Free The Wrong Girl by Zoe Foster Page B

lip dropped in faux sadness, missing the several undisguised hints in Lily’s sentence.
    â€˜We’ll be soooooooo quiet,’ Simone said earnestly. ‘We’ll be real good for my Lil.’ But then the manchild pulled down his undies, and with not a lick of shame or modesty, stepped into the bath, and awkwardly clambered down so that he was sitting under the water. This, of course led to even louder shrieking and laughter and splashing, which Lily took as her cue to leave.
    As she walked out and down the hallway to her room, she heard Simone call her name.
    â€˜Babe, would you, do you miiiiiind, is it possible for you to maaaaaybe bring up another bottle of champs? Is that okay? Have some! Have some with us!’
    â€˜You should come in!’ Skye squealed with excitement, as if she’d not just thought of that idea a few minutes ago.
    Lily decided there was no point trying to quash this mess, and, sighing, slunk downstairs to the fridge.
    Arriving at work the next day with the dregs of a double latte clasped in her hand, feeling like an elf had snuck in during the night and slipped her a handful of sleeping pills, Lily couldn’t believe she was expected to function. She put this down to her topless flatmate and simple friends having carried on until three a.m. before finally taking whatever it was they took to sleep and crashing out in the lounge room, with several candles burning and loud music playing.
    Lily was surprised to see Dale and Jack chatting by Dale’s desk. Mostly because ‘chatting’ to Dale was harder then putting toothpaste back in its tube, but also because Jack really did seem to be the world’s friendliest man to everyone except her. Today, she did not care. She had a job to do. As did he, more importantly.
    Eliza was doing her usual thing of not a lot, sitting in her office for a few minutes, then coming into the green room to graciously fawn over the talent, then retreating again. This made her look both busy
and
important, neither of which was very accurate. Sasha, on the other hand, was locked away in the production room, making sure every second of the show would be the very best it could. She was barely seen until after the show, unless she liked what had been cooked in Lily’s segment, in which case she would be first on set to claim.
    â€˜You got hayfever, Lily Woo? I’ve got tablets for that. They make you feel like Alice in Wonderland, it’s fucking
glorious
,’ Alice said, walking past Lily with a tray of coffee for her talent, an adorable brother-sister interior-design duo from Brisbane.
    â€˜No?’ Lily said, confused. ‘Oh . . . I get it. I look like shit. Simone had a bender, I got zero sleep.’
    â€˜Did she break your stupid bet?’ Alice asked, clearly thrilled at the idea.
    â€˜No, well, not that I
know
of. She and Skye
did
bring a male model home with them, but he seemed more interested in dancing with his own reflection in the mirror. ‘
    Alice laughed.
    â€˜Hey, get this,’ said Lily. ‘I ran into Jack yesterday at Delugi Brothers. He was so rude, didn’t even say hello, just told me I had something on my shoe, and then something on my face.’
    â€˜Well, did you?’ Alice asked seriously.
    â€˜Yeah, but, who does that?’
    â€˜Was he supposed to
not
say something?’
    â€˜Well,
I
thought it was rude. He’s rude and abrupt and weird and rude.’
    Alice cocked her head to one side, a sly smile spreading over her face. ‘I smell a crush. A filthy big sex crush.’
    Lily rolled her eyes. ‘You think everyone has a crush on everyone. You thought I had a crush on bloody Dale, for God’s sake. I can tell you in no uncertain terms that I do NOT have a crush on Jack, because not only is that predictable, but he is consistently offensive.’
    â€˜We only get angry with those we have feelings for. Didn’t your earth-mother tart of a