Chaos series by Kristen Ashley

She just was one.

“Not to mention,” I kept going, “any time she could get away with it, she gave me a look that told me she was plotting my murder. She sneezed into her hand once and immediately touched me, making it look like she was being nice but really rubbing her snot on the sleeve of a blouse. A blouse that’s dry clean only. And twice she gave me the finger.”

“I can’t believe this of Zadie,” Carissa said. “I’ve only met her a couple of times and she’s super cute.”

“And you didn’t tell High about any of this?” Tyra asked.

“No,” I answered.

“Why not?” Justine asked.

“Because he lost it during the Sprite incident and we left without even ordering food. He took us for takeaway Chipotle but only after giving Zadie a talking-to. It wasn’t pretty.”

“Good for him,” Elvira declared.

Normally, I would agree.

In the circumstances, I didn’t.

That day, with Zadie hiding her behavior, Logan had been happy. Straight out, not hiding it, had all his girls together, a biker stomping through the clouds in his motorcycle boots.

So it was also that I didn’t have the heart to ruin it for him.

“I’m not sure it was the right thing to do,” I said to Elvira. “It’s only given her more impetus to try to push my buttons. If he’d left the Sprite thing as being a possible accident and I’d been able to breeze through it, maybe I could have gotten through to her. Now it’s like she’s on a mission.”

“This isn’t okay behavior,” Tyra stated. “Including purposefully dumping a drink on your dad’s girlfriend. It’s good High sent that message.”

“You’re right, it’s not okay behavior,” I replied. “But it’s clear she didn’t get the message. And I broke through with Cleo. She isn’t texting me to make a date to bake cookies together but it’s not like she’s just tolerating me either. We have our moments and they don’t come often but it’s like night and day with Zadie.”

“What does Cleo think of what her little sister is doing?” Tabby asked.

“She doesn’t like it,” I answered. “But I’m not seeing any big sister sway between those two.”

The waitress arrived and set my drinks on the table while Lanie shared, “I see that. Zadie lives in her own world. Cleo’s a good kid through and through. She’d twist herself in knots for her mom or dad. Zadie’s kind of a princess.”

“Yeah,” Elvira agreed as I lifted a shot and threw it back. “It’s like Cleo senses her mom and dad weren’t happy, so she bent over backwards to be the good kid who’d make ’em that way. Zadie just thinks everyone exists to make her happy. It’s cute when you’re her age. Not so cute when you get older.”

As awful as it was to admit it, from what I’d noticed, this was the truth.

Cleo was alert, responsible, almost adult. She rushed in to help her dad any time there was even the minutest thing to assist with, like carrying our drinks and munchies at the theater or collecting the menus to hand to the waitress.

That in itself was concerning.

I didn’t know kids too well, especially girls her age, but she seemed way too young to be that deeply in tune with what was going on around her and that deeply keen to try to smooth out any edges. Most especially her knowledge that her mother and father never really were together and the fallout from that, most notably Zadie.

I knew kids were sharp, they noticed things, those things affected them and they behaved accordingly, in bad ways and good.

But they were still kids.

Cleo should just be a kid. Or if she couldn’t just be a kid, there should at least be times when she was a kid. Not a peacemaker or a helper, existing only to smooth out those edges, which was all it seemed she could be.

But when Logan said his youngest lived in her own world, what he meant was that she owned the world and we all lived in it with her.

I could see this as partly his doing.

He poured devotion on Cleo for being all she was, helping her dad out, sticking close, being attentive, smart, thoughtful.

He poured affection on Zadie for being Zadie and gave her her every heart’s desire, including her own bucket of popcorn because she didn’t like to pass while watching the movie, and three different kinds of candy, all of this only hours before we headed out to a late lunch.

“What are you gonna do?” Dot asked, and I looked to her.

“First, I’m calling off tomorrow,” I answered. “They’re supposed to come over for breakfast and then we’re supposed to spend the day lazing around, watching movies, eating and getting to know each other before we head out for dinner and they head back to the RV. But I’m thinking the girls need a break from me.”

Or, at least, Zadie did.

But possibly Cleo did too.

Three days straight having to put up with your dad’s new woman was two days too many.

On this thought, I threw back the next shot.

“I’m designated driver and your ass is in our car,” Veronica declared.

“You’re on,” I replied.

“Girl,” Elvira called, and I turned to her. “That’s givin’ Zadie her way,” she noted.

“It’s giving them some time just to be with their dad so they can be themselves and not have to put up with me, in Zadie’s case, or try to take care of their dad by finding reasons to like me, in Cleo’s.”

“I see the wisdom in this,” Dottie remarked. “Logan’s taking things too fast.”