Who's Your Daddy? (4 page)

I tried to earn car money babysitting, but everyone wanted the peppy little cheerleaders (a monopoly, mark my words). I subsequently found another creative way to earn fundage, but NO. One of my chickens**t clients had to go and rat me out, the hypocritical dirtbag. Then, instead of Dad recognizing my entrepreneurial genius, he—and all the other adults—saw me as some sort of at-risk youth. A juvenile delinquent.

My license? Gone.

The car-matching fund?
Pffft.

Now, just when I had the chance to, perhaps, find a way out of my bottom-feeder social cesspool? DENIED. Again.

SO wrong.

I pounded my way up the steps but exercised enough self-restraint to avoid slamming my bedroom door off its hinges. Dad hated that more than any other annoying thing, and there was no sense pushing my luck at this stage of the game. I threw myself facedown on my bed until my pounding heart had regulated itself and my breathing returned to normal. I never could think straight when I was flipping out. When my mind had cleared, I pondered the dilemma as rationally as possible.

Here’s the point my father did not grasp: I COULD NOT MISS THIS EVENT!!! Fate had brought the idea of the dumb supper into our lives. I was sure of it. What if, by missing it, I annoyed the fate gods enough to assure I would never have a single date? Years would drag by, and I’d wind up as a career virgin by age twenty-seven. Life would be OVER for me. Future teenagers would
study me in history class, in an effort to avoid repeating my mistakes. Couldn’t he see the horrible gravity of the situation?!?!?!?

Okay, so he didn’t actually
know
what fate had planned for us that night—he thought we were studying—and I might be overreacting slightly with the career virgin scenario (the jury was still out on that one). But I couldn’t exactly spell out the-whole-truth-and-nothing-but for the guy. Hello, GROUNDED! Remember that? Thanks to his cruel and unusual punishment, I HAD to use the studying spiel. He’d left me no other choice.

I frowned so hard it gave me a headache behind my eyes. Unfair, unfair, unfair. All of it—from being the only girl in a family of five creepy males, to having my cash cow chopped into hamburgers (ew!), to being grounded, to missing the equinox. ACKKKK!!!! My own FATHER would see more homecoming action than I would. In fact, I’d be the ONLY Moreno stuck at home that night!

How much worse could things get?

I was 0-for-3 on homecoming dates in my thus-far illustrious high school career. Now I’d be on house arrest while Luke escorted Supertramp to the festivities and
my FATHER trolled from party to party with the rest of the cops. The heavy police presence was my dad’s proactive solution to avoiding a rash of alcohol-related teen deaths that would land White Peaks (and him) on the front page of
The Denver Post
. Of course, I’d never wind up in the Post, because I’d be stuck at home surfing bad digital cable like all the rest of the losers, and ALL of it simply because I’d found a profitable way to fill a sorely needed market demand. (Who? Me? Bitter? What makes you think that?)

Wait one freakin’ second.

The realization hit me like an electrical jolt.

I was missing my own point. Dad would be at
work
.

I lifted my face from my pillow, hope bubbling up out of my pool of pissed-offedness and making me smile like the Grinch. What the old guy didn’t know couldn’t possibly hurt him, right? Meaning my dad, not the Grinch. If he wasn’t even
home
, how would he know whether I’d gone to Caressa’s or not?

Relief flooded through me now that a viable idea had percolated in my brain. I sat up, then scuffed my way across the room to my computer, booted it up, and checked my buddy list for the presence of Meryl and
Caressa (both there). I quickly sent them a chat invite, then drummed my fingers on the desktop until two identical musical “blings” alerted me that they’d entered the private chat room.

Lipstickgrrrrl:
Hey, Lila. Whazzup?

MerylM:
Hi guys.

Lipstickgrrrrl:
Hi MM!

LawBreakR:
First off, MY LIFE SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sucks, I tell you!

Lipstickgrrrrl:
Why?! What happened??

MerylM:
Why?

LawBreakR:
My freakin’ dad told me I couldn’t come to your house on homecoming night, Caressa, that’s why.

Lipstickgrrrrl:
R U kidding?

MerylM:
You HAVE to come!!

LawBreakR:
Oh, don’t worry, Mer. I’m coming. I don’t care WHAT he says. For God’s sake, I’m SIXTEEN!!!!!!!! It’s not like I’m a CHILD.

MerylM:
Wait a minute. Lila, don’t make things WORSE for yourself! Your dad will KILL you if you disobey him.

LawBreakR:
Life couldn’t possibly BE worse, Mer!!!!! I am NOT, I repeat NOT, missing the dumb supper!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just listen to my idea.

Lipstickgrrrrl:
Don’t do anything crazy.

LawBreakR:
Sheesh, you wimp girls. I’m not going to run away or kill him in his bed or anything. If I was going to whack anyone while he slept, it would be Luke. Believe me. I do have a foolproof plan, though.

MerylM:
Uh-oh.

Lipstickgrrrrl:
What kind of plan?

LawBreakR:
He (Dad) works that night, because of homecoming, remember? He won’t be home until three or four
A.M.
I’ll sneak out and be back before he realizes I’m gone. It’s perf!!!!!!!!

MerylM:
UGH, I don’t know. That makes my stomach nervous. He’ll end up hating all of us.

Lipstickgrrrrl:
Lila, yeah. Meryl’s right. Just forget it. You’ll end up grounded until you’re thirty, and this time you won’t be able to see us, either. We can reskedge.

LawBreakR:
NO WAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We HAVE to do it on the equinox! I just feel it!

Lipstickgrrrrl:
It’s our INTENT, right, Meryl? We can do it anytime.

MerylM:
Right.

LawBreakR:
I will NOT put my life on hold just because I got unfairly busted for creating an empire out of forged siggys! Donald Trump would probably give me my own company if I was HIS kid.

MerylM:
But, you’re NOT Trump’s kid. You’re the POLICE CHIEF’S kid. GRASP THE DIFFERENCE, LILA! What if you get caught??

LawBreakR:
[scoff] I WON’T get caught, and anyway, my life already blows. Even if I did, what could he possibly do to make it worse?????????

Lipstickgrrrrl:
Famous last words.

LawBreakR:
Ha-freakin’-ha. I will not live under these conditions! I’m a human being! An American. I have RIGHTS!!!

MerylM:
Actually, as a teenager, not many. Not even as an American teenager, which we can discuss further sometime if you’re interested in the parameters of the law. And the bust was kind of a big deal. No offense!!! I’m not discounting your unique talent for forgery.

Lipstickgrrrrl:
LOL! Rights, [snort] You’re so dramatic, Lila. Maybe YOU should be in the stupid play instead of me.