Chapter Twenty
Esosa and I stand on Sybil’s front porch andwave at Auntie Sara as she drives away. When the car disappears from our view, Esosa nudges me with her elbow.
“Looks like we got away with it.”
I don’t want to speak too soon, but she might be right. I release a long, loud breath. The tension that formed in my chest when we approached our mom with the lie finally loosens. Okay. I think we actually did get away with it. Esosa and I smile at each other, and then she presses the doorbell.
Within seconds, the door opens. Sybil’s big, bright eyes shift between Esosa and me.
“Hey, Enore. Come in.” She opens the door wider and allows us to step in.
The house, although it isn’t as expansive and grand as my uncle’s, is beautiful—a classic American ranch-style house with a cozy interior. I look at the collection of family pictures on the powder blue walls, squinting to get a better view of the faces in the frames. When Sybil clears her throat, I turn to her.
“You said you needed my help with something. What’s up? Everything okay?”
I take in a deep breath and gather the nerve to explain her role in Esosa’s plan. But what if she doesn’t agree to be an accomplice? That would create a huge dent in the plan. Anxious about Sybil’s reaction, I glance at my sister, and she instantly comes to my rescue.
“So here’s the thing,” she begins without the slightest tremor in her voice. Honestly, I want just a fraction of Esosa’s audacity. “Enore has a date with Davi in…” She pulls out her phone from her pocket and glances at the screen. “In about an hour.”
Sybil claps while bouncing on her toes; her lips part like she’s about to let out a squeal, but Esosa doesn’t give her a chance to react to the news.
“Put a cap on your excitement for a minute,” she says, holding up her hand.
Sybil’s thrilled expression flattens.
Okay. Maybe my sister has a little too much audacity.
“There’s one tiny problem,” she goes on. “Our mom would never let her go on a date. Well, not until she’s in her final year of university. FYI, our mom is really strict.” She huffs and rolls her eyes. “Anyway, so we… actually, I came up with a plan.” She grins proudly. “Basically, we told our mom we were coming over to yours for a study session. But the truth is, Enore is going to get dressed here, then Davi is gonna pick her up. They’ll go on their date, he’ll bring her back, and our aunt will be here to drive us home at about ten thirty. And that will be that. The world keeps turning, and our mom won’t know a thing.” Her proud grin expands.
Meanwhile, Sybil’s eyes are wide as she soaks in the information Esosa has just thrown at her. “So you want me to be your accomplice?”
“I actually prefer partner in crime. It has a more dramatic flair. But yes, accomplice works too.”
Sybil’s head bobs slowly and then fast. “Okay. Accomplice, partner in crime, whatever it is, I’m in.” She grabs my hand, she pulls me up the stairs.
“Wait,” I say, my first word since letting Esosa take the lead. “You’re okay with this—with helping us?”
“Well, yeah. You’re my girl.”
That answer, the confirmation of our friendship from Sybil, makes me halt on a step. I smile.
“Besides,” she goes on, “it’s a Saturday night, and Bethany and I are bored out of our minds. But here’s some fun. Right at my doorstep. As if I placed an order on Uber Eats.” She laughs.
“Wait. Bethany is here?” I ask.
“Yeah. We were just hanging out when you texted. Come on.” She pulls me up the stairs again, and I follow with Esosa behind me.
When we walk into Sybil’s room, Bethany is on the bed, swiping through her phone with a blank expression. She sits up when she notices us and tosses her phone aside.
“Hey, Enore and…” She looks at Esosa and frowns.
“I’m Esosa. Enore’s little sister. Bethany, right?”
“Yeah.”
“I follow you on Insta and TikTok. Love your content.”
Without a second thought, I know Esosa is networking. If she believed in business cards, she would pull one out and hand it to the body-positive social media influencer who is also our school’s cheer captain and say, “For all your makeup needs.” But business cards aren’t her thing. She believes they’re too direct. So instead, she says, “Enore has a date and we’re gonna help her get ready. I’m doing her makeup. Wanna help?”
That’s more her style of networking and advertising—subtle. Tasteful and unintrusive, as she once described it.
“Hell yes.” Bethany jumps to her feet. “It’s not like I have anything else to do.”
“Excellent.” Esosa rolls her bag straps off her shoulder, undoes the zipper, pulls out her makeup case, and places it on Sybil’s white dresser. When she presses a button, the case unfolds, unveiling trays filled with makeup.
Sybil and Bethany look between the extensive collection of makeup and Esosa, their eyes wide and amazed.
This, right here, is part of Esosa’s tasteful and unintrusive advertising.
