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"Well, if you gave him the same look you're giving me, I'm not surprised." She clearly has no sympathy for my plight.
I glare at her. “For real? What? Should I have smiled? Thanked him?”
"Well, that depends,” she says, closing her menu and picking up her drink, her eyes alight with mischief.
“On what?” I ask. I cross my arms in front of my chest while I wait for her to answer.
"Well, let’s go down the list,” she says in a deadpan, formal voice.
I blink slowly, several times. “You’re serious. There’s a list of reasons why we forgive strangers’ transgressions?” I sputter, surprised but also thoroughly amused. My cousin is something else.
She steeples her hands in front of her and tilts her head as she considers me, as if deciding whether or not I deserve to know.
I’m apparently found worthy because she holds up her index finger and says, “First, was he foreign or local?”
“Foreign. English if I placed his accent correctly,” I answer automatically.
Her eyes light up and she smiles, but she continues with her list.
"Oh, that’s good. Secondly, was he good looking or just average?”
“He was very good looking," I say begrudgingly but truthfully. I don’t add that he’s probably the best-looking man I’ve seen in a long time.
“Oooh, very good. How old?” She holds up three fingers now.
“Maybe late twenties, early thirties,” I respond, sounding noncommittal but recalling his face clearly now. He was really very attractive. Too bad about the asshole thing.
She drops her menu and stares at me, her eyes narrow with disapproval and disappointment. "I don’t know if wealthy, good looking foreigners grow on trees where you come from. Cha-lay!” she exclaims, clapping her hands together for emphasis at the local word used to express everything from annoyance to joy. Her iteration is coated in incredulity. “If he'd spilled a drink on me, I would have smiled, thanked him and let him buy me dinner. There’s a lobster tail on this menu calling my name," she chides.
"You can't be serious.”
"I’m very serious. I'm a poor medical student. All my friends are poor medical students. Did you forget that the reason we're staying at that old house instead of this resort is because I can't afford it?"
"I told you I would pay for us both, Porsha," I remind her.
"No. It's one thing for rich strangers to buy me a meal, but I won't take charity from my family. The shame." She shivers in horror.
"Yes, much more shameful than getting some strange man, with the manners of jackal, to buy you a meal,” I quip dryly.
"How do you know what his manners are like?" she asks, her dark and dainty eye brows lifting in avid curiosity.
And since I won’t be telling her that he was less than gracious when I tried to turn him into a pleasure doll on the plane, I have to force my mind to fast forward to my list of grievances from this evening.
"Um, well, let’s see. For starters, he barely apologized, and then he blamed me for the accident," I say dryly, but I also hear the whine in my voice. It annoys me.
She rolls her eyes and picks up her menu. "Listen, you said you came to relax and have fun. To escape, to quote, your email.” Her eyes come back to mine, and they’re serious now.
“You’re so beautiful, Lillian. But, you look so sad.” I break our eye contact, not wanting her to see anymore. I thought it was well hidden. No one else seemed to notice.
Porsha’s hand covers mine, and when she gives it a squeeze, I look back at her. She smiles, her eyes kind, and I try to return the gesture. She lets go and picks up her menu again.
“Try to loosen up. Do things you wouldn't ordinarily do. Smile when you want to frown. That's what vacations are for. I only get two a year, and I
make sure to enjoy them. I’ve even chosen my holiday name." Her eyes dance with excitement.
"Holiday name? What in the world is that?” I ask, completely baffled.
"An alias. You know, so I don’t have to worry that reports will reach my mother that Porsha Tagoe was drinking with a strange man in the bar. While we’re here, I’m Bambi,” she says with a completely straight face.
