8. #3
Every time I heard Colbie and Quinlee refer to Kyla as “Mom,” it made my heart happy, just like it did when Nica called Jolie “Mom.” I loved that the girls had so much trust in Kyla and Jolie, just as I was glad that Zeb now referred to Dante as his dad.
“I wonder what my mom would say about me if she were here,” Raylee said.
“Where is your mom?” Colbie asked. “I’ve never heard you mention her.”
I realized Nica already knew the details of what happened with Shiloh’s ex when she cleared her throat and announced, “We’re going to have to take drastic measures with his hair, you guys.”
“I’m not ashamed of what happened because it could be a lesson to women everywhere, especially ones our age who are starting to date seriously.”
Quinlee hadn’t taken Nica’s hint and asked, “What happened to her?”
“Her abusive boyfriend shot her in our living room after an argument.” Colbie and Quinlee gasped, but Nica didn’t react at all.
Finally, after a few tense seconds of silence, Raylee added, “My dad has taught me that you should never put up with anyone trying to control you–not what you think, what you feel, what you do, what you wear, or who you talk to. My life is my own, and the decisions I make will affect my life, so I should be the one to make them, not anyone else.”
When no one else spoke, I agreed, “That is very wise advice.”
“In our family, everyone seems to have an opinion about everything, but they don’t take it personally if you don’t take their advice,” Colbie said.
“I love that about them,” Nica chimed in. “Though sometimes it makes deciding harder, because there are so many angles to consider.”
“Have you ever ignored their advice and made the wrong decision?” Raylee asked.
“This discussion is way deeper than I imagined spa-day conversation would be.”
“Spa-day conversations usually cover a lot of different topics, but the guys aren’t normally involved,” Quinlee said.
Raylee patted Shiloh’s forearm. “Take a nap or something,” she said. “We’ll wake you when the girls finish talking.”
“Good grief,” Shiloh muttered, blowing out a loud breath. “I get no respect.”
“That probably has a lot to do with your music preferences,” Nica announced as she picked up Shiloh’s phone to find something she and the girls would like better. Right before the next song started, Nica announced, “Swifties unite!”
“Well, shit,” Shiloh said, his voice rising. “Aren’t we supposed to be relaxing? You didn’t tell me this would be torture. What the fuck, Biscuit!”
“Shh,” Raylee said before she yanked the other line of wax off his forehead above his eyebrow. When Shiloh howled again, she shook her head and said, “That does not bode well for the rest of what we have planned.”
Colbie held a mirror in front of Shiloh’s scowling face. “Sometimes beauty requires a little pain. Look at how fantastic your eyebrows look now.”
“A man’s eyebrows aren’t supposed to be fantastic. They’re supposed to be . . . manly and shit.”
“Uncle Mark used to scream like that, but he’s gotten better about it over time,” Quinlee told him. “You’ll get there, big guy.”
I fought the urge to laugh, every twitch made the mask pull the skin around my mouth, but Shiloh’s pleading look did me in. The black pore-cleaning mask hid his fading bruises , but it only made the angry red skin above his eyebrows pop. I hooted before I could stop myself.
“You’re not helping, Cupcake.”
“I didn’t realize I was supposed to be.” When Shiloh’s expression crumbled into a pitiful frown, I lost the fight. I started laughing again but immediately winced when the mask tugged at my face. “What is this stuff? Rubber cement? Industrial glue? Good grief.”
“It’s a plumping mask,” Nica replied. “I bought it on Temu.”
“Oh, great. That makes me confident that it’s not going to pull my face off.”
“Shouldn’t you guys be out on a date somewhere?” Colbie asked as she bent over my hand and stared at my cuticles. “How do you have hands like this when your sister owns a salon?”
“If you think mine are rough, you should see how they talk to Lake when she has to go in.”
“Lake works with her hands, so that makes sense.”
