[Dedicated to Aria, one of my best writing buddies. Ever since the first Camp NaNoWriMo, I can't ask for a better friend for advice and support. Thank you, boo!]
Carter cleared his throat from above my head as I slouched over the kitchen table, trying my best to concentrate enough to read my summer reading book. I turned my head, not bothering to lift it up, raising my eyebrows although I really just wanted to fall asleep. "What?"
"Please tell me why your two best friends are here," he hissed in my ear, eyes wide with something like trepidation. (He actually felt anxiety over something other than exams...which I supposed was rather normal for a person like Carter.) "They're freaking the fuck out of me."
I blinked slowly. "Why?"
Carter straightened abruptly and began to pace around the kitchen table, almost reminding of our dad whenever he stumbled upon a particularly perplexing case during his medical practice. "But you have to save me from them. They're like" – he waved his hands desperately – "a pair of rabid bunnies!" He bent over on the table again, slamming his hands right next to my nose. "Please, Lottie."
It was so fun to watch him in such a state of dismay, even though it was way too early for my brain to be functioning. It was fucking ten in the morning, for goodness' sake, and I already found it incredibly difficult to blink.
I yawned once again, and my jaw cracked.
Immediately, I flopped my arm over on the table and massaged my chin, feeling it crack again when I pushed it back into its normal position.
"Lottie," Carter whined, now shaking my shoulder rather vigorously, if I had to say so. God, if he shook it a couple more times, it would crack mightily. I held my breath for a second, and then – crack. There it was. Carter recoiled right then, but he still somehow had the audacity to tap the top of my head. "Seriously."
When I pushed myself up from the table with a groan, sending my chair clattering behind me, I plodded my way over to the refrigerator to grab a yogurt container. I turned around, raising my eyebrows as I met my brother, who was basically on his knees at this point. "What?"
"Please don't make me beg." Carter tilted his head to the side with a scrunched nose. I put my hand on my hip. If this wasn't begging, then I wasn't quite sure what he'd been trying to do all this time. He continued, "Okay, I'll even stop making snarky comments whenever you ramble on about that Frank Sinatra musical." He widened his eyes. "Seriously. I'll even admit that I like the Adelaide character."
"So basically" – I reached across the countertop to get myself a spoon – "you're willing to do anything."
He nodded forcefully. "Anything."
So a couple seconds later, I found myself trudging down the main hall of my house with a yogurt container and spoon in hand as I listened to Carter dump all of his life's troubles on me – most of them concerning my apparently "psycho" best friends.
Carter stopped me right next to the one painting we had in the house (of a very fascinating bowl of fruit that must have taken forever to set up since it was rather elaborate) by clamping his hands down on my shoulder. I gingerly turned my head to inspect his hands – if he pushed down any harder, the other shoulder was going to crack.
Crack.
There it was. I shrugged his hands off, putting a spoonful of my yogurt into my mouth. "Spit it out," I blubbered thickly through my mouthful of yogurt.
He sent me a derisive look, probably because some of my yogurt must have made its way on his college t-shirt, before he began talking. "It's Dacey," he hissed. He crossed his arms over his chest. "That girl terrifies me, and you know it."
"Huh." I shifted my weight to the other foot and swallowed my yogurt, scrunching my face a little. I hadn't quite realized that there were chunks of strawberry in there – the company should have mentioned that on the label. Or maybe I should have read the label. "I didn't know that you're afraid of a high schooler, but anyway, continue."
Carter's expression was so flat that it was all I could do to not burst out laughing right there, morning breath and all. (This time, karma bit me on the butt, and Carter had dragged me out of bed without even letting me go through my normal morning hygiene routine.)
"Can you tell me about why she keeps looking at me?" Carter looked around him like he expected to find a wide-eyed Dacey staring down at the two of us from the stairway. If I had to be honest, I'd say that he was suspicious for a good reason. "And is she interested in my college or something? Why does she keep asking me questions about the school campus?"
By this time, Carter's eyes had grown so wide that I could poke it out with a scalpel with ease – if I really wanted to, of course.
