feel what I did when you kissed me.”
Liam turned. Stared right at me. “Don’t worry about me. I’m used to being second best.”
He shoved his hands in his pockets and disappeared into the crowd.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
I barely had time to process the previous night when my phone vibrated against the nightstand, waking me up. Five texts.
Maya: OMG last night was crazy!
Desiree: ’Sup girl?
Maya: Srsly. Strike on all Laurentis. Call me.
Ethan: Please don’t hate me. I never meant to hurt you.
Number Unknown: This is Sara. You made the gossip pages!
Ok an unnamed mention at the end of twenty-pic slideshow online article but I got you girl!
The Laurentis were trouble. Even Liam. He was hurt and lashed out at me. His problems with his brother were not my issues. His daddy drama was also not my issue. It was a good thing school started soon. I could spend my days in school and fill my free time with activities off the estate.
A knock sounded at my door. “Mila?”
Abuelita edged in, hanging in the doorway instead of her usual barge-through.
“What?” I said through my pillow, which covered my face. Like old times.
“I think you should go over to the house. Straighten things out with the boys.”
I yanked the pillow free. “Why do I need to fix their problems? Why is it up to me to straighten things out? No. Nope. Not going.” I grabbed my phone and tapped up RunwayGirl12 and frantically Liked a bunch of photos. Ugh, my user icon. I’d changed it to the one Liam made me. I’d have to delete that. Forever.
“Amelia. Sometimes you need to be the bigger person,” she said, and quietly left.
Um, no. I didn’t need to be the bigger person. Mami would understand. She was always going on about the Laurentis having everything and being super privileged.
After a few minutes stewing, I left my safe cave, but Mami wasn’t home to reassure me. Only Abuelita reading her People magazine.
I returned to my room as another text came in. Amy.
Amy. How could I be the bigger person when I’d never sent that apology e-mail? Abuelita thought I should settle things with the Laurentis when I had my own unresolved issues I’d actually caused. I clicked on my laptop and sifted through my draft e-mails. I read over the message and added a few more lines. Send.
I waited for the awesome feeling to settle in. I did the right thing! Funny, I didn’t feel any lighter. Amy might not talk to me again. I read her text a few times and typed a response. Check your e-mail. We can talk if you want.
I threw on clothes, trying not to dwell on the absence of any messages from Liam. I made a quick stop at the bathroom to ensure my hair wasn’t a total disaster (it was) and bolted across the lawn to the estate.
The cameras were set up in the atrium overlooking the backyard gardens. Ethan, surrounded by a small crew. Instead of his typical swagger, Ethan appeared deflated, like his charm had a flat tire.
“Describe how you felt when Haylo broke up with you,” a producer asked.
A few seconds passed. “It sucked. Haylo, she’s a cool girl. Beautiful, fun. I don’t know what happened. I’ve been trying to figure that out.”
His stare switched focus to an image only he could see. Unanswered questions and longing filled that stare. He was straight-up hung up on Haylo. I never stood a chance.
He noticed me. “Amelia. I’m so glad you’re here.” He stumbled across the room. “Last night was a mess.”
“Cut!” The producer turned on me. “We’re shooting here. You can’t interrupt.”
“She’s the other girl from yesterday,” the director said. “We need to fill in some story gaps.”
“It’s the stylist girl,” the producer snapped her fingers at the camera operator. “Amber? Is that your name? She’s in enough footage to get a B story. Let’s get this girl in hair and makeup.”
“No,” I told her. “I’m not part of your, your B story. I came here …” Why had I come here? The only person I wanted to talk to was Liam. He was smart enough to hide from the freak show.
“She’s the daughter of the house staff,” a guy with dark hair told the producer. He looked familiar, but I didn’t know his name. “Could be a real angle there.”
“Other side of the tracks. Rags to riches.” The producer’s eyes glazed over.
My spine went rigid. The camera’s lens zoomed in, slow and menacing.
