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Her smile droops even more. “Well… I told him I was going to be in the date auction tonight.”
“He doesn’t care.”
“He didn’t say he doesn’t care,” she snaps, and her smile turns into a scowl. “He didn’t say he wouldn’t come, either.”
“He probably thought you were smart enough to figure it out on your own. I’ll let him know he gave you too much credit.”
Vanessa crosses her arms, annoyed. “Why does everybody act like it’s so ridiculous that he could like me?”
“He has a goddamn girlfriend, Vanessa.”
“From high school! Who brings their high school girlfriend to college? Especially a guy like him. He should marry a Zeta like any self-respecting Blue—” She freezes, loses several shades of color in an instant, then turns and leaves without another word.
Addison watches her go, then she looks at me and sighs. “Most Zetas are great. And then there are the legacies,” she says, with a subtle nod in Vanessa’s direction.
“Her mom was a Zeta?”
Addison nods. “Her mom and dad met here freshman year and got married straight out of college. She’s determined to follow in their footsteps, but she got mesmerized by a pouty mouth and dark eyes and set her sights on the very wrong guy.”
Ryan shakes his head. “She has a better shot with Brynn.”
Addison smirks, but before she can comment, I spot Shelby Cunningham waving us over.
“Hey, I think we’re being called up,” I tell her, gesturing toward Shelby.
“Good luck husband shopping,” Ryan tells us.
Addison corrects him, gesturing to herself. “You mean wife shopping.”
His eyebrows rise and he points to his booklet. “This has a pink and blue border around your picture. You don’t go both ways?”
“Technically, but I’m more into women. They’re prettier, smarter, and less sociopathic in my experience.”
He smirks. “There goes my plan to buy you, I guess.”
“It’s for the best. I can’t marry a Ryan whose last name isn’t Gosling on account of the rest of them being straight trash.”
She startles a laugh out of him. “Without exception?”
“An absolute truth,” she verifies.
“How many Ryans have you met?” he asks, amused.
“Girls,” Shelby says, waving more dramatically. “Get your pretty little asses over here.”
I grab Addison’s hand. “Come on, you can insult Ryan more later. We’ve gotta be auctioned off right now.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be disobedient chattel. I was raised better than this,” she murmurs playfully, allowing me to pull her along.
___
I try not to be nervous as I wait for my name to be called. I tell myself it’s absurd to be nervous about this, but then I peek out from behind the curtain and see chairs filled on either side of the room with a runway in the middle. Vanessa struts out there, smiling and flirting with the audience of mostly men.
And then there’s the fact that it is mostly men, so I start to worry about Addison getting bids she won’t hate. For all that Sloane talked about this like there was some level of inclusiveness what with including who we wanted bids from on the call sheet, I don’t see many women in the audience. This seems to be aimed pretty straightforwardly at men.
Unfortunately, we’re going alphabetically by last name and B comes way before M. B is also way at the front of the alphabet, and that means Vanessa is the only girl to walk out ahead of me.
Sloane calls out bids and encourages the guys to bid a little more, and finally, a guy in jeans and a blue button-down wins her for the bargain price of $65.
