Page 108 of Dream On, Ramona Riley

“I just need some air,” she said.

Or maybe yelled.

She couldn’t quite tell. Didn’t care.

“Sweetheart,” Carrie said. She was standing too. Following Dylan as she headed toward the front door, dragging the chair behind her.

“Don’t call me that,” Dylan said, hand on the heavy oak door.

“What?”

Dylan paused, turned around. “I’m not your sweetheart, Carrie. I’m not your perfect little daughter and I’m not swell and the show I played a lead on for six years is calledSpellbound. Spell.Bound.”

Carrie blinked at her, hurt filling her expression.

“No,” Dylan said, leaning against the door with her back, then pointing at Carrie’s face, the same ice-green eyes as Dylan’s tearing up. “You don’t get to look like that. Youdon’tget to look all—”

But she never got to finish her sentence, because the door flung open then, someone out on the street trying to get in, and Dylan went flying backward as all her weight had been resting against the solid wood. She stumbled, tried to catch herself, but she also had a chair in tow, and she ended up hitting the pavement hard, her ass first, but then she felt the skin of her elbows scrape, the chair landing perfectly upright and in a way that caged her in.

And that’s when it hit her.

It was official—she’d truly gone and lost it, Killin’ Dylan done in by a cute girl, great sex, and brunch with her too-famous parents. She felt her eyes fill up as she stared into the blue summer sky. She didn’t want to move. Wasn’t sure it was even worth it.

“Oh, honey,” she heard Carrie say, disappointment lacing her mother’s voice.

And then, another voice.

“Dylan?”

A face, replacing the cerulean sky, freckled and beautiful and perfect.

“Ramona,” Dylan managed to say. It wasn’t a question. A lament, maybe.

“God, are you okay?” Ramona bent down, her hands going to Dylan’s face—cradling it, really. “Did you hit your head?”

“That was a spectacular fall,” someone said. April maybe. Though when Dylan angled her neck to see, there was a third person there she’d never seen before. At least she didn’t think she had. Head full of dark curls, large black boots, definitely queer. A half-bored, half-curious expression on their face as they looked down at Dylan.

Maybe Dylan had hit her head. And if she didn’t, perhaps she needed to. Because she was lying on the sidewalk underneath a chair, drunk off her ass and wishing for a meteor to land on her right the hell now.

Except a meteor would also hit Ramona, and she liked Ramona.

“God, I like you,” she said, lifting her hand to touch Ramona’s face. “So much.”

“She’s drunk,” someone else said. Definitely April this time.

“Dylan, my darling,” her mother said, though there was no warmth in the term of endearment. “Why can we never have a simple conversation when you’re upset?”

“Holy shit,” April said. “I didn’t see you there. Carrie Page. You’re Carrie Page.”

“There she is.TheCarrie Page,” Dylan slurred. “Jack’s around here somewhere too, so don’t worry about me. Nope. I’ll just lie here in the middle of the street while you all lose your fucking minds over the two worst parents on the planet.”

A beat of silence.

Long enough for Dylan to wonder if she’d said that out loud, and fuck, the silence must mean she had. She wasn’t sure she’d even meant to, but there it was. The truth. Fine. Great. Let it fly.

“Help me get her up,” Ramona said.

“Not sure that’s wise,” said Curls.