“Forget about them,” Ethan’s voice cut through my hesitation. “Just tell me you don’t hate me.”
A microphone sneaked into view overhead, silently absorbing my thoughts. “I kind of missed the part where you apologized,” I said to Ethan. “For what you said about Liam running to the help.”
“I just said that to piss off my brother.”
“But, what you said matters. What you said was inconsiderate and rude and made me feel like I’m not valued.”
It seemed to take him a minute to realize other people’s feelings had been involved. “I didn’t mean it.”
“Look,” I said. “Let’s stop pretending you and I have anything in common, because we don’t.” A harsh truth, but truth. “I’ve watched you long enough to know you don’t hang around the same girl for long. God only knows how many other girls are lining up right now to be with you.”
Bless his heart, he actually looked around for a second.
I took a breath. “You’ve been my crush for as long as I can remember.” This was like talking through a mouthful of food I couldn’t swallow. “Liking you was safe, I guess, because it wasn’t real. When it became real, well, I think you liked how much I flattered you, and … adored you.” I grit my teeth. “Haylo doesn’t act that way, but it doesn’t mean she doesn’t care.”
“Let’s move this shoot to the next room—we’ll have more control of the lighting,” the director said.
“What do you think you’re doing filming my daughter?” Mami’s voice echoed against the marble floors. “You.” Mami pointed at the dark-haired guy, whose hands flew up in a defensive gesture. “You told me you would keep her away from the cameras!” Everything after that was a tsunami of Spanish insults and curses. Words reserved for rare occasions, like when my dad called.
So, that was Alex.
While I still had a moment, I yanked Ethan aside. “Please. Tell Haylo how you feel. She likes you. She’s only stepped aside all this time because she thought you wanted to be friends.”
“And Liam. You really like him?” He shuffled back a step. “Makes sense. I could see it happening, I just thought maybe …”
Maybe I’d choose him, anyway. Of course. Ethan had never been second choice. Ever.
Mami appeared, anger venting off her like a furnace. “Mila, we are leaving. No one is taking our lives and producing it for television.” She pulled at my arm. “We are over!” she called out to Alex, then pointed at Ethan. “Stay clear of my daughter, and especially of me.”
At home, Mami stomped through the house. A drawer slammed. And another.
“It’s time. Finally time.” She was muttering, pulling out papers. She booted up her clunky desktop computer. “You and me. Out of here. Gone from this apartment, and this crummy job.”
Every hair on my scalp stood at attention. “Wait, what? What are you talking about?”
“Your ’buela’s been saying for years that I need to move on. I’m stuck. I haven’t done jack with my life. Look at all we’ve given them, and they throw this back in our faces.” Her fingers flew across the keyboard.
“They who? The Laurentis? They had nothing to do with filming me for the show. Fine, be mad at your boyfriend, but don’t blame the Laurentis.”
“Mila.” My
mother looked up, impatience and pity competing for top billing in her expression. “If it wasn’t for the Laurentis, neither of us would be in this situation. These men trying to control us, trying to run our lives. Using us.”
“Alex isn’t Dad. He was just doing his job.”
“Don’t make excuses for him. And especially not for Ethan. If he can’t see how wonderful you are, it’s his own loss.” She gave me her Look, the lecture look, but she was too preoccupied to expand further. “We’re moving to our own apartment. I’m giving my two weeks and I’ll take on full-time work with the caterers.”
The floor quaked underneath me. “Hold up, moving? Aren’t you overreacting?” I reached for the couch arm and lowered myself down. “You’ve got the Ethan thing all wrong. I told him he needs to be with Haylo. Liam is the one who …” I wanted to be with. Who no longer wanted to be with me.
“Letting you become so close to that family was a mistake. We should be closer to our own. My sister said a place is for lease by them. We’ll be near your cousins.”
My heart beat triple time. “Seriously, can we scale this back? There’s no reason to jump ship just because you’re mad.”
