𝐜𝐫𝐮𝐞𝐥 𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐞𝐫, 𝐣𝐣 𝐦𝐚𝐲𝐛𝐚𝐧𝐤

𝐞𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭

"You're not dressed?" wheezie asks as her and claire walk into the kitchen to see sarah in her normal clothes.

"No, I'm not going." sarah mumbled and turned her phone off. claire scoffed loudly at this and turned away.

"I mean, it's Midsummers. You've been talking about Midsummers since last year." wheezie told sarah.

"You have a date, remember?" claire put an emphasis on 'date'

"Yes, I remember." sarah says slowly, not understanding what's wrong with her twin. just then, rose walks in the room in her pink dress.

"Sarah says she's not going." wheezie tells the woman.

"The hell she isn't." rose chuckles, "Your father is being coronated as Guardian of Knights of the Rhododendron. You're going." rose says.

"You're not my mother, I don't have to do what you tell me." sarah sneers.

"Whatever. Your daughter says she's not going." rose tells her husband as he walks into the kitchen.

"She's off Topper, JoJo." wheezie says.

"Wheezie, please. Go." he motions for the younger girl to leave.

"What's goin' on?" ward asks his oldest daughter.

"I just... don't feel like Topper is my splinter bean." she says.

claire rolls her eyes at this and scoffs again.

"I don't know exactly what that means, but it sounds to me like you should probably dump his ass, maybe, huh?" ward told her and gave claire a confused look as to why she scoffed.

"Probably should've done that a while ago." claire said.

"Maybe you could, I don't know..." ward trailed off.

"I just don't want to go with him." sarah groaned.

"I know, I know. What if you just paste on a smile and you go, and we have a good time, all right? and you deal with your love life mañana? and you can deal with whatever problems you have." ward said to his girls.

"Please."

he walked out of the kitchen and sarah swung around to look at claire.

"what is your deal?" she asked.

"my deal? oh yeah. the guy that i think im in love with, just got arrested, my other best friend went missing for two and a half days, and my sister? went completely mia for two and a half days and didn't give me a warning, lied to dad about staying at scarlet's which you couldn't even have done because she's currently not on the island. that's my deal." claire told sarah.

"look im sorry-"

"don't even say you're sorry. i added things up. you and john b both go missing, for the same exact amount of time. coincidence? probably not. my guess is y'all were together. am i right or am i right?" claire asked.

"okay, i was with john b in chapel hill. but it was because he was on this treasure hunt for this ship." sarah told claire.

"oh so he told you everything." claire scoffed and walked away.

to say the car ride to midsummers was awkward would be an understatement. you could cut the tension with a knife. claire couldn't wait to get out of the car. between everything that had happened lately, she was frustrated. she honestly did not want to go to this event tonight but she did to make her father happy.

"i have one request." ward spoke up as they pulled into the club. all the kids looked at him waiting for him to continue.

"behave." he said.