Jealousy Best Served Devious (Clash Of Cliches Book 1)

Chapter 4- Making a Splash

Chapter Four.

Making a Splash

Saturday rolled around as sunny as could be and found me in a crappy mood. It could have been due to the fact that everywhere I went during the past week, Ryder and Celeste were there. And I do mean everywhere. I even found him waiting for her outside the washroom at the food court. It could also have been due to the fact that our neighbors had recently invested in a drum set for their teenage sons, who had a pathetic garage band. Said teenage sons were driving me up the wall because the only time they 'practiced' was in the middle of the night. I was seriously beginning to entertain thoughts of burning the outhouse were they kept their band equipment down. But it was most likely due to having my Aunt Vivienne, who had recently moved to Sao Marino from Atlanta after yet another messy divorce, hanging out with my mom in the back yard daily, sipping mai tai's and asking me why I wasn't dating anybody.

"You know your cousin Christina? She's been with the same boy since 7th grade. They're getting married in the fall! And we just moved to town a month ago, but Dianne's on a date right now, as we speak. You're a pretty girl, you have straight teeth, dimples, no pimples. Why is it so hard for you, Makayla?" she started today as soon as I stepped outside.

I shrugged, handing my mom an iced tea. "I just decided I'm into girls," I said evilly, just to get her off my back. It worked because I kept spotting her giving me nervous glances. Muahahaha!

"Who's Di on a date with?" I asked, since Aunt Vivienne was totally giving off an 'ask me!' vibe.

"Peter Benson. He is truly enamored with her." Aunt Vivienne crossed her legs with difficulty on the hammock and looked down her nose at me. Obviously she was auditioning for a bit part in a Shakespearean play, because 'enamored' was a word that probably hadn't been used since the 16th century.

Just wanting to be perverse, I said "I heard Pete Benson was into booty calls."

Aunt Vivienne put a hand to her throat, looking shocked as she shook her head. "Absolutely not! My Dianne is an excellent judge of character! She would never date a boy who was just going to use her for sex."

She mouthed the word 'sex', looking down at an oblivious Arielle, who was busy coloring fishies in her Finding Nemo book and probably hadn't even noticed that I was almost on top of her.

"He probably is just gonna use her for sex."

"I heard that!" Arielle said in her high, piercing voice. "And you're in Bob."

"Sorry," I told her, moving so that I was nowhere near Arielle's creepy invisible friend. I didn't wanna be in Bob. He was creepy as all hell! Ever since he showed up around 2 years ago, Arielle's been acting weird. I didn't like to speculate, but I think Bob might have been a hobo who died while squatting in our basement.

"Kaylee, watch your mouth when you're around Arielle. You know how easily influenced she is," mom scolded me, wiping the rim of her glass with a wet wipe as I looked on in amusement. OCD at its best.

"I said sorry!"

And where did mom think Arielle got her 'easily influenced' quality from? She was the daughter of a man who spent most of his money on the Shopping Network, after all.

"Don't you have somewhere to be?" mom continued, sitting up in her chair and peering at me over her glasses. "The annual pool party is today, isn't it? I thought you'd be hanging out with your friends as opposed to mooning about at home."

Mooning about. Was that what I was doing? I suppose so. All I'd really done this week was walk around my room listening to my 'Heartbreak Play list' on iTunes. But I wasn't bothering anybody, so I couldn't exactly figure out why mom was trying to get rid of me.