She pushed her chair back from the desk. “This,” she flipped a hand toward the room, “was supposed to be temporary. I never meant for you to live in staff quarters your whole life. This arrangement was only until I got on my feet.” She closed her eyes, as if her shortcomings played in a video montage. “If I don’t ever take a chance, why would you?” She sat on the couch next to me and pulled me into her with one arm. “My Mila. This whole mom thing. I never feel like I’m doing anything right.”
We stayed like that for a while, both of us needing to calm down.
“You like Liam, don’t you?” she asked.
“Yes.”
Liam wrote me off, though. He thought I saw him as second best. He gave up on us before there even was an us.
“Maybe you’re right,” I said. This apartment, cozy but a tight fit for three, set on a beautiful property, but one we didn’t own. If the Laurentis were the solar system, we were the moons revolving around their planets, orbiting their lives and never forging our own trajectory. “Maybe we could use a change.”
She perked up a little. “You’d stay in the same school. We’d live only a few miles from here. Closer to Maya.”
“What about Abuelita?”
She smoothed my hair down. “You let me handle her.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
“How can I set the table with papers everywhere?”
“How about it’s not your house, so put your feet up for once?”
That smart remark came from my cousin Mateo to Abuelita, who insisted on taking control of our housewarming party.
Abuelita swatted him with one of Mami’s business flyers. Blanco & Ramos Event Specialists would cater to business meetings and local events. Their launch was next month!
“Stop with the table setting,” Mami said to Abuelita. “This is casual. No one wants to sit at the table.” I could see the pride in Abuelita’s eyes at Mami bossing her around about her own house. I secretly thought she agitated my mother on purpose.
Our own house. A rental, but still. A whole, real house. A ranch with three bedrooms, a full kitchen, and a screened-in sunroom looking over our own little yard. We were a fifteen-minute drive from Abuelita, who now had our old apartment to herself.
“Welcome to the neighborhood!” Maya, her parents, and younger brothers tumbled through the door carrying armloads of food.
We’d moved in last month, but this was our first free weekend with school events picking up and Mami working to get her catering business in order. Almost two months away from the Laurenti estate.
Our friends and family raised glasses, cans, and kiddie cups in celebration.
At the first opportunity, Maya, my cousins, and I split off from the adults to hang out in my room.
“I’m basically an expert at costuming milkmaids,” I explained to my cousin, whose family drove down from Fort Lauderdale. “Half the Fiddler on the Roof cast are freaking milkmaids.” Milkmaid or not, I loved having an outlet for my sewing with the school musical.
“Don’t forget reality TV,” Mateo said. “Y’all are going to be stars!”
“No, we’re not,” Maya said, and changed the subject.
Maya was all about cutting the Laurentis off for good. The Laurentis were into themselves and their own lives. We really were better off without them. Mami had shown me that. Ethan and Haylo were together, and by now I was sure the UFit app was being pilot tested in the department store. Liam didn’t have to worry over me. We were all where we needed to be.
Mateo, who couldn’t sit still, poked at the various projects on my sewing table. “Come on, you’re really not going to watch?”
“I’m sure they cut us out, anyway,” I said.
Everyone in my family knew of Mami’s drama breaking up with Alex over the reality show. Only they didn’t know how Gigi Laurenti and Haylo had worked together to make sure the producers made right on their exploitation. (Mami’s word, “exploitation.” I was convinced my scrap of a story line with Ethan and Haylo was too inconsequential to make it into the final edit.) Either way, we had some nice cash flow thanks to a parting gift from the Laurentis and please-don’t-sue-us-for-filming-your-underage-daughter hush money from the reality show. It was true—connections mattered.
“You mean to tell me you guys planned this party the same night Savings and Lohman’s comes on and you’re not going to turn on the TV?”
The room quieted for a beat before Maya’s siblings and the younger cousins tore through the hall laughing and screaming, followed by Maya’s father hollering that the kids go outside.
