Spoiled (11 page)

Molly tipped back the bottle of Stella Artois and drained the last few drops into her mouth. She tossed her bottle at a garbage
can. It bounced off the rim and landed in the grass. Nobody noticed, because she’d hidden herself behind an unused corner
settee underneath a string of lights that had burned out.

“I just missed the trash at point-blank range,” she told Charmaine.

“Oh, man, you are going to be so sorry tomorrow,” her friend said through the phone.

“I am fine!” Molly announced. “Liquor before beer, in the clear. Besides, I deserve a little fun.”

“Then go have some. The
People
Twitter says Ashton Kutcher is there. Hang up the phone.”

Charmaine was right. Hiding was stupid. And the grass was itchy. Molly hated being itchy. She popped up from behind the couch
and her gaze fell on a buffet table several yards away that was still very well stocked.

“Food!” Molly squawked. “Do you want anything?”

“Yeah, I’m not there, dumbass. Seriously, if you don’t hang up and go take a picture with Demi and Ashton, I will post something
on the Internet that says you have a third hand growing out of your back.”

Molly poked at her phone and then dropped it into her dress’s pocket. In addition to being right, Charmaine was bossy. But
those mini hot dogs looked awfully good.

It took forever to get to the buffet tables. Putting one foot in front of the other seemed both way more fun and much harder
than normal. By the time Molly reached the finger food, two things were clear: She was hammered out of her tree, and… she
forgot the other thing.

Molly slammed her hand down next to a tray of taquitos and glared at them as though they had just tried to cop a feel. How
had this happened? The first martini had, as Danny was fond of saying, taken the edge off, but when it was gone Molly still
felt like she needed something to do with her hands. All the other kids her age seemed to be drinking; hence the first beer,
which dulled the remainder of her shrieking nerve endings. The second had been because she’d texted Danny and told him what
was happening, and his response was, “Awesome, let’s have a beer
together.” The fourth had been… wait, she’d skipped three; what was three?

Dammit. She
was
going to hate herself in the morning. Charmaine had been right about that, too.

“What did you just say about Charmin?” a girl asked.

“… I am out loud?” Molly asked.

The girl peered at Molly through a curtain of black hair, then broke into a slow smile. “Try the mini quiches,” she said.
“They’re excellent on a drunk stomach.”

“I’m not drunk,” Molly insisted, standing up as straight as she could and trying to sound polite. “I’m Molly.”

“Of course you are,” the girl said, floating away on a purple cloud, which Molly realized was a very familiar-looking cocktail
dress. “We’ll meet again, Molly.”

Molly tried to concoct a charming, friendly response to this while the girl was still within earshot, but her fuzzy brain
didn’t seem to be working right. Scooping up a handful of snacks, Molly wobbled back to her safe place and crash-landed on
the grass. She shoveled several mini quiches into her mouth. After about the fifth one, her stomach started to complain, but
her mouth didn’t listen. She emptied her plate.

Dragging her knees into her chest, Molly leaned her head against the back frame of the couch and closed her eyes. So much
for her social debut. She was wearing a dress better suited to a quilting bee, she’d let everyone point and stare her into
submission, and she’d been too scared and
nervous to go up to anyone and introduce herself—which is why she’d spent half the night on the phone to Indiana. And now
she was wasted. And queasy. And grass-stained.

Molly felt lost and frustrated, as if she’d followed the exact directions she’d been given but still ended up in the wrong
place. Her own skin had never seemed so uncomfortable. She didn’t even notice the tear running down her cheek until it made
a salty splash on her upper lip.

Minutes later—or hours, or seconds; Molly had no idea which—she thought she heard a girl’s voice. By the time she willed a
bleary eye open, though, there was no one there. Then she heard a rustling noise.

“Daddy, she’s passed out,” Brooke’s voice all but shouted. “I can’t believe she did this to you. How
humiliating
.”

