Page 15 of Isn't She Lucky
“I’m not—” I lower my raised voice again and say more tempered, “I’m not going to jail for you.”
“Nobody’s going to jail. Just marry me.”
“No.”
“Giada—”
“Oh my goodness…is that why you signed up for this auction? You were going to ask the woman who bid on you to marry you. It just so happened to be me.”
“Not exactly. Look—a million is a million. My offer is generous.”
I shake my head. Ain’t this something…
He takes after his people all right! One thing I remember my mom telling me about The Nobles was how they could buy their way out of anything. Everybody with money could. The rich don’t go to jail. They don’t worry about things normalpeople worry about. That’s proof that money rules the world and everything in it.
But it doesn’t rulemyworld. I’ll be broke before I get caught up in some crazy scandal, because when the doodoo hits the fan, it’s me going down for a crime – not him.
I say, “Um, the answer is no, and I’m appalled you would even ask me something like this.”
I stand up, take my purse, and say, “Thank you for dinner. I would say it was nice seeing you again, but I’m not sure about that now.”
“I’ll keep the offer open for a week,” he says.
“Don’t bother.”
“You’re not thinking rationally.”
“Whatever,” I say and walk quickly to get out of there. Dinner started off so promising, but ended like this – with this man trying tobuyme. Do I give off vibes that I’m for sale, because I’m not? Now I know for a fact that I shouldn’t have come to this bachelor auction after all. The next time, the children are getting a direct donation – something that doesn’t require me to be wrapped up in some nonsense with someone I thought I knew who turned out to be nothing but a disappointment.
3.
I didn’t knowhow Giada would react when I floated the idea of marriage, but I didn’t expect she’d get so angry. For one million dollars, any woman would jump at the chance. Of course theoneI wanted would give me a hard time.
Giada Gardner…
Yeah, I knew she would be there at the auction last night. She’s the only reason I signed up. It was a gamble. She could’ve placed a bid on someone else, but somehow, I knew she would bid on me when she realized who I was, and I was right. And she was happy to see me. She wasn’t so happy about being offered money in exchange for a fake marriage. While it may not be ethical, it’s certainly not illegal. People get married for different reasons other than love all the time.
But not Giada…
She needs to reconsider because I’ve been in love with her since we first met as children. She was my first love, I believe. I don’t know how I was able to discern that at such a young age. Maybe it was because I was growing up alone in a fifteen-bedroom home before I met her. My own echo keptme company. I was lonely. I had everything I wanted, but had nothing at the same time.
When her mother came over to do her housecleaning duties, I would watch her work. She’d try to entertain me sometimes, but she couldn’t do that and work at the same time. That’s when she first got the idea to start bringing her daughter.
The moment I saw Giada, I remember smiling. Finally – thank God, finally – I had someone to play with. Someone to talk to. My parents thought private school would put me with the offspring of the wealthy families in our neighborhood, and I’d hit it off with them and grow up with a bunch of friends who had the same things we had. Children who were supposed to be going places. I never felt like I fit in there. I fit with Giada.
When we were EIGHT, Giada taught me how to ride my bike. My parents bought one for me. I’m sure it cost a fortune, but they never had time to show me how to ride it, and what’s interesting about that was, I would take time with them, with us, as a family, over an expensive bike I didn’t know how to ride.
At NINE years old, Giada taught me how to play blackjack. We used to play a lot back then, but as an adult, I haven’t played it once.
When we were TEN, we busied ourselves with playing hide and seek and with a house of that size, sometimes it took a half hour for us to find each other.
When we were ELEVEN, everything started to feel different. I knew I loved being around her, and whenever she wasn’t with me, I felt an emptiness – like a hollow tree that still stood tall, but didn’t produce any leaves. I was dead inside. When we were together, my world began to bloom again.
I was more in my feelings when we were TWELVE. I guess it just came with all the physical, emotional and psychological changes that sprouted with puberty. Though she was a tomboy, I was more aware of her femininity. Her softness. More in tunewith her. I felt nervousness and jealousy. We’d go to the park down the street, and whenever I saw boys trying to talk to her, I’d get jealous. It was also the year we promised to have each other’s backs no matter what.
That all continued when we were THIRTEEN, but we were locked in. I invited her to my eighth-grade dance. She happily accepted, though her mother didn’t seem too thrilled about the idea. Thinking that it was because she probably couldn’t afford a dress, I had my mother buy her one.
When we were FOURTEEN, Ms. Gardner caught us kissing in my bedroom. Well, she didn’t actually catch us in the act, but she could read between the lines. I suppose she saw it in our eyes, or it could’ve been the way we both jumped when the door opened.
