All the Pretty Lies Read Free Page A

true. “Let me see it.”
    “It’s still got plastic on it.”
    “So? You think I can’t see through plastic
wrap?”
    Reluctantly, I ease my pajama bottoms over
the film taped to my hip. Sig looks at it, a disapproving
expression clouding his face.
    “An oyster shell and two butterflies? What
the hell is that supposed to mean?”
    “That’s not all there is to it. That’s the
base of it. There will be more butterflies.”
    “Where?”
    “Going up my side.”
    “Sloane,” he begins warningly.
    “Sig,” I respond eyeing him right back. “It’s
my body, my life, my choice.”
    “But you’re—”
    “But nothing. Y’all have got to let me
live.”
    He rolls his eyes. “You still haven’t
answered my question. What’s it mean?”
    “I feel like I’ve lived inside a tight shell
my whole life. And now, finally, after all these years, I’m gonna
get to crack it open and spread my wings a little.”
    “But you know why they—”
    “I know why, Sig. And I love y’all for it.
But it’s time for me to live a little. To make my own choices and
do my own thing. Mom was Mom. But I’m me. Y’all can’t keep
me locked away, safe from the world, in a shell for the rest of my
days. Besides, there are some things you can’t protect me from, no
matter how hard you try.”
    Sig doesn’t say anything for a long time.
“When are you getting the rest?”
    “I go back tonight.”
    “Well,” he says, stirring a heaping spoon
full of creamer into his coffee. “Just don’t let Dad catch you
coming in. Or Steven.”
    “Yeah,” I say with a heavy sigh. “I’d
forgotten what a pisser it is having him around.”
    “He probably won’t be here for long. I feel
sure coming back here is cramping his style. I mean, it’s not like
he really chose it. Things just didn’t work out with him and
Duncan. Mark my words, he’ll be moved back out before
Christmas.”
    “You think?”
    “Hell yeah! He’s already looking for places
cheap enough for him to make rent on his own.”
    “Why don’t you go live with him? That would
help him out a lot.”
    Sig’s eyes get wide and his mouth drops open.
“Bite your damn tongue, devil woman! I’d rather eat a plate full of
cat shit than live with Steven for the rest of my life.”
    “It wouldn’t be for the rest of your life.
One of you is bound to get married eventually.”
    “Living with Steven, without anyone else as a
buffer? Trust me, it might as well be the rest of my life.
It sure would feel like it.”
    I can’t help but giggle. Poor Steven. He’s a
great guy, but he takes life very seriously and tends to be the
resident wet blanket in most cases. He takes after Dad. So does
Scout. Well, a little bit. He’s more of a split between both
parents, I guess, whereas Sig and I are both fun-loving. More like
Mom. But in fairness, Steven was older when Mom got sick, so he was
affected more profoundly. Not that we all weren’t devastated, but
he and Dad seemed to get the worst of it. Her sickness and
consequent death seemed to drain the life right out of them, at
least the part that makes people enjoy living.
    “He’s had a tough life, Sig. Cut him some
slack.”
    “You have, too.”
    “We all have.”
    “Yet no one uses it as an excuse to be an
asshole except Steven.”
    “It’s just the way he deals, Sig.”
    “Well, whatever the reason, I’ll be damned if
I’d subject myself to that shit on a daily basis for an extended
period of time. Growing up with him was bad enough.”
    “Yeah, but he made a great target for pranks,
didn’t he?”
    Sig looks down at me from his imposing
six-six height and grins. “Hell yeah, he did! You remember that
time we put laxatives in his birthday brownies?”
    I can’t help but laugh as I think of it. “He
couldn’t leave the house for two days. Thought he’d never come out
of the bathroom.”
    “Good times,” Sig says, carefully sipping his
coffee as he looks wistfully out the kitchen window. “Good
times.”
    And