Molly rocketed to her feet, then instantly regretted it as her knees buckled. Brick caught her.

“Brookie, be quiet,” he said firmly. “Molly, let’s get you upstairs. We’ll talk about this tomorrow.”

Molly found the ground with her feet, then rubbed her eyes to see if that made the scene less blurry. It didn’t work.

“Sounds rad, man,” Molly joked feebly. But the instant the words came out, she realized how blasé and sloshed she sounded.
“Oops. I didn’t mean… that was dumb… this is all so… I wish I had… I want to rewind,” she heard herself slur next as she wiped
a fresh river of tears from her eyes.

Brick looked astonished. Molly suddenly felt hysteria
bubbling up in her throat, imagining what she must look like to him, all smudged makeup and a runny nose and breath that smelled
like a brewery on a night that she was supposed to make a good impression. She had a history of laughing at inappropriate
moments, like at her mother’s funeral when the priest got to “ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” because Laurel used to say that
when she cleaned house. Tonight, as then, her nerves—this time abetted by the booze—won out. She broke into a guffaw and sagged
against Brick. The trees overhead were spinning like slot-machine wheels through her vision. A face appeared among them. Molly
peered up at it and smiled.

“G’night, Mom,” she slurred. “See you in the morning.”

After that, darkness.

IN THE DREAM,
Molly was two inches tall. She fought through the blades of grass in Brick’s backyard, running in slow motion, trying to
tell him something very important. But she was too small. He couldn’t see her. Then Brooke appeared, sauntering toward Brick
with a plate of mini quiches. Her shoe came down toward Molly’s matchstick-size head, closer, closer, closer, making an odd
rapping sound as it found Molly’s skull….

She cracked a bleary eye.

Tap, tap, tap.

“Molly?” said a male voice from outside the door.

Molly pulled the covers over her head then lowered them enough to peek out without actually exposing her bedhead.

“Come in,” she mumbled.

Stan popped open the door and backed inside, carrying a large silver tray with a domed lid on it. He took one look at her
in her down comforter cave and smiled empathetically.

“Feeling okay?” he asked. “You seemed a bit the worse for wear last night.”

Molly groaned and rolled into her pillow.

Stan reached out to where her foot seemed to be and patted it. “We’ve all been there. Even Brick.
Especially
Brick, since he won’t eat the food at his movie premieres—says it’s a caloric trap designed to make him fat and force down
his salary.”

He set the tray down on the large bench at the foot of her bed. “He ordered this just for you,” he said. “A shot of wheatgrass
juice and a vegan prune muffin bar. He swears by them. So if you lift this dome and see an Egg McMuffin with hash browns,
well, I’m afraid I won’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Thanks,” Molly mumbled, and tried to summon a smile for him. It didn’t exactly work. Her mouth was dry, and it tasted like
the bottom of a birdcage. “It’s nice of you to do this for me on a Sunday.”

“No worries. It’s my job. In Brick Berlin’s world, there are no weekends,” he said. “Why do you think I know the best hangover
cures?”

Stan headed for the door, stopping just as he reached for the knob. “He does want to see you, though,” he added, looking a
bit grim. “Come on down to his study as soon as you feel up to it.”

He closed the door behind him. Molly rubbed her face and sat up, then immediately regretted moving. Her stomach sloshed, and
it felt like someone had gotten trapped inside her brain and was trying to tunnel his way out using a ball-peen hammer. It
might be a long time before she felt steady enough to go downstairs, physically
or
emotionally. A week ago she’d never met her father; now he was about to punish her for crawling down the neck of a beer bottle.
What a great first impression. He probably thought she got hammered all the time in Indiana, and was on the phone with Ginger
asking if she’d ever staged an intervention.

Molly could barely remember what happened after Brick picked her up off the grass, though she had faint, misshapen memories—like
photos accidentally sent through the laundry—of Brooke towering over her, squealing something gleeful. But she didn’t want
to think about that, or what it might mean. Plus, her head really hurt.