"Well, I don't think she's interested in your college." I stuffed another spoonful of yogurt in my mouth before continuing. "But can you figure it out yourself? Because otherwise, I won't tell you."
Carter held up his hands. "Woah, why the harshness? I honestly have no idea, which is exactly I came to consult you."
"Next time, wake me up sometime in the afternoon," I responded matter-of-factly. "And in that case, I'm not going to tell you exactly what's on her mind."
In fact, Dacey had wanted to use me for her confession (in other words, she really wanted me to be straight-forward with my brother and his rather slow brain and to just tell him exactly what was going on in her head). But I was never the type of person to make someone's love life easy. Besides, Dacey had laughed at me with Dom enough times, and this was payback.
"Please," Carter repeated. "I don't even –"
I held up a finger, frowning. "Wait, this is reminding me of something." I bit my lip. "Oh, that's right. You're kind of reminding me of Miss Adelaide."
Carter began to roll his eyes, but he seemed to just remember our arrangement then. "Wait," he said. "You're going to get her to back off of me, right?"
I nodded.
"Fine, shoot." He pretended to shoot a gun at the painting with the bowl of fruit. When I didn't speak for a couple seconds, he turned to me, raising his eyebrows. "Well, didn't you have something to say about Miss Adelaide?"
So now he was begging me to talk about Guys and Dolls? A grin grew on my face. My luck was incredible. "Well, you have a crush on the actress, I think? Miss Adelaide, the long-time girlfriend of Nathan Detroit, who's the badass dude who runs the entire gambling establishment in New York? You remind me of her."
"All right, I just said that she was hot – not that I'm anything like her." Carter rolled his eyes.
"No, kind of." I poked his chest. "Adelaide wanted to get married to Nathan. I mean, the two were engaged for fourteen years. And, like, 'Adelaide's Lament', she, like, reads a book about sickness because she thinks she has a cold from being unmarried too long. How awesome is that?" I paused to gauge my brother's reaction, which was very flat, so I continued.
"You, on the other hand, are lamenting to me about how you can't get someone away from you. And you guys, like, have exactly the same emotions going on." I pulled on his ear affectionately even though, like Dom, Carter was quite a few inches taller than I was. "It's so awesome."
"Don't you dare start squealing." Carter flicked my fingers off his ear and sent me one of his most potent glares, which was rather potent. "And are you implying that Dacey and I have a romantic relationship going on? I swear, that girl is like a tick that keeps holding on." He leaned in closer to me. "And it's fucking creepy."
I put my entire palm on his face and shoved him back. "Ew, get your face away from me, slimeball. Besides, when was the last time you showered?"
When he paused and scratched his head sheepishly, I scrunched my nose at him. "Nasty. Anyway..."
Carter raised his eyebrows at me expectantly. "Well?"
I shrugged. "You'll understand in due time."
That was my way of saying, Oh shit, I'd said way too much. Well, at least if I didn't want to become a full-blown matchmaker. Anyway, I was about as obvious as a bright green slug on an immaculate white tablecloth. If I did become a matchmaker, I would probably take the whole endeavor too seriously and would therefore require someone to rein me in.
Carter let out the longest sigh that I'd ever heard from anyone (including Dom when I tried to explain the gambling culture in Guys and Dolls as we were strolling through Washington D.C.). "Cryptic shit."
And when I thought that our conversation was over and tried to step away from him and his superior height (which he rubbed into my face whenever he got the opportunity, which was pretty often since all the things that I wanted always seemed to be on the top shelf), he blurted out, "Why'd you go to D.C. the other day?"
I coughed. "It's cool. What's up with that?"
Carter scoffed and rolled his eyes. "I'm not stupid. Someone picked you up. And he or she had a pretty sweet ride, if I had to say so." He looked up at our chandelier, biting his lip. "Damn, I hope the kid doesn't crash it."
"Dom Amaro." I sighed myself, glancing to the side. Oh, I was going to get hell for this.
Carter's eyes popped open, even wider than they had been a couple seconds ago like what I had said was the most preposterous thing that he'd heard in his life. "Dom Amaro?"
