you are trying to feed me that old line,” I said, cringing. “Why are you even defending him? It was a crime, Lacey. There were enough drugs in that car to light up half of London. You got arrested.” I took a hot, impatient breath. “Have you even thanked anyone? Marj had to massage the US Embassy to get you out. But you’ll have to go back and testify.”
“Can’t Marj call in a favor or something?” Lacey chewed on her thumbnail.
“The US Embassy was the favor,” I said through gritted teeth.
“Then Nick, maybe?” Lacey wheedled.
I said nothing.
“This is so unfair,” she said. “I’m getting blamed for someone else’s mistake! If it were you, they’d move mountains.”
“If it were me, I wouldn’t have been in Tricky Tony’s car,” I said. “But I’m also the one engaged to Nick, so yeah, they would have to do more.”
“But I’m your sister! It’s so selfish of them!” she insisted. “And of you. After everything I’ve done for you, I can’t believe you won’t make this go away.”
I felt all the blood in my body rush to my face. “I think you need to leave.”
She reacted as if I had slapped her. “You’re not serious.”
Lacey looked around as if she expected someone to back her up, but the only company she had was on my dresser: a framed photo of our seventh birthday, me giving her rabbit ears, her missing a tooth, both of us sitting behind a vanilla sheet cake with rainbow frosting. She’d thrown a tantrum when I asked for chocolate, and I gave in because the histrionics weren’t worth it. Cake was cake.
“You can’t throw me out. I need you,” she pleaded.
“Yeah, when you can use me,” I said. “I take your calls. You never take mine.”
“That’s because you spend all your time talking about Nick,” Lacey spat.
“That’s funny, because I could tell you the last six places you ate dinner, but you didn’t even know that Nick deployed again,” I countered. “And Nick was not a problem for you two minutes ago when you wanted him to do you a solid with the French police, and he wasn’t a problem when he was getting you into clubs, and he absolutely wasn’t a problem when you wanted to meet Freddie.”
“Nick was the entire problem with Freddie,” she said with vitriol. “Have you completely forgotten how hysterical he was that we not date in case it made you look bad? I put what I wanted on hold to get you through years of dating and not dating Nick, and now you won’t even do me the smallest favor, because you’re saintly Princess Rebecca, with her perfect fake hair and her perfect life.”
“You know that’s not how it is!” I said, worked up enough that I threw off the covers and stood up. “You of all people know how weird and hard this has been.”
Lacey rolled her eyes. “Yeah, poor you. Dad paid for your flat so you could land a guy. I gave up med school to be with you and you gave up…what, art classes? And all you got out of it was, hmm, let me think…everything. I feel so sorry for you.”
“Are you kidding me?” I actually stomped my foot; nobody brought out my juvenile side like Lacey. “You gave up med school so you could sleep with Freddie. I am just the excuse you used to pull it off.”
“You ditched me at Cornell!” she accused.
“I did not!” I protested. “I did something for myself.”
“No, you ran off and left me in your dust,” she said. “And I think you like it that way.”
“Our lives aren’t some kind of race, Lacey!”
“Then why do I always feel like I’m losing?” she said, almost crying now.
We had, without realizing it, moved toward each other so that we were yelling in each other’s faces—our gravitational pull in its worst iteration. Abruptly she turned and stomped out, smacking the doorframe with her hand, then stomped back in again and set her jaw.
“I got fired,” she says. “From Whistles. Before Ascot.” At my dumbfounded face, Lacey sneered, “Now who’s the one who doesn’t know anything?”
“But I asked how work was, and you’d say it was great.”
“What, and admit they didn’t want me if I didn’t come with you?” she said spitefully. “Once Donna shoved her way in and you stopped shopping in public, my manager decided he didn’t need me anymore. Because everything revolves around you. The book deal fell apart because they only wanted me