I sit in front of the vanity, and Sybil and Bethany gather around as Esosa works a makeup brush against my face. Whenever I imagined my first date, I always overlooked the preparation. Instead, I focused on the date itself—the biggest part of the night. But it occurs to me this moment holds more significance than I ever thought. But maybe the added value has more to do with the company. All three of them dote over me; their voices and the music Sybil put on fill the room.
“We should probably keep it down,” I say. “Just so we don’t bother your parents.”
“They’re not here,” Sybil says. “They’re away for the night—seeing some show in the city.”
And she isn’t throwing a party? It’s the norm in the movies I’ve watched, the only course of action when parents are away and a teenager is home alone. It’s what Jules did in Superbad.
“Let’s go with a soft lip,” Bethany says. “Matte or glossy?”
Esosa taps a finger to her chin and ponders briefly. “Glossy,” she concludes.
“Yeah. My thoughts exactly,” Sybil adds.
I’m not part of the decision-making process. Even the outfit I planned to wear has changed—the yellow sundress swapped for a red one.
“You want to make a statement,” Esosa said as she folded the spaghetti strap number into my bag before we left home. “Trust me, this is the dress.”
When I step out of Sybil’s en suite bathroom and look in the full-length mirror, I don’t regret allowing my sister to steer this operation. I’m in red slingbacks and the red minidress—truly the ideal combination of cute, sexy, and elegant. I look incredible because of her. I’m about to go on my first date because of her. She just might be my version of a fairy godmother.
“Oh my gosh,” Bethany gasps with one hand over her mouth. “You look freakin’ amazing.”
“Right?” Sybil adds. “Like, drop-dead gorgeous. Red is definitely your color.”
Esosa watches me with her arms folded, smirking. “I think I might add stylist to my credentials.”
I roll my eyes and laugh, and then the doorbell chimes. My heart races. That must be Davi.
Esosa glances at her phone. “Seven on the dot. Right on time.” She looks at me. “You stay here. Let him wait a little. I’ll get the door.”
“I’ll come with,” Sybil says, trailing after Esosa.
When they leave, Bethany examines me again and nods. “Yeah. If he’s not blown away, he doesn’t have a functioning brain.”
I chuckle softly—awkwardly, actually. My shaking hands ball up as I breathe deeply and try to contain my nerves. Being left alone with Bethany doesn’t do much to alleviate the flutters in the pit of my stomach. We’ve sat at the same lunch table before, talked, laughed. Though the group always created some sort of distance between us. We’ve never talked intimately—one-on-one—like Sybil and I have. Because of that, I’m still trying to pinpoint her intentions. More and more, I’m convinced she isn’t a mean girl concocting a plan to humiliate me. But I still haven’t figured her out completely.
“Isn’t this a little strange for you?” I ask, watching her through narrowed eyes.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you know, I’m about to go on a date with your best friend’s ex-boyfriend.”
She chuckles. “Honestly, sometimes I forget that ever happened.”
“They only broke up in March. How can you possibly forget that?”
“Trust me, we’ve all tried to forget it.” Her green eyes wander for a moment, then she cringes. “Them dating was the worst. They weren’t even, like… compatible or whatever.”
“Then why did they date?”
“A miscalculation. They mistook their connection as friends for a romantic connection. It happens. When two people are lonely and in pain and going through shit. That was them at the time. So yeah… they started dating.”
There’s a lot to unpack from Bethany’s statement. There are questions I want to ask and details I need to clarify. It takes a lot of restraint not to probe.
“Anyway, them dating was the worst thing that could have happened to us. They fought all the time. They were miserable, we were all stressed, and Zane’s chakra was all out of sorts. To this day, he claims he’s not fully recovered.” She rolls her eyes. “But he’s a major drama queen. Anyway, it was, like, the worst couple of months ever. When it finally ended, it was the biggest relief.” She sighs deeply. “Trust me, no one’s mourning that loss. Not even Ara.”
A moment of silence passes between us. I absorb everything Bethany said while still watching her through narrowed eyes.
“Look. If you think I’m harboring some sort of bitterness ’cause you’re into Davi, I’m not. He’s one of my best friends. He was miserable with Ara. But he lights up with you. It’s goofy as hell, but it’s cute. So, yeah. This works for me.”
Slowly, I nod. My narrowed eyes return to their normal size. Maybe it’s time I let go of my paranoia, the fear that the prettiest girls in school are out to get me. Well, maybe Ara is. But Sybil and Bethany definitely pass the vibe check.
“Come on.” She hooks her arm into mine and leads me to the door. “Let’s not keep him waiting any longer.”