I said nothing in response but examined the painting behind his head. It was absolutely fascinating. Fruits were so mundane.
My brother broke me out of my observation mode by breaking out into guffaws, gasping for air as he bent over. Disapprovingly, I put my hands on my hips and watched him break down. Thankfully for me, he recovered almost immediately after I thumped his back with my open palm.
"Dominic Amaro?" he gasped out as he stood back up. "The soccer kid? He's rumored to get a scholarship easy; I've heard that my school intends on recruiting him."
"Ew, please don't embarrass me any more by trying to talk him into it." As soon as the words slipped out of my mouth, I had a sudden urge to cover it with both hands – shit, talk about giving out too much information to my dunce of a brother.
Well, he wasn't a dunce if he could figure out everything after hearing a single sentence.
"Why would you be afraid of being embarrassed?" Carter raised his eyebrows. "Did you do something?"
"Um, well." I glanced around me. Where was Dacey when I needed her? If she were here, she would hang on to Carter like she was a leech, and I would be able to run away like a horse recently liberated from its stall. "Dom, uh –"
Carter snapped his fingers right in front of my nose. "That's exactly it. Dom's the dude you've been mooning over since forever." He stopped to examine my countenance. "Am I right?"
Again, I didn't answer, but for some reason, Carter's grin grew. "I'm completely correct. This psychology degree is working."
"Wait, you're a psych major?" I squinted at him. "I thought you were really into engineering or something. Wasn't that the reason you applied to CalTech?"
"CalTech?" Carter rolled his eyes. "You've been so out of touch with all my college application musings, sis. I didn't apply to CalTech; it was the Mercier girl."
When I blinked at him blankly, my brother stared me down like I was indeed the stupidest person that he'd ever encountered. "Not Luc Mercier. He's the rugby dude, right?" Carter continued when I nodded. "She's the dude's cousin. Super smart and super snotty. I'm glad I don't have to look her in the face anymore."
I cleared my throat. "Well, that was absolutely fascinating."
"But anyway, I'm doing a psych major." He leaned back against the wall with a satisfied smirk. "Therapists bring in big money."
"Huh." I looked around us. There was absolutely no sign of Dacey here. What in the world was my brother going on about? "Why are we discussing this?"
Carter snapped again. "Dominic Amaro." He straightened his back, narrowing his eyes at me. "He was the one who took you to D.C.? Didn't you two have a little spat about your stupid musical?" When he caught my annoyed eyes, he continued hurriedly, "Okay, Guys and Dolls isn't stupid, and yes, I do listen to you even though you pulled me up at fucking six am."
"I was fueled with rage," I said and crossed my arms over my chest. "And why are you so disbelieving?"
"Well, from what I heard from Cara," my brother said, shrugging casually, "you can barely talk around the guy without somehow dragging in the musical. And he thinks it's annoying as hell." His smirk grew. "You aren't getting any, sis."
I slugged his arm with as much force as I could and scoffed, putting my yogurt container, which was now lukewarm, in his arm. "Of course I can, and I am going to make progress with him."
Wincing, Carter rubbed his arm and glanced down at my yogurt derisively. He looked like he was going to spit in it, but I kept a wary eye on him and a raised fist. Eventually, he said, without groaning too much, "I don't think you'll be getting into a relationship any time soon. You're..." He scanned my appearance. "Well, you're kinda annoying."
Carter neatly sidestepped to dodge my punch.
"That was uncalled for," I muttered, grabbing my yogurt from him and stuffing a spoonful in my mouth. I really didn't feel like eating any more, but if I wanted to have a productive morning counseling Dacey because she'd hung around this idiot for much too long, I'd have to have some sustenance.
Carter shrugged. "I only tell the truth."
"Get the fuck away from me." Grouchily, I sauntered down the main hallway, not bothering to look behind me to see if my stupid brother was following. Sometimes, he was too mean. But again, he himself wasn't the most well-endowed in the looks department, so I'd be able to poke him back sufficiently later.
