Fourth Comings_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [24]
Shea guffawed.
“What?” I asked.
“Huhhuhuhuh,” Shea chuckled. “You said clit.”
This proves it: I am living with Beavis and Sluthead.
“Well,” Manda said, “it’s slightly less humiliating than the three-carat solitaire Sara bought herself.”
“Ah yes,” I said, recalling our Pineville High classmate’s condition. “A carat for each trimester…”
“When’s she due, anyway?” Hope asked.
“Two weeks ago,” I answered.
“Ouch,” Hope and Manda said at the same time.
eighteen
I haven’t seen Sara in about six weeks, not since the babymama shower. I was the only one in Sammy invited. As you might recall, Manda and Sara were former BFF’s, the cornerstone of the Clueless Crew back in their Pineville High heyday. But Manda hasn’t forgiven Sara for so gleefully informing all of Pineville that the former had turned into a quote carpet muncher unquote in college. And Sara hasn’t forgiven Manda for so gleefully informing all of Pineville that the former had dropped out of college after getting knocked up after two minutes of unprotected passion in the Bamboo Bar parking lot.
I was not an obvious invitee. High school graduation brought with it many liberations, including my emancipation from the alphabetical guarantee that D’Abruzzi, Sara would be assigned to sit in front of Darling, Jessica in homeroom and every single honors class from seventh through twelfth grade. Since I threw my mortarboard into the air back in June 2002, my relationship with the guest of honor has consisted of rare, random run-ins around Pineville. I was only dragged to the shower by my sister, who felt obligated to attend because of her husband’s ongoing business partnership with Sara’s father, the Jersey Shore Junk Food King, Wally D’Abruzzi. These two families have gotten insanely wealthy off Americans’ insatiable desire for frozen custard and deep-fried dough, having opened up twenty-five new drive-through Papa D’s Donuts/Wally D’s Sweet Treat Shoppes in the past year alone.
Wally D spared no expense on his daughter’s celebration of accidental fertilization. But I don’t need to relive the gitchy-gitchy goo-goo gag-me details because it was hardly any different from a typically torturous baby shower. Not that you, Marcus, would have any idea, since you were lucky enough to be born with a penis. The only significant deviation was how there was more talk about the bride-to-be than the fetus-that-already-was.
“Omigod! You should see my Vera Wang!” Sara brayed. “It’s so quote Jessica Simpson unquote.”
“Scotty proposed?” I asked. “Uh…”
“Congratulations!” my sister chimed. “That’s fantastic!”
Sara flinched, then quickly recovered. “Well, we’re not technically quote engaged unquote,” she said brightly. “Not technically. But it’s like everything but technically. We’re living together, and he totally wants this baby.”
My eyes bulged in disbelief. Bethany elbowed my ribs to shut me up.
“It was practically his idea to have it! Any other guy would have wanted me to quote get rid of it unquote. But he was all like, ‘Do you want to keep it?’ and I was like, ‘Yeah, I totally do.’ And I know he totally wants to get married, so I’m just, you know, helping him out, getting things started because he doesn’t have a lot of money and I do, so…”
So Sara—unemployed college dropout and daughter of self-made millionaire Wally D’Abruzzi—bought herself the three-carat solitaire diamond that she will start wearing as soon as her ring finger shrinks to its prepregnancy size. Nothing Sara said could make me believe that this was anything other than a devious get-married gambit. By purchasing her own ring, Sara had put a new and demented twist on the classic Impregnation Equation:
ENGORGEMENT + ENTRAPMENT = ENGAGEMENT
“Think of all the bad girls who have been transformed by marriage,” she said at one point during her insane, estrogen-spiked monologue. “Christina Aguilera. Avril Lavigne. Pink. Omigod! Getting married is, like, the best makeover ever.”
There was only one little quote glitch unquote to getting