#5 Icing on the Cake (7 page)

“Are you nervous about it? Shelby said she took you shopping after school the other day so you got a cute dress. I hear the plans are to go to a tree-lighting celebration and dinner. You don't seem excited? You don't feel any pressure from this guy do you?”

My mom was going in so many different directions. The attorney in her was coming out, and she was doing her investigation, probing trying to figure out what was wrong with her baby girl.

So, since I was that important to her and I really did need her advice I said, “When should
a person stay out of other peoples' business even when they know the information they have is life threatening?”

“Well, if it's that dire, then you need to come to people you trust,” my mom said as she squinted.

Trying to calm her, I shouted, “I'm not saying it's me!”

I could tell she didn't believe me, but, grinning, she said, “Oh, okay. Well whoever it may be needs to come to someone they trust like their parents. Seriously, Yuri, is there something you want to talk about? Something you need to say? I know I've been a million miles an hour. It seems over the last few months, you girls have been going through so much.”

My mom was right. If it wasn't Shelby being caught in the middle as her boyfriend dealt with a domestic violence situation or Ansli having to deal with a homeless boyfriend, it was Slade mixed up with some guys dealing drugs or Sloan uncovering all kinds of corruption going on at school. Now it seemed to be my turn. I had three big things on me. I was scared for
Logan. I was petrified of Ms. Pinky's ways, and I still was really worried about my dad's health.

Before I could figure out a way to just talk to her, Sloan busted in her office and said, “There you are, Yuri! Come here, I need you to see something.”

“Well, let it wait for a minute, honey. I'm talking to your sister.”

“It can't wait, Mom. It can't wait,” Sloan screamed in a panic.

“Is everything okay?” she asked Sloan. I wondered the same thing.

Sloan nodded, but the panic was all in her face. Something wasn't right. So I kissed my mom on the cheek and followed my sister upstairs to her room.

“What's going on?” I asked.

Sloan pointed. “Look, online.”

“What am I looking at?”

“Read it,” she said as her body started shaking like she was having a conniption.

My sis had me worried. I looked at the screen. I held my breath, seeing there were several negative comments floating around out
there about Logan from her being a freak to her being an imbecile. It just was stupid nonsense, but the negative posts were growing.

The last one said, “She'd be better off dead than to show her face back around Marks High School. Marks is no place for sluts.”

“But then look at this post from Logan,” Sloan said, pointing to the computer screen.

My heart dropped when I saw the words Logan had typed “I'm done.”

I couldn't hold back the emotion. It was the weekend, and I didn't have Logan's number, but, instantly, I needed to talk to her. I needed to make sure what I was assuming she was saying wasn't really how she felt. Helping her was what I had to do.

“I got to talk to her. I got to calm her down. This isn't good!” I squealed.

Sloan bellowed, “For sure you're right. This isn't good.”

“Is she going to take her own life, Sloan? Oh my goodness! Why are these people being so mean on here?” I asked as my eyes watered.

“People who know they can get to you, they gnaw and pick until you have nothing left. You know I learned that going through that stupid scandal.”

My sister was right. She had always been a tough girl, but having naked images of her floating around the school made her feel like worthless. But she kept her head up high, and we Sharp sisters supported her, and she got through it. People really felt bad for her when it was all revealed that she didn't even take the picture of herself. Sloan texted a couple of other people. Somehow my sister got Logan's home number.

As soon as I dialed it, I heard a male voice say, “What now?”

His harshness made me barely want to speak, but I mustered up the strength because I knew I needed to. “Can I please speak to Logan?”

He shouted, “You leave my daughter alone!”

“Sir, I'm a friend of hers,” I said, hoping that would make a difference.

“Yeah right, a friend? Who are you?”

“My name is Yuri Sharp. I go to school with
Logan. Can you please tell her I want to talk to her?”

“No! And don't call this house again!”

“But sir, I need to make sure she's okay!”

“Don't call this house again,” her father barked, slamming the phone down in my ear.

I got off the phone even more worried about Logan because she had to live with that tough man. No telling what thoughts were going through her mind. But there was nothing I could do. I just had to hope she was going to be alright.

“Come on, Yuri. Avery's here!” Slade knocked on my door and screeched out.

Avery was my sister's boyfriend, and while Slade could sing, Avery could blow. He actually had a record deal with Mundy Records too, but his was not just for distribution. He was their new up-and-coming artist. His new single dropped the month before, and it was blowing up.

“Come on. Come on!” Slade pounded and said again.

“She's coming, goodness,” Sloan told her.

“Yeah, I got to make sure baby sis is just right,” Shelby said, as she tweaked and tweaked and tweaked on my outfit.

I had to admit, I looked fly. Sporting a black, short, leather skirt, some black tights that had a design on them, sweet, funky wedge boots, and a sweater shirt that Shelby created that hung just low enough to be cool and just high enough to be sort of sexy. Slade was getting so upset because my door was locked. My sisters knew they weren't turning me loose until they were ready for me to go, and Ansli stood at the door once Shelby was finally done and snapped tons of pictures.

“It's not like I'm entering into a fashion show or anything,” I said to them.

“You're going on your first date. We've got to capitalize on this moment,” my sister said to me as she hugged me tight.

Ansli whispered, “Mom and Dad would be so proud.”

