Elizabeth Shoupe is evil personified. You might as well be dead to her if you aren't rich or influential. She feeds off the attention, knowing that she has the town in the palm of her hand. But perfection doesn't exist, and royalty comes at a cost...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Sarah's words are playing repeatedly in my head. Did Ward really fire John B because of my slip up? I didn't mean to tell Rafe about John B, but he had already come up with this insane theory that I was sleeping with John B.
The words slipped off my tongue in a desperate way to save myself from his wrath but I unknowingly put another person in the firing line.
What can I do?
Should I speak with Rafe and confront him about it?
What would I even say? The damage is already done.
"Eliza! That's enough free time! Come help me cook!" Mother orders, her stern voice breaking my train of thoughts. I shut my book closed, only 10 pages away from finishing it, standing up from the towel.
My good mood is now ruined.
"Coming!" I call back, picking up my towel and shaking off the bits of grass before folding it and heading inside with my stuff.
"Have you finished the book?" Mother asks, preparing the saucepans to cook.
"Ten pages away" I answer, "why is it taking you so long?" She questions, "I'm just not feeling it today" I shrug. "Well just get over it, it's probably not even that big of a deal" she waves me off and I'm not in the mood to argue.
"Finish the book in your room and then clean your room before coming to help me cook" she instructs, "you got it" mother is surprised by the lack of back-chat but doesn't say anything.
As I step up the stairs, my phone falls from my pocket. I scramble to catch it, using my earphones to grab it before it hits the ground. I go to slip it back into my pocket but mom rushes over and grabs it from me.
"What happened to your phone?!" She examines the broken screen.
Memories of my phone smashing when I dived out of the way of John B's van on the day they nearly ran me over.
"I dropped it" I keep it vague, "it's not a big deal, it works perfectly fine, the screen is just messed up" I try to grab it back but she lifts it out of my reach. "Why didn't you tell me?" Why is she making this such a big deal?
"Because it works perfectly fine" I repeat.
"I don't care if it works, you can't be walking around with some cracked phone" she scolds me and for once I don't know what I've done wrong.
"What would people think if they saw you with a broken phone" she brings up as I roll my eyes, "they will think that you're no better than that filth in the cut" she spits. "I can't have them thinking that we can't afford nice things" this is ridiculous.
"It's not a big deal, no one cares and even if they did, why should I care?" I fire back, "because people talk about the little things and you know that reputation-" she starts, "is everything" I finish, fed up of hearing those words.