Molly burrowed through her bedding until her head popped out next to the tray, then grabbed the McMuffin and dragged it with
her back under the covers. She’d face the world later.

Brooke’s phone rang. And rang. Irritated, she lifted her head just enough to check the clock. Eleven thirty in the morning.
Obscene.
Who called at this hour?

She groped at the nightstand until her hand found her
iPhone. Brick’s name flashed up on the screen, along with a picture of him on the red carpet at the Oscars. He’d done a cameo
as an unusually muscular Rasputin in
Night at the Museum III: MoMA, Mo’ Problems
, which had been nominated for best costumes. Brooke smiled, remembering how funny his bit with Ben Stiller had been when
they presented Best Editing. Then she heard his stern voice in her head from the previous night and recalled the disappointed
way he’d looked at her—at
her—
when she brought him to Molly’s slumped, drunk body.

She sent the call to voice mail.

Almost instantly, Madonna’s “Material Girl” kicked up again. Brooke ignored it, still stung that Brick had seemed so put out
when she was only trying to be helpful by showing him what Molly was really like. She wondered how much inertia it would take
before her body forgot how to function. Once she was rendered immobile by her psychological pain, maybe Brick would see how
much harm he’d done, bringing this ruinous boozehound into their lives. The question was whether he’d realize this before
or after Brooke got an oozing bedsore.

Her phone tolled a third time. “Shut up, Madonna,” she mumbled. But this time, it was Brie.

“Good morning!” her assistant chirped. “This is your daily tabloid report. One of the
Real Housewives of Santa Fe
threw her pottery wheel at a photographer, that new Fashion Week documentary opened huge, and one of those girls from
The City
wore the ugliest orange poncho to an
MTV party last night. And that’s it. Nothing else made news. At all.”

“You are a terrible liar, Brie.”

“No, it’s true, the poncho was awful. E! Online said she looked like the Great Pumpkin’s trashy girlfriend.”

“Brie.”

On the other end of the line, Brie took a deep breath.

“Okay, it’s actually not that bad. Most of what’s online from last night are just pictures of Brick and Molly smiling. But
Hey!
…” Brie trailed off. “They got a picture of you hunched over Molly and talking on your phone, while she was passed out. It
really looks like you’re laughing at her.”

“Dammit!” Brooke swore. “Why did you tell me that?”

“Because you—”

“In the future, please recognize when to tell me what I want to hear,” Brooke huffed.

There was a loud banging on her door.

“Go away,” Brooke crabbed. “I’m very busy.”

“Unless what you’re busy with involves being comatose, you will come downstairs right now,” Brick’s voice boomed.

“Um, Brie, gotta go. My trainer’s here.”

Shoving her feet into fluffy slippers, Brooke padded downstairs hoping she looked childlike and innocent. The last time Brick
yelled at her, she was six and had spilled her apple juice on his pager; he’d been so overcome with guilt that he’d bought
her a pony named Mr. Pickles. She doubted this would end as happily: From his tone, Brooke could
guess that Brick had seen exactly what Brie had, and it wasn’t sitting well.

Brooke shuffled toward her father’s study, through the hallway that contained every certificate Brick had ever received—including
one from the American Dental Association honoring his teeth as the best in showbiz—and a gallery of her school photos over
the years. When she reached fourth grade, Brooke stopped, noticing a tiny, dog-eared picture that had been tucked into the
corner of the frame. It depicted a little girl with crooked front teeth, brown-red braids, and a grin so earsplitting you
couldn’t see the color of her eyes.

Molly.

Brooke resisted the urge to rip it down, knowing that act of vandalism wouldn’t actually affect anything except possibly her
prospects of getting a car—though those already looked bleak. She took a deep breath and reminded herself to deny everything
for as long as possible. This worked well whenever celebrity couples ran into rumors of marital problems.