Despite my better judgment, I pulled up the show on my laptop where it live streamed the same time as cable. I had my crew with me, sprawled out on my bedroom floor. Everything would be fine.
The first part of the episode involved Mrs. Lohman meeting with Miami socialites, and Pru and Fayth bickering. Pretty much the standard drama you could see on ten different channels. The story shifted to Haylo and Ethan. Watching Ethan on TV wasn’t much different than watching him from a doorway or my window. Only now I didn’t feel the pull toward him. It dulled to almost nothing—a memory.
Haylo was shown questioning her relationship with Ethan. The weird part was, the show set them up as already dating so they could force a breakup, but Haylo’s questioning came off genuine. On screen they laughed and bumped against each other in all these cute accidental ways. They really did belong together.
After a commercial break, the show picked up with the Welcome to Miami party. Of course they’d show that during the first episode.
“Look! That’s me!” Maya made us pause and rewind to see the side of her head in a crowd shot.
In an amazing move of editing, Ethan had a “fight” with the hot Ivy League brochure guy (who was an actor, obviously) and Ethan ended up with a fat lip that way instead of a punch by Liam. The fight had been over Haylo. After commercials, the scene shifted to the following day, where Ethan filmed the confessional about breaking up with Haylo.
Mateo sat up on his knees. “Is that you, Amelia?”
It was the back of me for a quick flash. I recognized my hair and the shirt I’d worn that day. The scene moved to Ethan saying “Tell me you don’t hate me,” words he’d said to me, but the editing switched it to Haylo, who returned a response.
“That isn’t even how it went down,” Maya said, who knew the truth about everything.
“Wait.” I hit Pause and rewound. Was that? In the background stood another figure, shadowed in the doorway.
Liam. He’d been there watching the scene unfold—the real one with me in it, not with Haylo. His face told me there was no way he didn’t care. “Stricken,” was the word. Crushed.
“Don’t do this to yourself,” Maya said.
But I couldn’t stop staring at Liam. Hearing empty words sourced
from hurt was one thing. Faces didn’t lie.
Two weeks later, I loaded up the car with weekend getaway essentials (yes, there was an inspiration board). Maya and I together with our moms planned to leave for Marco Island for a few days away.
Since Mami had a client meeting she couldn’t cancel, Maya offered that we meet her and leave directly from the meeting. All fine and good in the ’hood as far as I was concerned. I had a new sun hat to road test.
Maya insisted we go inside to wait. Fall or not, it was hot outside. Maya checked at the desk and the staff pointed us toward a ballroom. Even if I could go to the beach in Miami, Marco Island was on the gulf, a different experience. I hadn’t been on a road trip in ages.
“You go first,” Maya said.
I opened the ballroom door.
“SURPRISE!”
A balloon archway opened up to familiar faces. Faces with huge smiles. Faces ready to party.
“Feliz cumpleaños, Amelia!” Mami said, clapping.
Maya pulled me into a hug. “Happy birthday, girl! Sorry for lying to your face.”
“Um, you guys. My birthday was six months ago.” Then I read the sign. Happy Half Birthday: 16 & 1/2!
I laughed. “Really? A half-birthday party?”
“Your last two birthdays were less than awesome,” Maya reminded. “But you are not. We couldn’t wait another six months.”
Standing next to Maya—Desiree. “Des? Ahhh!” I threw my arms around her. She looked fantastic in a long maxi skirt in sunset colors. She had Miami chic down.
“Oh my gosh, Amy!” I hugged her next. Amy’s petite frame was decked out with layers of colorful tank tops, beaded jewelry, and clear plastic platforms.
Slowly, we’d picked up our friendship, emailing and video chatting with Des, the three of us. Now she’d come all this way for me.
“I can’t believe you’re here.” I fanned myself with a brochure about a dolphin eco tour, which I clearly wouldn’t be needing this weekend.
“I’m checking out the University of Miami,” Amy said. “My parents couldn’t say no to a college trip.”
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