I knew she meant our biological parents. We very rarely talked about them, but every
now and then, when it was a special moment, we both connected … hating that they weren't there. I probably moved past it a little bit more than my sister. She was a couple years older than me, so she remembered our parents more than I did. She also took it pretty hard when she learned that they didn't just die in an accident. When we did more digging, we learned that my dad was depressed when he got released by one of the NFL teams for taking steroids. Somewhere along the way that messed him up. He became angry, bitter, and depressed. He took my mom's life and then his. As I pulled back from Ansli and saw the tear in her eye, I knew she was thinking about all of that. But we were okay now. We were still alive, and we did need to make them proud and remember the good.

Finally when we opened the door, Slade yanked me out of it. She was running and not letting go of my arm. We almost tripped going down the stairs.

“Slow down,” my mom said to both of us, dipping her head to the left so we could see we had company.

There was her date standing at the door. I guess Slade thought he was in the car. She stopped running down the stairs then. My sister was all smiles, looking at the hottie who was becoming a rising R&B star.

“You both look lovely,” Avery said, making us both blush.

Slade reached in and gave him a big hug. She looked back at our mom before exiting and winked. My sister liked this guy. The smile in his eyes made me know she had feelings for the right one.

“Take care of your sister tonight,” my mom said to Slade.

Slade was locked arm in arm with Avery and jabbed, “I got her, even though she made him wait.”

“Oh no, it was no problem,” Avery said, another reason why I liked him.

When we got to the tree lighting ceremony, Avery kissed Slade on the cheek and said,

“I got to go to the back. Mr. Mundy told me they want me to sing.”

“Are you late?” Slade said, looking over at me.

“No, no, no, I'm cool. It was last minute, so they're just happy I can do it,” he said, and I stuck out my tongue at my sister.

“Cool. I'm gonna find Charlotte, and we'll see you out here for ice skating.”

“Ohhhh, I can't ice skate,” he said to his girl.

“If I'm going to ice skate, you're going to do it. We'll fall down together,” Slade said, looking at Avery all goo-goo eyed.

“That's wassup,” he said, as he kissed her and dashed off.

“You really like him,” I told my sister.

“Well, you look cute. But next time we got to go, don't let our sisters make you late. It's not cool.”

“I'm sorry. I am nervous though.”

“Don't be. You're adorable. This guy wanted to go out with you. I only met Charlotte's brother once, but he's a cutie. I just didn't know you were into the vanilla like that, girl. I like my coffee like mom.”

She nudged me, and I nudged her back and said playfully, “With a little cream in it.”

“Uh oh little sis!”

“Whatever, you're not that much older than me.”

“Right, right, right.”

“There he is! There he is!” I said, with more excitement than I knew I had as I saw Paris skating extremely comfortably. “I can't skate like that.”

“Well, it looks like you'll have him to hold you up. Where's his sister?”

We both looked for her singing partner, and I froze when I spotted her. “I see Charlotte and umm …”

I didn't know how to describe it so I just pointed. Charlotte's lips were on another girl's lips. Slade was clearly shocked. Her eyebrows raised, and her mouth hung open.

“Oh my gosh! What is she doing? We got to end this. She can't be out in public kissing on a girl. I thought she was here with her date.”

Popping her in the side, I said, “It looks like that is her date.”

“Oh, nu uh. I am not having this,” Slade said, wiggling her finger back and forth.

“You might own the record label, but you
don't own Charlotte. What's wrong with it anyway? What if she is with a girl?” I questioned.

“Uh!” Slade yelled out, heading straight over there to Charlotte.

I tried to stop her, but she headed straight to Charlotte. “What's all this? Who is this? I thought I was meeting your boyfriend.”

“No, I told you I was coming with a date,” Charlotte calmly told her, holding the taller brunette's hand as they swung them back and forth, obviously smitten with each other.

Slade got louder, working her neck and hips, trying to tell Charlotte what to do. Paris startled me when he came up behind me. I turned around.

“You look beautiful,” he said.

“Thanks,” I bashfully uttered as he leaned in and hugged me.

Slade said, “See that Charlotte, that's what's natural. What you're doing is crazy? I'm not going to be in a group with somebody who is …”

“What? You can't accept me? Then I don't need to be in a group with you. You're not my dictator, Slade. Come on, Jenna,” Charlotte said to her date, and they were gone.

“Oh so you just gone walk off and leave?” Slade yelled from behind, but Charlotte didn't turn around.

It was getting ugly. I was so excited when the music started playing and Avery came on the stage. All Slade's yelling halted when she gave in to his beautiful voice.

I leaned over to my sister and said, “Now you see, that's what Christmas is about, loving on people, accepting them for who they are.”

“Don't start, Yuri. We have an image to uphold. Charlotte's ticking me off. We're not staying because I don't want to run into her tail no more. You'll have to see this Paris guy another time.” Slade walked towards the stage.

My sister and Charlotte were at an impasse. Paris and I were caught in the middle. I was a little disappointed that I wasn't going to get to hang out with him. However, I was so nervous about skating and having his arms wrapped around me that I was okay with having to postpone.

“At least let me buy you hot chocolate or something. You can come with me while I take
my skates off,” he said, overhearing that I had to go soon.

“I just don't know what my sister's problem is.”

“Uh, my mom has the same problem, but Charlotte is her own girl, and Jenna's cool,” Paris explained.

“They seem happy.”

“I want to be happy with you. Can we talk about that?” he said, getting closer.

“Can we get some hot chocolate?” I laughed and said, before I was startled, looking up to find Ms. Pinky with another stand.

The lady was everywhere. Paris sat down on a nearby bench and took off his skates. I walked to the dessert stand. She dropped two cookies, picked them up, blew them off and put them back inside a plastic bag to sell. I was stunned.