Watch for Me by Moonlight Read Online Free PDF Page B

spend good money, Merry reasoned aloud, on old worn-out guys like Will Brent?
    “I know it’s not for you, and shopping without buying must be like being allergic to cocoa and locked in a chocolate factory. But I’m actually glad you’re with me,” Mallory said. “I have no idea what looks good on me. I have no idea what looks good, period.”
    “The same sister who used to make puking noises whenever I got dressed up?” asked Merry, who never even went for a jog without lip-gloss and mascara. “You bought all those clothes last spring.”
    “Not dance clothes,” Mally said briefly. Mallory’s last shopping spree had been with her now-vanished friend Eden. “I humble myself to you, the patron saint of malls.”
    At that moment, Neely, Kim, and Erika came running up to greet them.
    “Mallory’s buying a dress for the formal,” Merry said, in case anyone missed it.
    “Mal, you could have used one of mine,” Neely said.
    “I think it’s time for me to step into semi-demi adulthood,” Mally said. “Kicking and screaming. At least, I have Wonder Shopper here to be my coach.”
    Kim was also shopping for a dress but wanted to go to the Little Luxie boutique instead of Hardwicke’s. Neely wanted a questionnaire book and the notes for Romeo and Juliet, and Erika had serious skincare shopping to do. Mallory was silently grateful that no one but her sister would see her trying to get something to look sexy on a body that was basically shaped like a very tall and slender fire hydrant or a very short lamp post.
    The dress the twins found did the trick.
    It was black and hung straight to a few inches above Mallory’s knees. It was spangled in a way that looked lush instead of trashy— flexible and free, almost like something from nature. It showed off her strong shoulders instead of her nearly nonexistent boobs. The girls each had one pearl earring they could make into a pair (each twin had three piercings in her ears, the first one made at birth so their parents could tell one from the other). Then Merry insisted that her twin buy silver pumps with three-inch heels.
    “It’s a dance!” Mallory complained, after she got the pumps on her feet. They fit, but she had to grasp the row of chair backs in La Bou and struggle to a mirror. “The specific purpose is to dance. If I try to dance in these, I’ll end up with a broken ankle.”
    “You’re such a deef,” Merry said. “You have a week to practice. Lean on the balls of the foot. Yes. That’s right. Push down and step. Push down and step....”
    “Wow, Mallory! You look like a runway picture,” said a soft, sweetly accented voice, and both girls looked up to see Babysitter Number Two, Sasha Avery. “Is Owen okay? You never called me the other night, Miss Merry. I had to call your mom!”
    “I’m sorry, Sasha,” Merry said. “We were so freaked out that night.”
    “Never mind,” Sasha said. “Those are truly fabulous shoes, I have to admit. And not too matchy-matchy with the dress you had on.”
    “Oh thanks! Oh help! Yikes! I’m so bad at this. I thought I could get out of here without anyone seeing me,” Mallory told her. “I feel like a complete idiot, and these things already kill my calves.”
    “Heels take getting used to,” Sasha said. “At my old job ... at my old school, girls wore them all the time with everything. Even jeans. You got so used to it, it was like wearing flip-flops for me. Now I’ve gotta find something that will work with the kind of dress we wore in Dallas, as in with two crinolines and a corset.”
    “What’s a crinoline?” Merry asked.
    “It’s a big puffy skirt that goes under your dress. Yeah, I know, right, it is kind of dumb,” she held up her hand to wave off a protest. “But it gets you noticed. It’s a big gigantic slip, so the dress stands out like a Cinderella dress. Like in the Civil War? Girls didn’t wear those little shift thingies down there, though I have to get one. They are really