The One Who Loves You (Tickled Pink #1)(32)

It’s like I’m breaking the habit and I’m past the shakes stage.

The world didn’t stop spinning just because someone took New York from this girl. Even all the stuff with Fletcher feels like it’s on hold.

Like not getting messages from him every day, coupled with being so busy cleaning the school, is convincing my brain that he doesn’t exist.

And now that I’m not distracted by my calendar and social life and the appearances I keep up anymore, I’m dismayed by what I’m seeing.

I really do want to do better.

Self-improvement is a new mountain to climb. One that might actually be more worth climbing than I would’ve considered if Gigi hadn’t dragged us here.

The thing about having someone look you in the eye and tell you that they don’t like you because of who you are is that sometimes, you realize you’re not so sure you like yourself either.

It’s like Teague Miller knows that when I’m at a fundraiser or garden party or brunch or gala, my joy comes from knowing I’m in a place others can’t be, not from feeling like I’m among true friends that I could tell anything to.

I don’t know how he knows. He’s a freaking fishing lumberjack in a rural hell that he seems to enjoy.

Maybe I’m projecting.

But I’m not wrong in realizing that I could be a lot better than I am.

“You’re seriously retaking your entire degree this year?” Tavi’s horrified.

And not fake horrified like when a paparazzo catches her on film reacting to a story about a bunch of puppies being forced to eat grocery store kibble. Like, real horrified.

“Just algebra, biology, and two English lit classes.”

“You can’t do algebra?”

“I can do algebra.” I think. It’s so stupid, though. I have a calculator on my phone and an entire computer at my disposal during the day job. I know how to use a spreadsheet.

Mostly.

And what I don’t know, I have an assistant for.

Why do I need anything else? That isn’t the kind of self-improvement I’m talking about.

For the record.

Tavi starts walking again. She’s barefoot but not complaining about the uneven cobblestone street. Probably because she’s made of fairy wings and magic and is actually immune to stubbing her toe on uneven bricks in the ground. “So why didn’t you do your algebra the first time?”

“Because I was dating a senior who was really good with his tongue, and if I went to class, I didn’t get tongue, since it was the only time he wasn’t booked. Probably with other women, but I didn’t care.”

She cracks up. “No! You seriously skipped class for sex? You? No. No way.”

“It was so good. Do you know how few men actually know how to treat a clit?”

“Sadly, yes. Was he from money?”

“He made me see stars.”

“So that’s a no.”

“Exactly.”

We lapse into silence for a moment.

It’s weird.

Almost comfortable.

“Do you ever wish you hadn’t been born a Lightly?” I ask. How is it that a week ago, this question never would’ve crossed my mind, but since Teague asked me who I am, it’s all I can think of?

It’s her turn to bump into me. “When I was younger, I wished I was related to Alexander Bentley, but then I realized if I wasn’t a Lightly, I probably wouldn’t get to pick another rich family. So if my options were having money and a crappy family or having no money and a good family, why not keep the money and look for a different family along the way?”

I start to laugh, then realize she might be serious. “But what if the money keeps you from being the kind of person who’ll fit in with a good family?”

“Or what if our family actually is a good family, but our own teenage angst and then normal human conflict scarred us into thinking it wasn’t, and now we can’t see the good for the habits we formed in our thoughts and actions when our brains weren’t yet fully developed?”

I glance at her, which is silly—I still can’t see more than her profile—but she’s clearly looking up at the stars too. “Dad cheats on Mom all the time. She lets him because she likes all the comforts of Lightly money and connections, plus we pretend he doesn’t and that we don’t know. Carter’s a spoiled brat who’d probably be in jail if we didn’t come from money. Mom always consults her tarot cards instead of dealing with anything head-on, and Gigi rules with terror. You really think that’s not awful?”

“To people here? Probably. But where we’re from . . . we’re lucky that’s the worst of it. Carter’s not in rehab, Mom and Dad seem to each get something beneficial out of their arrangement, so long as the details about Dad’s mistresses don’t leak to the press, and no one ever tries to cross Gigi or blackmail her, or if they do, they don’t succeed, so we don’t have to deal with the blast radius. The worst we have is Uncle You-Know-Who.”

Right.

Life on the Upper East Side. The crime isn’t the crime. The crime is getting caught. Our uncle got caught, and he and his wife and kids no longer exist.

At least to Gigi.

Not even here, where she’s trying to save herself from hell, even if I’m beginning to question her methods.