After all, I was a pretty evil sister.
(However, I wasn't as evil as Cara, who I imagined would be a terrifying older sister. It was a good thing that her parents didn't provide siblings to bully.)
I heard a couple snickers behind my back as I made my way into the morning room. If I wanted to be the better person, I would sit him down and give him an extremely detailed lecture about why that was a rude thing to do. However, that would probably be rude on my part. So instead, I just ignored him in stony silence.
My brother was such an asshat.
When we both made it to the morning room, standing outside the double doors, I turned to Carter. "Well, since you've dragged me up early, I'm going to make the best of this." I pointed at Dacey, who was reclining on one of my mom's favorite couches like she owned the place. "You coming in?"
I turned to look at Carter, who was shaking his head so adamantly that I was extremely certain that he'd shake off his head in a couple seconds.
So, in response, I reached out, grabbed his arm, stuffed my half-finished yogurt container in his hand, and gave him the flattest look I could manage. "Then shoo. I can only deal with a certain amount of your shit every day."
And with that, I burst into the morning room with the most ostentatious jazz hands I could manage. (I couldn't only imagine what my brother was thinking.) "Hey guys!"
Unfortunately, the entire affair felt rather anticlimactic because the only person who had a reaction was Dacey, who sat up on the couch and crossed her legs neatly. Cara only looked up briefly from her Cosmopolitan magazine, nodding a little in greeting. So, sighing, I plopped myself down in between the two of them.
"What's up?" I said. I grabbed Cara's magazine, to her great (silent) protest and threw it on the coffee table in front of us.
Dacey plastered a grin on her face. "Well, what do you think?"
"Why'd you do that?" griped Cara, who slouched back on the couch.
Sometimes, I felt like our roles were reversed, and I was the one making sure that Cara wasn't the anti-social freak. I tapped her head with my finger. "You spent the whole morning with it already, I bet. Plus, you have to help me."
"Well?" said Dacey into my other ear. I turned to face her, and she continued, her speaking pace speeding up with every word. "I think I totally fucked up; I just pelted him with questions about campus life, and he probably thinks that I just wanna go to his college."
"Aw, that's not true," I responded, frowning to make an appropriate sad face and patting her arm. It was necessary to maintain her happiness, of course, as a good friend. "You're totally cute and everything."
Dacey buried her face in her hands. "Well, you and Dom...I guess at least my relationship with Carter is better than you guys, right?"
I shot her a dirty look. But since she didn't see that, I continued. "About Dom...I need to tell you about how things went in D.C."
Dacey sat up immediately and turned her head toward me, beaming. "Tell me all about it!" On my other side, even Cara perked up a bit with a little hint of an approving smile on her lips. Wow. That was incredible.
I held up a finger. "Well, first, I need to say one last thing about you and my brother."
Both my best friends nodded, raising their eyebrows.
"I think you should go on with the bikini plan."
Cara groaned.
→
Hi everyone!
Thank you for the incredible response I've gotten for Roll the Dice so far. Seriously, I can't even imagine to have you guys as such fantastic readers...but anyway, I'm going to stop rambling on about this sort of thing.
So anyway, no Dom in this chapter, unfortunately, but there's Carter, one of my personal favorites, right? And the gang is present here too... I can tell you guys that Dacey takes her antics to another level very, very soon. Also, because I have no further comments to make about this chapter (comment what you think about everyone though!), I just have to spill to you guys that I just finished up a major #Dottie chapter, and I'm so excited for you guys to see it in a little!
About the song "Adelaide's Lament", I've attached it above. It's a really hilarious song. Basically, the character of Miss Adelaide, the slick Nathan Detroit's fiance, has a rant about how she's getting a cold from being engaged and not married for too long. This entire song is just so witty and funny and full of Adelaide's essence—definitely one of my all-time favorites. (In the video, I tried to skip to the part where she actually starts singing, but if it doesn't work, just watch the entire thing for more context. For just the entire song, skip to 5:34.) Check it out!
Again, I'll have the date of the next upload in my bio very soon, and see you guys then!
Anne xo