Page 20 of Grease Monkey
“Hi, Morgana.” Sadie waves from the porch, her smile beaming as her husband slinks behind her, wrapping his arm around her waist and hauling her to his chest.
“Good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Grant,” I say, darting down the stairs without making eye contact with Miles. After avoiding that family for the past week, you’d have thought the embarrassment of being caught in a compromising position with their son would have ebbed. Apparently not. Especially when Miles leans down and whispers something in Sadie’s ear, and she tries to stifle a giggle.
Great.
“Sweetheart, how many times do I need to tell you it’s Sadie and Miles? Mrs. Grant makes me feel like his mother”—she thumbs up to her husband—“and she’s a miserable old bat.”
“Hey, that’s my mom.”
“And? You call her much worse,” she says, looking up at him pointedly.
“That woman gave me life…”
I scurry down the pathway, leaving them to bicker playfully, and my stomach squeezes when their laughter carries on the wind. They love so freely, out in the open for everyone to see, compared to my parents. God forbid my father holds my mother the way Miles had Sadie for even a second. It could be snapped by paparazzi, plastered all over the internet and manipulated in a smear campaign by his opposition. Or at least that’s the excuse my parents give whenever I’m being lectured about etiquette in public.
Morgana, don’t smile too wide; it looks like you’re overcompensating.
Morgana, don’t speak too loudly; no one likes an attention seeker.
Morgana. Morgana. Morgana.
“Hey, Morgs,” Shay sings as she thunders down from her house, joining me on the sidewalk and linking her arm in mine. “Have I told you that you’re my best friend in the whole world?”
I narrow my eyes. “What do you want?”
“Always so suspicious.” I purse my lips and wait. “Urgh,fine. Think I could convince you to skip school today? Madame Baudelaire is going to hand me my ass. I didn’t study for this test at all.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t have taken AP French, then,” I say, tugging her along. “Just because your parents take you to Paris every spring does not make you an expert on the language.”
She gasps and knocks her hip into mine, making me stumble as we laugh. “You take that back! When I am a big blogger writing about French cuisine, I’m going to post a picture of me eating snails, giving you the middle finger with the caption,Va te faire voir, Morgs.”
“Why do I get the feeling you only know dirty words in French?” I pull her arm closer to my side. “I cannot wait to see it.”
“See it? You’ll be taking the photo. There’s no way you’re not coming to Paris with me.”
My smile dips. If only I could.
Shay sighs. “Honestly, Morgana, when will you start standing up to your parents and start doing the things you want to do?” I stay silent. It’s an argument that never goes well, so I’ve stopped trying. It’s what’s best. She tugs out of my hold and twists me around, stopping us mid-step, her eyes filled with a fierce determination that makes me squirm.
“Youhavetold them you want to go to business school, right?” I bite my lip, my chin dropping. “Morgana, why the hell not? You’ve already applied to five different schools and received acceptance letters from them all. What’s stopping you?”
I shrug. “It’s never come up.”
“Bullshit,” she snaps, and my mouth drops. She’s never this abrupt with me. “As soon as graduation is done, your dad is going to send you to Harvard.Harvard. As in Boston. As in nearly one-hundred and eighty miles away from here.”
“I know.”
“To get a degree in something you hate. Not that business is any better.” She grimaces.
“I might not even get in. I still need to take the LSATs,” I tell her, hoping that might placate her and get her off my back, even if she is right. I should have sat them down months ago, especially with graduation looming, but I was hoping that the longer I left it, maybe—just maybe—I wouldn’t be accepted and wouldn’t need to tell my parents anything.
“We both know that’s just a formality. Your dad will click his fingers, and the Dean of Admissions will personally show you to your dorm room.” My shoulders sag because she’s right. Dad is like a rock star there. “You need to talk to them, Morgs. You can’t be miserable for the rest of your life when it’s barely begun. You’ll be stuck being their puppet forever, babe.”
I look down at the sidewalk and kick at a single stone, watching it bounce from the sidewalk and down the storm drain. “I can’t disappoint them, Shay.”
She pulls my arms, crashing our bodies together as she wraps herself around me in a back-breaking hug.
“I hate them for making you miserable.”
