Page 10 of I Shouldn't Love This Way

“Yeah, that was a little O.T.T. if you ask me. But at least your dad ‘un-grounded’ you and gave all your things back.”

Uh, yeah!He freakin’ had to!I was so mad at him.

“I can’t stand my stepmom sometimes. I wish she would just disappear.”

Okay, that was extreme—like—Stephanie Cohen extreme. I wouldn’t wish death on anyone… except for Rob.

“Wow…” Jess glanced at me. “I didn’t know you hated her that much.”

“You don’t want to know what it’s like to live with her.”

“She can’t be worse than my mom. My mother is so damn strict about what I wear, who I talk to, who I go out with… The list goes on. I swear she’s worse than my dad. Sometimes I feel like she’s the one wearing the pants in the relationship.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. I had met her mother before, and she appeared as the control-freak type. “My stepmom doesn’t give a crap about what I wear. I don’t think she owns anything that hides her cleavage.”

“Now you sound like a judgmental feminist.” Jess laughed.

I had a hard time coming up with a legitimate reason to hate Vanessa without exposing Noah and me.

“I don’t know. She just annoys me! Vanessa always sticks her nose in my business!”

“Okay, yeah,” Jess replied. “That can be annoying. But I still think my mom is worse.”

“Oh, hush! Let me bitch about her for a while, please!”

“Sure, babes, vent away.” She laughed.

I playfully nudged her shoulder and grabbed my mascara out of my makeup bag.

“I still need to meet this infamous uncle of yours.”

“You’ll meet him soon.” I smiled.

Evan and I had got so much closer throughout the weeks. Spending time with him took my mind off Noah; things between him and I weren’t going so well at home. Technically, I still wasn’t allowed to see my uncle, and I would have listened if Noah hadn’t pushed me away again. He wanted things to be normal between us. While he focused on rebuilding his sham of a marriage, I focused on school, friends, and amazing Evan.

“We should go shopping for prom dresses this weekend,” Jess said.

“Sounds good, I’m free.”

My high school was hosting the big event on the 18thof May, which was three weeks away. Our prom had a modern masquerade theme and was going to be held at the Rouge Hotel in Beverly Hills. Jess was looking forward to it. I knew I couldn’t ditch the event, so I said yes when Ryan asked me to go as his date.

“Are you girls ready?” Tammy asked from behind the door. “Our cab’s here.”

“Yeah, we’ll be right out!” I put my cosmetics away and examined my outfit.

This skintight dress looks like a million bucks!

And I couldn’t wait to go out and flaunt it.

??

Originally, the girls and I had made plans to go to a club called Avalon. Apparently, this place had been in business since the 20s. The club was known as Hollywood’s reining nightlife establishment, and we all wanted to go, except we had a big problem: we didn’t have any hookups to get in. Steph and Jessica’s birthdays were in the summer, so they weren’t eighteen yet, like me and Tammy. Fortunately for us, Steph’s friend,Marco, worked as a bouncer at Orca, and he had promised to get us into The Velvet Lounge with no problems. How Steph knew this thirty-something year old guy was beyond me.

“Whoa… look at that lineup,” Steph said, stepping out of our cab.

Tammy stood on the sidewalk next to me. She was a platinum blonde, just like Vanessa. The only physical difference between her and my stepmom was that my friend was naturally blonde and had real blue eyes—oh, and minus the plastic surgery. She seemed anxious as she asked Steph, “Are you sure we’ll be on the VIP list?”

“I didn’t threaten to blackmail Marco for nothing!” Steph exclaimed. “Trust me. We’ll get in.”

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