"so, how is work?" Aria asked as they ascended the stairs.
Lily rolled her eyes. She felt insulted by this question. Why would Ariana, ask her about work when the little snake probably knew that she had no job?
"Work is just fine," she replied with a tight smile.
Ariana noticed how aunt's Lily's voice changed all of a sudden. She thought the woman probably had personality disorder. She was happy one moment and the next moment she got angry once again. Ariana soon learnt her lesson and decided to stay quiet. Who asked a person with a thousand behaviour?
They soon stepped unto the corridor and Ariana kept going behind Lily as she walked them to her room. They got to the door and Lily simply pushed it open and stepped in.
Her room wasn't anything that was worth commenting on. Except for the bed, which was scattered due to the business Lily and her husband spent the whole night doing, the room was arranged. One thing Ariana found fishy in the entire space was that it was too arranged for a room of someone who was still looking for her earring. Something smelt fishy.
"Here, help me lift it up," Lily made to lift but pretended it was too heavy. "Okay, let's go," she said and bent to lift as did Ariana. But the wood wouldn't move.
"Let's go," Lily said again energetically, but to no avail. This continued for the next ten minutes. And Ariana was getting tired of it. What exactly was she trying to do?
"I best be going now," Ariana excused herself, "probably have to wait till Matt, Noah or your husband comes back."
"Look here," Lily's tone had now changed. She was no longer nice, or better still, no longer pretending to be nice. "You have no place here. You'll never get married to Calhoun and you'll never be a part of this family. Better you run back to wherever ditch he picked you up from and stay there for good..."
Ariana was still digesting what Lily had said and how quickly she changes when a loud scream came from the kitchen downstairs. It was Bianca. Ariana rushed to see what had happened. Her heart was running as fast as a moving train. Thoughts about what might have caused such a scream ran into her head and she couldn't breath.
A lot of others had gotten there before Ariana. Somehow, Matt and Noah were both there. Everyone covered his nose and mouth with their hands, some with handkerchiefs. There was smoke everywhere.
Ariana held her breath, "Oh no," the food had got burnt. She had totally forgotten about it.
"Who is responsible for this?" Matt yelled. Everyone turned to Bianca for some explanation. Instead, she held her breath and made to go out.
"Where do you think you're going?" Grandfather intercepted her. "You want to burn down the house or what?"
"It's not really her fault grandfather," Lily spoke up as she came down the stairs. "It's this evil girl that your grandson brought to this house that has made it a mission to burn down this house. And ruin everything for the family."
Everyone turned to look at Ariana. She could never become familiar with this look on their faces. It was the same look she had gotten when she was accused of stealing Matt's credit card. The same look at the garden with the mutilated sunflowers. The same look, yet terrifying every time.
"Yes," Lily continued, "Bianca had left Ariana to check up on the food while she gets back, but Ariana got carried away and left the food to burn."
There was a gasp among the people gathered. Some were wondering why Ariana would do that. She was a sweet and nice girl, who was responsible and respectful. Or was she pretending all these while?
Ariana didn't expect anything less from Lily, but most surprisingly, she definitely didn't expect things to turn out like this. Now she was on a tight spot and there was no way she could defend herself.
"Because she comes from a family of wretchedness and wastage. She is here busy wasting food, and the money used to buy these food items, gone," Noah said, as if he cared about the money spent. No one really cared. It was just the fact that the food they were supposed to eat got burnt that they were acting up plus it was drama and Ariana was yet again the lead actress.
"Enough!" Grandmother hollered. "Let the young woman answer for herself." Even grandmother had left her soap opera for this moment. The drama hit different when it was happening right in front of you.
Ariana stood speechless. She had known that Lily would go to extra lenghts, but this... this was not anticipated.
"I'm sorry everyone," Ariana stammered. "I didn't mean to get the food burnt, and neither the house. I went out briefly to help aunt Lily with her wardrobe in her room. She said she was looking for her missing earring and I thought it wouldn't take long."
"This girl's a liar," Lily answered, "I didn't even see her in the kitchen. She came up to my room, entered without knocking and pretended that she wanted to help me." Lily lied making Ariana's heart sliced into half as she realised what the woman had played her with.
"But just now, you explained that Bianca had left Ariana to check up on the food, then how is it now that you're saying Aria was not even in the kitchen?" Grandmother tried to make sense of the whole thing.
Lily looked cornered.
"The fault is all mine," Bianca replied, "I shouldn't have left Aria all alone in the kitchen. I had to quickly attend to little Rosa. She broke one of her teeth."
"We're not talking about who broke who's tooth or not," Noah raised his voice, "we're more concerned about the person who is responsible for attempting to burn down this house."