“I’m not sure I’m ready to tackle these,” Raylee said as she picked up Shiloh’s hands and started inspecting them. When he made a fist and lifted his middle finger, she scoffed. “That’s not very parental of you.”
“Says the ungrateful child who has been picking on me for . . . What is on my face? Why does it feel like that?”
“Like what?” I asked, turning to look at him. A shiny black substance covered his face, though the girls had carefully steered clear of his beard and his eyebrows, so it looked like a mask. “You look like the Hamburglar,” I said.
“Who is that?” Colbie asked.
“Don’t try to explain it to them. It will just make us feel old,” Shiloh warned.
“Back to my question,” Colbie redirected. “Why are you here with us when you could take her out on another magical date?”
“Magical?”
“I heard Mom and the aunts talking, and they said that the men in our family need to up their game because you took her for all of her favorite foods.”
“That’s what he does with me,” Raylee told us.
“He takes you to different restaurants?”
“No, when it’s his turn to cook, he asks me what I want to have for dinner and then makes me a plate.”
“At our house, it’s usually the chef's choice,” Colbie said. “I guess your house is the opposite, but we make our own plates.”
“It’s not that, really. I guess you’d have to experience it to understand.”
“Are you finished with me yet? If you’ll get this shit off my face, I’ll make each of you a plate for dinner.”
“Really?” I asked.
“I think it’s a law that we have to feed them occasionally,” Shiloh answered sarcastically.
“You’re probably not going to want to feed any of us when we’re finished, but I’m hungry, so let’s get this over with and see what happens,” Nica said as she got up and stood next to Shiloh. “Lean your head back.”
“Why wouldn’t I want to feed you?” Shiloh asked as Nica lifted the edge of his mask with her fingernail.
“You won’t swing at me, will you?” Nica asked.
“What the hell kind of question is . . .” Nica ripped a section of the mask off Shiloh’s face, and he roared. “What the fuck was that?”
Nica looked disgusted as she stared at the strip of his mask dangling from her fingers. She glanced at Shiloh’s face and said, “I didn’t get all of it.”
“I’ve got skin left?” Shiloh asked, lifting his hand to touch his cheek. “I think you ripped out my soul!”
“Let me do one,” Raylee said cheerfully as she reached out and yanked another strip off his face. When he shouted in pain, she giggled and said, “You guys were right. This is fun!”
Colbie reached across the table, but Shiloh scrambled back to avoid her hand. He shot to his feet, hands up. “No more! That’s it!”
Quinlee gently peeled the mask off my face, and I sighed in relief. Apparently, I had a different one than Shiloh’s because it didn’t stick at all. The cool air felt wonderful on my freshly-cleaned skin.
“That can’t be it. You’ve still got it on half your face,” I said to Shiloh.
“Wash it off!”
“It doesn’t work that way,” I informed him. “Unless you want to find your scuba gear and soak it off in a tub of water, you’re gonna have to let them pull it off.”
“I’ll pull it off myself!” Shiloh said as he stomped toward the bathroom.
Once he was out of earshot, Quinlee whispered, “He says he’s gonna do it, but my bet is that he caves and comes back out for us to finish the job.”
“Do you know this from experience?” I asked.
“Uncle Mark didn’t talk to us for three days after we used this on him,” Colbie told me with a grimace. “We didn’t want it to go to waste, so we just . . . decided to use the rest on Shiloh.”
“Why don’t you use it?” I asked.
“No way! That stuff hurts!” Nica whispered just as Shiloh’s angry shout came from down the hall.
A few seconds later, I heard the bathroom door fly open and then Shiloh’s heavy tread coming toward us.
It looked like he might have made half an inch of progress on the piece of mask left on his forehead, but that was probably generous.
He didn’t make eye contact with the girls, but I looked around and had to bite my tongue so I didn’t laugh at the innocent looks on their faces.
“Just get it over with.”
And just like that, I lost the battle and started cackling. He looked so ridiculous, and was so clearly pouting, that I couldn’t resist.