CHAPTER 2: The Stupid Party.

"Whatever, mom!" I say. She has just forced a frilly blue girly-looking dress onto me and I am squirming below deck, trying to peal my way out of it. Taylor struts into the room looking perfect in her indigo silky dress that trails down, covering her black Mary-Janes. I huff. As I peer into the mirror, I see myself. Taylor looks beautiful, and I look tattered and forced with my ratty brunette hair and bright green cat-eyes. Taylor is blond-haired and blue-eyed just like my mom is. Now Chase come in flashing us a super white smile and shining in his brown tuxedo. Chase looks like mom, too. His hair and skin are both pale and he is tall but farely muscular. We are all going to be heading up deck for a special ceremony of some sorts. Actually, though, it is more of a party in celebration of Dave and mom. It's not like they're married or engaged or anything but Dave's Hawaiin and his super-friendly family wanted to host this shindig in honour of Dave finding love or something cheesy like that. Anyway yeah, here I go to celebrate something I am fuming about. In fact my face is beet red from anger (and sweating). Mom is the prettiest of us, with her brown highlights glistening and her red silk-soft dress reaching down to her pale white knees. Her hair is swept back into a friendly, but elegant up-do and her makeup is not but red lipstip.
"OK, Anna, brush your hair; Taylor do your makeup if you need to; and Chase, find some shoes," orders my mom. I hed over to the mirror the sits on an old stained dresser. I feel around and find a hairbrush, designed to straighten my tangly mess I call hair. Today, it is leaning and moping around the back of my head, and stick out off the top as if I have a rats' nest up there. Once it's brushed and straightened, though, I look quite fine. Not compared to Taylor and mom--or even Chase, for that matter. Finally, 20 minutes later, we are looking clean and dressy so we head up to the loust boat deck or whatever you call the top of the yacht. Many people I don't know are standing aroung in silk designer dresses or traditional Hawaiin ones that still look elegant (to them). I have never been to one, but I've seen them in movies and stuff, so to me, this looks like one of those office parties where you're supposed to go up and make small talk with people you don't even remember the name of, and the whole time you're talking to them, you are trying to guess their name in your head. Yeah. But at this party, instead of mini sandwiches and coffee, there is ounch and bowls of fruit and stuff. Some random people in the corner are doing some traditional Hawaiin dance. Mom says it isn't a Hula but I say all the dances must be the exact same then. Dave rushes over to mom and grabs her slim, soft hand in his rough, tense fingers. "Layla Shonon, may I take this dance?" he asks, jokingly. Mom laughs (her name, in case you haven't guessed, is Layla Shonon). Then they sweep onto the dance floor and start a Hawaiin-ballroom mixture thing. Finally the lights, dim and a spotlight fades onto mom and Dave. Everyone claps and Dave yells something in his parents language. Then, to my surprise, instead of leaning in to kiss mom, he kneels.
"Layla Aubrey Anne Shonon, will you marry me, my dear?" he pleads.
I already know mom's answer, and personally I think it'a dumb of Dave to propose to her while we are half-way to the island on a boat in the middle of the ocean. Because now, he's just gonna have to turn this thing around and go back home. Maybe he'll even have to push us Shonons right off the boat and have us swim the rest of the way home.
"Yes. Yes, Dave. Yes!" mom squeals.
I gasp. How dare she?