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Coral Creek
Greer
“Ialready know that this place is going to be awful. And you know what? Honestly, I really resent having to come with you rather than going to the Mediterranean with Ashley. I mean, Greer, have you seen her yacht? It’s beautiful!” Chelsea’s whiny voice pierces through my concentration and through Lorde’s version of “Royals” that’s blasting through my earbuds. Before I can stop myself, I make the huge mistake of lifting my eyes from my copy ofCatcher In the Ryeto look at her. I really should know better by now.
“The least you could do is stop being your usual boring, antisocial and nerdy self and spend some quality time with me!” she complains mournfully with a scowl on her heavily made-up face, while pulling my book out of my grasp before lowering the tinted window of the limo and throwing it out unceremoniously.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I snap, lowering my shades, suddenly glad I packed so many other books. I inhale the soft breeze that invades the car, trying to calm myself so I don’t kill her. The light wind brings the scent of the ocean and the summer flowers that are blooming everywhere on the island.
“Ah, finally! Hello, Greer. Nice to see you! As I was saying, this place sucks. I can just tell. I hope to convince Daddy to let me join Ashley—”
I interrupt her, willing to pick this bone with her since she just threw away my book. “Why are you so sure that this place sucks? Daddy literally just bought the country club, and he wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t think it had value. He says it will be the gem of our chain of luxury resorts.”
My sister sneers, turning up her nose. “Obviously not, since it doesn’t have a decent landing strip or helipad and we’re stuck on asuperboring road trip!” She lowers the privacy partition and raises her voice on purpose so our poor driver can hear this part of her rant.
Honestly, I hate stereotypes, but if anyone’s going to fit the spoiled brat, rich girl vibe, it’s one hundred percent my sister. I mean, she literally turned her nose up. This is why I keep quiet most of the time, especially around her. I don’t want anyone thinking that I’m like her. Chelsea and I are as different as night and day, which is immediately clear as soon as you meet us since her nose is often up and mine is almost always turned down in one book or another. It drives our mom insane, and the words “Greer, posture!” have been the soundtrack of my childhood—at least before we were sent to boarding school.
Finally setting my eyes on her, I notice an obvious tension in her shoulders, but I still try to get through to her. “What’s really crawled up your ass, Chelsea? What’s wrong with spending the summer break with our parents? We’ve always done that! I haven’t seen them since Christmas.”
Chelsea sighs and explains her grievances in a patronizing tone, as if she were speaking to a child—a slow one to boot. “I doubt you’d understand, Greer. You’ve always been a daddy’s girl, so you don’t see how boring and conservatively old fashioned our parents are. You don’t see how they keep us from having fun like we should at our age.”
I can’t stifle an eye roll, because if that isn’t some bullshit, I don’t know what is. “Why? Because they gave us a first-rate education and tried to teach us the value of hard work?”
Honestly, she isn’t completely wrong. My parents are a bit old fashioned,butI know that it doesn’t come from a place of “let’s suck all the fun out of our daughters’ lives.” No, I know the concepts of summer music festivals in Los Angeles, raves in Paris, or spring break in Miami aren’t even dots on my parents’ radar. Instead of trying to explain what she wants to our parents, Chelsea just complains about them being “unfair” because they want to know where we are and what company we keep at all times. I mean, our family is worth a fortune… literally. I don’t mind the all-girls boarding school or the service car Daddy asks for us to use whenever we’re home. I don’t think he wants to control us. It only makes sense in my mind that he wants us to be safe.
“Go figure! I knew you’d say that. You can’t see how reactionary Mom and Dad are. The boarding school they sent us to in the UK was like a prison. An all-girls school too! God forbid we’d ever meet a boy and date. You’ll see what I’m talking about once you start Bridgeport U in the fall.”
I shake my head at her expression. Since we met at the airport, she’s been acting so superior, as if she hadn’t attended my exact same school since kindergarten. “School wasn’t so bad, Chel. One year of college couldn’t have been—”
“You’re hopeless,” she concludes. “You follow every rule like a sheep. Boys are the shit, Greer, and so much fun, but Mom and Dad have brainwashed you to the point that you don’t even know how to have fun.”
I don’t disagree with her that boys might be “the shit.” I honestly have never thought about dating because I’ve been focused on school. Although, and not that I’d ever admit this to my sister, there have been a few times when my friend Laura and I would leave school to go to a local pub and talk to some of the boys from the local all-male boarding school. Nothing much happened, heck, I didn’t even drink, but it isn’t like I’ve never interacted with a boy in my entire life. Christ. Clearly I’m not the one with a skewed perception on shit in this car.
“If this is still about me not wanting to smoke with you and your friends on the roof last year…” I begin, partly because it will piss her off and I have a feeling that was when things actually turned sour between us.
“Ha, that just proves my point. I’d completely forgotten about that. You got us caught. Mom and Dad cut my allowance for months after that! You’re such a stick in the mud. If you think you’re going to narc on me all summer and that I’ll spend my days playing golf with Dad and learning how to crochet and do ceramics with Mom, you’re delusional. I’ll pretend I don’t even know you. Understood?”
Like every other time in our lives.Seriously, Chelsea has always ignored me and made sure she excluded me from all the fun shit. I remember when she started treating me like her idiot little sister and acting like she barely tolerated my presence at school, especially in front of her friends.
“Isn’t that Chelsea?” Laura asked, pointing toward a group of girls.
I looked in that direction, struggling to see through the pouring rain as we walked back from class to our dorms.
“You’re right.” It was impossible to miss Chelsea’s platinum blonde hair, even through the rain, so I dragged Laura to where my sister and her friends were laughing, dressed in their street clothes and all dolled up as if they were going somewhere.
“Chelsea?” I called as we reached them.
“Greer.” She didn’t even look at me, as if she was embarrassed to be seen talking to me, as her friends kept talking and giggling as if I wasn’t even there.
“Are you going somewhere?” I asked, taking in her tight, ripped jeans and the plunging neckline of her band tee.
“To see Torn Stars in concert,” she said, lifting her chin in a defiant way that challenged me to fucking say anything.
“Weren’t we going together? I got those tickets for both of us.” I hated the way my voice quivered with disappointment, but the tickets to our favorite band had been a surprise for Chelsea’s birthday.
Her eyes darkened with guilt, but it was just a flash before she schooled her features back to her normal bored expression. “I’m going with my friends, Greer. I upgraded the tickets you got for us to one VIP ticket. Only losers miss out on going backstage. And Faye’s dad owns the venue, so she got us a special, private meet and greet with the band.”
That was the first time I realized that my sister and I were drifting apart and there was nothing I could do to stop it from happening.
