Those people turned to listen, as did the group next to them, and there was no doubt that we were now the center of attention. The bombshell, as if not hearing Susie, reached her hand out to me, “You must be Lisa, are you, Lisa? Lisa Davenport?”
“Yes, yes, I am, and these are my friends Jessica and Alexis. Cody, I think you know, and the rest of his team.”
“Oh, hi guys.” Her smile seemed to linger on Chad a bit longer than necessary before turning her attention back to me.
“Come with me. Cody, you don’t mind if I steal her away for a minute, do you?”
“Yeah, I do.” She was stumped by his straightforward answer, but her easy laughter and winning smile showed that she was more laidback than most.
“I’m not going to run away with her; unhand the poor girl.”
“Where’re you taking her?” She rolled her eyes and looked back at me. I’d already guessed who she was by her approach and the next words out of her mouth confirmed it. “I’m Melissa Eldridge; I had a very nice chat with your mom this afternoon. I didn’t know we had the offspring of one of our chapter’s star alumni right here on campus.”
Cody relaxed beside me but still did not release his hold on me, which I saw out the corner of my eye was of great interest to Susie. “Oh, I don’t know about star.” The heck, I don’t. If there’s one place I know my mother shines, it’s in a social setting where she has to put her best foot forward.
“Of course. You must tell me what it’s like to have a legend for a mother. Is she as awesome as everyone says?” Okay, the evening was taking a strange turn. Who is this person she’s speaking of? A legend? Mom? What did she do? Raise the most money for some charity that the bigwigs in charge were going to take ninety-five percent of?
That’s not fair to mom; she’s very serious about her charity work, but what exactly was going on here? I kept a smile on my face while I wished I’d asked mom more about her sorority days. From what I recall, it had sounded more like a long list of never-ending socials and Chi Omega blah-blah-blah.
“So, Cody, can I take her? We’ll be back in a minute, I promise. You two should come with us as well as this concerns you.”
“It’ll be fine, Cody; I won’t go too far, I promise.” He let me go grudgingly, and I followed Melissa with Jess and Alexis bookending me.
There was another group of girls or young women waiting for us when we reached the room at the far end of the hall, and for some reason, they were all looking at me as if I had the answer to some burning question they had.
“This is her. Everyone, this is Lisa Davenport. Blaire Davenport, née Astor’s daughter.” They squealed and gravitated toward me, each with one question after the other. What exactly do these people think my mother has done? Susie was having a hard time not letting her face explode at all the attention I was getting, and I have to say it was a bit much, even for my purposes.
I knew mom would use her influence as a member, or is that past member, of this sorority, but I had no idea she’d lay it on as thick as she obviously had. They were falling all over themselves to fawn, and I was losing the plot. “It’s so nice to meet all of you. And this is Jessica and Alexis, the others who are interested in pledging.”
I almost kicked Jess when I thought she was going to huff at me again. If I’m here, she’s here. I need her for ballast because the way Susie’s breath is wheezing in and out of her lungs, I’m not long for this world. Poor thing, the evening hadn’t even started yet, and her friends were already doing all of the work for me.
And when Melissa, who was the president of the chapter, brought out the little leather-bound ledgers she’d hidden behind a floral arrangement on one of the side tables and held them out to us, I guess Susie Q had had about all she could stand.
“Melissa, what are you doing? This is against protocol. They didn’t even rush; no one voted….”
“Of course, we did.”
“Why wasn’t I informed?”
“Well, it was pretty much unanimous, and besides, we got a call from the head who okayed it. You can call and check with her if you’d like.” Even I knew that would be a big no-no. Though I certainly did wish she was that stupid.
She finally turned those venomous eyes my way, but all I had for her was a shrug of my shoulder that pretty much said, ‘sucks to be you.’ I guess Cody was watching us this whole time because he called out for me to come to him, and his tone did not leave room for argument.