wrong. Even though they weren’t children, she often took the fall for anything that Skyler did wrong when they were both at their father’s new home. In his eyes, Skyler did nothing wrong, and since Jayden had decided to live with her mother, she had to be the one who was to blame when the girls argued. That was why she refused to see them after a couple of visits.
“I’m glad we don’t have scorpions in El Paso,” Carmella said.
“You probably do,” Jayden said. “They’re pretty much found all over Texas. But we never have talked about where y’all live. Why don’t each of y’all tell us about your hometown?”
Carmella raised her hand. “I’ll keep goin’. My daddy is a heart surgeon, and he was really angry with me when I got caught shoplifting for the third time. If he’d known how many pieces of jewelry I’d walked out with and given away, he would have sent me straight to juvie himself. I gave a thousand-dollar bracelet to a homeless lady once and told her to go pawn it for money for food, and I can’t count how many pieces of jewelry I’ve given my friends. They probably don’t even remember me now.”
“What does your mama do?” Jayden asked.
“Daddy got custody of me in the divorce. My stepmother says she’s my dad’s office assistant, but her main job is to be beautiful. According to her, she can’t even hold her head up in front of her friends because of me. Truth is, I kind of like that idea after the way she’s put me down for years. My mother moved to Paris to work for a fashion designer, so I only see her a few times a year and then it’s usually just for a day.”
“I’m from Tyler, Texas,” Tiffany said. “My dad owns Jordan Oil Company, and my suite of rooms back home is bigger than this cabin. I have a sitting room, a bedroom, and my own walk-in closet with a huge dressing room and bathroom attached to it. My mama is the company lawyer. My therapist, the one at home, not Karen, said I act out to get their attention. I thought she was full of crap, and I acted the way I do because I want people to like me. But, I see that now, and it’s crazy, but neither of my folks have ever had time for me. I feel like they were ashamed of me even before I got into trouble. They’re both beautiful people, and they wanted a boy to carry on the family name after they had my beautiful older sister. Instead, they got a tall red-haired throwback to Daddy’s grandmother, and then Mama couldn’t have any more kids, so it was bye-bye to ever having a boy.”
Jayden’s eyes stung with unshed tears, and when she tried to say something, her mouth had turned as dry as if she’d been eating a green persimmon. She picked up her water bottle and took a long drink, but the lump in her throat didn’t shrink a bit. No wonder these girls had such problems. Jayden wished she could wave a magic wand and fix them all, but she could only be there for positive support. They had to want to change, or it would never happen.
“Amarillo,” Ashlyn offered without being asked. “My mama inherited a string of hotels that are scattered all over the state of Texas. She and my stepdad travel a lot in connection with that, and I’ve always known my nanny better than I know them. My daddy’s family has a horse ranch in Virginia, and he helps run that. My stepmother trains horses, and I usually have to spend a couple of weeks with them in the summer. They don’t get me this year, and I’m glad. As much as I don’t like this place, I’d rather be here than there. Spending time there is just trading off one mostly empty house for another, because they’re too busy to even pick me up at the airport. My sweet nanny died last year”—she stopped and wiped a tear from her eye—“and”—she sighed—“there’s two wet bars in our house. One downstairs in the den and one in the media room on the third floor. No one even missed the bottles of whiskey that I drank to help me get past all the pain of her death.”
Listening to them tell their stories was cathartic. Jayden hadn’t been the only outcast in the world.