Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen - Dyan Sheldon [72]
“Uh-oh,” said Sam. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“What?” asked Ella, her back to Carla.
“She smiled,” said Sam.
“Are you sure?” asked Ella.
The way they were carrying on, you’d think they were two Red Guards talking about Stalin. He scratched his ear this morning… Well, someone’s off to the firing squad…
“She’s bluffing,” I said airily. “She doesn’t want everyone to know she spent yesterday crying her eyes out.” I grabbed both of them by the arm and steered them towards the entrance of the lounge. “Come on,” I said. “Let’s watch Carla Santini eat humble pie.”
Everyone turned around as Ella, Sam and I stepped into the lounge.
“Well, if it isn’t the Great Pretender!” called Carla.
“Kill her now,” muttered Sam.
The smile that had been on Carla’s face since she saw us grew like a cancer. “Come to hear what the Sidartha party was like?” she crowed.
As if she’d said something hysterically funny, the rest of them laughed.
“Why would we want to hear what you have to say?” I asked sweetly. “Ella and I were there, remember?”
This, apparently, was even funnier than what Carla had said.
Alma started shrieking hysterically. “Oh, my God!” Tears of laughter watering her mascara, she turned to Carla. “Did you hear that? She said they were there!”
Marcia gave me a pitying look. “You know, lying’s not going to help you,” she said as though she wanted to be helpful. “Everybody already knows that you didn’t go.” She shook her head, baffled, as many of us are, by human behaviour. “How could you think you’d get away with it?” she wondered aloud. “Nobody who isn’t an idiot believed you in the first place.”
“That’s right!” chimed in Tina. “I mean, you? The only way you’d get into a party like that is if you were one of the waitresses.”
I stood there, taking their abuse, staring at Carla in shocked disbelief. She had no intention of eating humble pie; it wasn’t on the Santini menu. She was going to lie through her teeth, and make it her word against mine.
“Don’t you pretend you didn’t see me!” I was calm, but strong. I stood up straight. “I know you did.” I sent a sneer in Tina’s direction. “And don’t you tell me the only way I’d get into a party like that is as a waitress. It just so happens that Ella and I got in with Stu Wolff. After we practically saved his life.”
Carla gestured to the photographs spread out on the table in front of her. “There’s the proof,” she purred. In case I was too thick to get what she meant she explained. “Those are my pictures from the concert and the party. Lola isn’t in one of them. But Stu is.” Her smile was Antarctica with lipstick. “Now how could you have been saving his life, Lola, when he never left the party all night?” She made a helpless gesture to her audience. “Why isn’t Lola in any of the pictures?” Her expression became sweetly sly. “It’s not like she’s camera shy, is it?”
Another round of laughter greeted this insightful witticism.
“Bride at the wedding … corpse at the funeral…” muttered Alma.
I wanted to turn the tables on her. I wanted to say that she had taken a photo, but she was pretending that she hadn’t. Only Ella was there. I’d promised her I wouldn’t lie any more, and I definitely wasn’t going to when she could hear me.
“You’re not going to get away with this,” I said instead. “Ella and I were at that party. My dad and Stu are even going climbing together – sometime.” When Stu got back from finding himself in India.
That, unfortunately, was the wrong thing to say.
Carla went off like a siren. “Your dad? But you don’t have a dad, Lola. Ella’s mother told my mother that your father died before you were born.” She turned her lethal smile on Ella. “Isn’t that true?” she asked.
It was obvious that our adventure really had changed Ella. She recovered more quickly from this sudden attack than I did.
“If you say so, it must be true,” said Ella sarcastically but without strictly lying. “All I know is that Lola’s father is very much alive and living on the Lower East