Juliet Immortal

it’s always colder on the coast.”
    “I know. I was freezing,” I agree, the lies coming easier now. “So a friend gave me his sweatshirt, and a ride home.”
    Melanie shakes her head. “But what about Dylan? What happened?”
    He’s dead. Your daughter killed him, and now a monster is living in his body
.
    I lower my eyes, studying the brown stars on the linoleum, wishing Ariel had never met Dylan Stroud.
    “I thought he really liked you,” Melanie pushes, refusing to take the hint. “He actually came inside to say hello to your
mother
. That’s kind of a big deal, isn’t it? I thought boys didn’t do that anymore.”
    “I guess.” I shift my gaze to the ceiling, where lumps of paint bubble like an untreated rash. Ariel’s memory tells me the style is called a popcorn ceiling. The artist within me is unimpressed.
    “So? What happened?” Melanie’s impatience is sharp in the air. This is the point when Ariel would usually scream for her mom to leave her alone and run to her room.
    Instead, I meet her mother’s eyes, willing her to let the subject drop. “After we were alone, I didn’t like him. I asked a friend to take me home. The end.”
    “
You
didn’t like
him
?”
    “No, I didn’t.” I grit my teeth against the disbelief in Melanie’s tone. “He was rude.”
    She sighs and rolls her eyes. “Ariel, real teenage boys aren’t like characters in the books you read. They smell funny and are obsessed with video games and say dumb things. They’restill learning, just like you. You can’t expect a seventeen-year-old kid to—”
    “I can expect whatever I want to expect.”
    “Fine,” she snaps, not bothering to hide her anger. “If you want to be on the outside looking in for the rest of your life, then go ahead and spend your time painting dead animals and vampires and—”
    “They’re not vampires!” I shout, not certain what Melanie is talking about, but knowing Ariel hates it when she says things like that about her work. She hates that Melanie even sees her paintings, wishes she could lock the door to her room when she leaves and keep Melanie away from the pieces of her subconscious hanging on the wall.
    “Your fantasies are never going to help you—”
    “Wanting a boy who won’t take bets on whether or not I’ll sleep with him is a fantasy?” I wince as the words leave my mouth. I didn’t plan to tell her about that, but her assumption that Ariel is a clueless idiot is infuriating.
    “What?” Her eyes grow large, fear swimming in their depths. “Oh god, honey. You didn’t …”
    “No, I didn’t. I found out it was a joke before … before.” My temper fades a bit when Melanie’s body sags with relief. Still, I’m not ready to let her off the hook. “But after that he was awful.
Really
awful. I know the difference between a normal boy and a bad person, Mom. You should trust me.”
    “Oh.” She blinks. “Well, I do. Of course I do.…” Her teeth worry her bottom lip, her confusion making her look younger. “I just wanted you to have a good time. I was … I thought maybe … But if Dylan was a jerk, it’s good you found another way home.” Her hands clutch at her robe, tightening the knotuntil it seems she’ll never get it undone. “But you could have called me, you know. I would have come to get you.”
    Does Ariel know? I don’t think she does.
    “Well, I kind of … lost my purse,” I say. “And my cell phone, so I—”
    “What?” Anger surges back into her voice. “Ariel! We still have another year on that phone before you’re eligible for an upgrade.”
    Really? She’s going to have a fit about
this
? After everything I’ve just said?
    “You’ll just have to figure out where you left it.”
    “I left it in Dylan’s car,” I say, wondering how Romeo is going to explain his wrecked car to his new “parents.” Hopefully his welcome into his new family is going even less smoothly than my own. “I can’t get it back.”
    “You
can
get it back.”
    “No, Mom. I can’t. I’ll pay for the phone myself, I—”
    “With what? The money from the part-time job you never applied for?” She makes a sound that’s more of a snort than a laugh. “I swear, Ariel, I—”
    “I never applied because
you
said no one would hire me!” My voice rises to Ariel’s usual, strident whine. If I don’t lose my cool at this point, Melanie will surely suspect her daughter has been possessed.
    “Probably not for counter service