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Finally, after yanking on a pair of sweatpants and a cropped shirt, I put on my flip-flops and head out, fully prepared to get my ass chewed out by my publicist when she learns I cut out of the shoot.
I hate that I can’t find it in me to care.
* * *
Beingthe baby in a family of five, I was always too small to play with the big kids. By the time I was ten, Maddox was graduating high school, and Noah was realizing it wasn’t cool to be seen with his little sister. It made me sad until I realized that meant I could hog our parents’ attention.
Because of that, they became my best friends.
I should have been embarrassed to consider my mom and dad my closest friends, but I wasn’t. Not in the slightest. I had, and still have, the coolest parents. The ones who knew when to tighten the reins and when to let you out on your own. The kind who never judged and always had a plan to fix whatever it was that went wrong.
That’s why I’m here, sitting on the porch swing with my mom, a virgin strawberry daiquiri in my hand because she still refuses to believe I’m old enough to drink.
If there’s anyone who can help with what’s going on with me, it’s Mom.
“Tell me what’s going on in that beautiful head of yours, sweetheart,” she says when I continue to keep silent, watching the treeline at the edge of the property sway with the breeze.
“Ivy can’t come to Europe.”
“What happened?” she asks, voice calm and as soft as ever.
I tuck my legs beneath me and lean into her side, my drink melting in the wide glass from the heat of my palm as I continue to hold it without drinking.
“Things just didn’t work out. She found a new apartment, but the landlord is a hard-ass who won’t let her move in after the first of July.”
She runs her hand up and down my back in a soothing motion, humming like she always does when one of us is upset. “Would you like me to tell Noah to go with you? You know he’ll listen to me.”
I swallow back my horror. “No, thank you. He’d probably leave me in a dirty hostel and fly back home alone.”
“He wouldn’t dare,” she swears.
A giggle crawls up my throat. “He totally would. But that’s okay. That stick in the mud wouldn’t do half of the stuff I have planned on this trip, anyway.”
“And what exactly are you planning on doing over there?”
She pulls back enough to stare down at me with slightly narrowed, glittering emerald eyes. They crinkle at the corners from years of laughter and smiles, and my heart warms at the sight.
I grin, flattening a few rebel chestnut hairs at the top of her head. “Nothing you need to lose sleep over, Mommy Dearest.”
Blowing a raspberry, she nods sarcastically. “Right. My darling daughter has never done anything in her twenty-one years of life that’s made that hard to believe.”
“Hey, I kept your life interesting,” I protest.
“Of course, dear. Whatever you say.”
“You suck.”
“Yet here you are,” she gloats with a cheeky smile.
I sigh. “Yeah, here I am. And it’s your motherly duty to give me advice on what to do now. Am I really about to go on a two-month trek across Europe on my own?”
“Absolutely not,” Dad barks, his entrance surprising me enough I jolt, some of my drink spilling over onto my hand. I quickly lick it off.
“Okay, Mr. Super Stealth. Warn a girl next time,” I mutter, scooting over enough that he has room to sit on my other side. When he only stands in front of the swing with a frown and his hands on his hips, I arch a brow and pat the cushion. “Sit down. You’re making everyone nervous.”
“You are not going across the world by yourself, Adalyn. I’m well aware of your fearless nature, but please, have mercy on us this one time. I’m too old to be dealing with this stress.”
“You’re only too old if you believe you’re too old,” I point out.
