My good mood plummets.
I’ve been trying not to think about my shaky relationship with my great-uncle. I don’t know what to say to Lyla though, so I just nod and head back toward the door.
Sure enough, my uncle is in the kitchen, slamming some pots and dishes around.
“Need any help?” I ask him.
He just grunts and I roll my eyes, moving to join him at the stove. I’m getting used to his grunts and nonverbal responses. By the end of the summer, I’m going to speak fluent Stan.
“What are we making?” I try again.
“Soup.”
“It’s like a hundred degrees out.”
“If you don’t like it, you can make something else. Or get your new boyfriend to take you out.”
The venom in his voice catches me off guard and I flinch, staring at him wide-eyed.
It’s like I’ve been slapped. It’s not like we’ve become best friends since I got here, but I thought that we would at least be civil toward each other.
“Do you mean Chet? He’s not my boyfriend. We’re not even friends. He was just nice enough to show me around town.”
I can’t help but take a small dig of my own at him. I’m sick of being the only one of the two of us to try here.
Suddenly, all of the anger and sadness that I’ve been carrying around with me since my mom died hits me like a train. The shock of finding out that my mom was dying, then having to watch her die. The days of funeral planning and weeks of packing up the house and getting another shock from her letters.
It all slams into me and I’m like a pot boiling over. I just can’t take anymore. I can’t take the snide comments. I can’t take everyone thinking that they know better than me. I can’t take being pushed around by men.
I snap.
“Why did you let me stay here? It’s obvious that you don’t want me. No one wants me,” I scream.
Stan looks at me, shocked and his mouth opens but I barrel over him.
“I just didn’t want to be alone. I wanted family, but you’re not my family. You’re just some mean old man that I don’t understand. And you don’t want to understand me either. I’ve been trying. I’ve been trying so hard, for so long, and I’m just done. I’m done.”
“Sutton…”
That’s all he says, just my name and I can’t take it. I know that he doesn’t know what to do with me, that he doesn’t know how to fix me and it’s okay because I don’t think that I can be fixed.
Tears are already threatening to spill over and I don’t want him to see me like that. I turn and bolt, running up the stairs to my room. I fall down on the bed, curling up into a ball and sobbing.
I don’t even know what I’m crying about. My mom dying, Stan being a jerk with no interest in me, being alone, Chet pushing me around, Teller wanting me to throw away my plan for the future, feeling so lost and alone.
I cry for all of it, until I can’t cry anymore. Until there are no tears left.
Then I get up and take another shower. I build my walls back up when I’m in there and by the time I step out and look at my reflection in the mirror, I can no longer see any remains of the scared, lonely girl that I am on the inside.
Sure, my spirit is bruised, my mind tired, but on the outside, you can’t see any of that. All you can see is the mask. The face that I show the world.
I’m Sutton Tate. The girl with a plan.
10
I swear that I was going to cancel on Chet, but by the time I get out of the shower, it’s already so close to when he’s supposed to pick me up and I don’t want to bail at the last minute. Besides, I need to get out of the house before Stan tries to come talk to me.
Chet picks me up again and from the first word out of his mouth, I know that tonight is a mistake. I should have canceled at the last minute and let him think that I was a rude bitch. I’m too tired, too drained, and not at all prepared to spend hours listening to him brag and talk about himself.
Chet takes me to the fancy restaurant that Lyla lives above. According to him, Prim + Proper is the place to eat in Destiny Falls. It is nice, but I get the feeling that Chet is telling me this because he wants to know that he is high class and paying a lot for our dinner. He strikes me as the type of man to expect things for buying a girl an expensive meal and I start to look for the cheapest thing on the menu.
Chet talks about the menu here and from the sounds of it, he’s tried everything they have to offer.
“The spaghetti Carbonaro here is delicious. So is the sirloin. They get the best cuts of meat here. It’s really the only place to take a date in this town.”
That last sentence makes me think that he’s trying to brag about how many dates he goes on. Disgust fills me at that thought. What a dumb thing to brag about.
I order a strawberry and feta salad and I can see that Chet doesn’t like my choice of order. I have a feeling that he’s annoyed that I didn’t order one of the menu items that he had recommended.
He orders the sirloin and the spaghetti Carbonaro, assuring me that I’ll want to try some. Him thinking that I can’t order for myself just pisses me off even more. What is it with men thinking that they know better than me?
Chet doesn’t seem to notice that and he moves onto his day and how important his job is.
“So, we had to file all of the paperwork,” he says dramatically and it snaps me out of my daydreams.
I take a large gulp of my wine, downing half of it, but when I see the excited look in Chet’s eye, I vow to stick to ordering water for the rest of the meal. Hopefully we can be in and out of here in an hour and I can put Chet and this crappy dinner behind me.
“Anyway, I ended up arguing with Tom Hartford about the zoning permits for like an hour. I mean, does he really think he knows more than me? I’m the mayor’s son and an aide and he just runs some little tourist shop on Main Street.”
His condescending tone has my anger rising and I have to grind my teeth to keep from telling him that I think he’s an egotistical prick.
Chet keeps going, not noticing that I’m bored out of my mind and finding him repulsive. He just keeps droning on and on about how important he is, how rich his family is and how he’s so smart. Luckily, none of this requires my input because my head is a million miles away. Or I guess, actually just a few miles up the road would be more exact.
My conversation with Teller and Stan both pass through my mind all throughout our first course. I debate trying to play a drinking game and taking a sip of my wine every time Chet says something obnoxious but I’d be wasted before our salad plates were taken out of the way.
Every time that Chet brags about himself, I think about what Teller said about him and I regret not telling him that he’s right and canceling this dumb date.
Part of me can’t help but compare the two men and I wonder what a date with Teller would be like. I doubt that he would take me somewhere as fancy as Prim + Proper, but if he did, I bet it would be more fun. I also know that he wouldn’t spend the whole date talking about himself.
I’d have more fun with Teller. Hell, I already have more fun with him and that’s when we’re working around the Mystery Cabin.
The date is stilted and uncomfortable and feels like it drags on and on. A few people from town stop by our table to talk to Chet. They give me curious looks but he doesn’t bother to introduce me. Why would he? He’d have to talk about someone else to do that.