A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea and Tomorrow - Laura Taylor Namey Page 0,25

and framed collages. I draw close to one. Black and white photos show the Great Wall of China and an endless bamboo forest. Desert sunsets and abstract sections of bridges and monuments. It’s like the world on a wall.

“My dad’s travels,” Orion says behind me.

“You ever go with him?”

“Not this far.” He points to a photo of a gigantic flat mountain. “Table Mountain in South Africa.”

“Ri, we’ve got it all set,” Jules calls from the kitchen. “I can only hold off these barbarians for so long.”

“Better hurry if your friends are anything like my family,” I say.

In less than five minutes Jules and Remy managed to artfully arrange plates of reheated food on Orion’s counter. They move around the kitchen like they belong here. Sliced roast beef with a thick, plummy glaze and tiny herb potatoes and roasted vegetables smell almost as good as they look.

Remy hands Orion a plate. “You first and we’ll slop up what’s left.”

“Like farm animals.” Gordon hands me a plate and grabs one for himself. “Should we save some for Flora?” He cranes his neck. “Where is she anyway?”

“At Katy’s for pizza and whatever else they do,” Orion says, piling his plate with Remy’s dad’s delicacies. “She meant to scram while, you know… but she’s got curfew.”

I’m no part of hungry, but I still take a bit of everything before joining Orion at a round farm table. Jules pulls a spare chair from the wall. She turns it so the spindled back rests against the table, then straddles it like a horse. Does this girl ever sit in chairs normally?

Remy and Gordon are last, plunking down five ice-cold bottles. I read the label—Oldfields Cider—and remember Orion’s old enough to buy alcohol here. I’m new to hard cider. My first sip is a burst of hoppy, tart, apple happiness. Not too bitter or sweet or anything. The cider is perfectly balanced, just like any proper dessert.

Doesn’t take long for Jules to become heavily acquainted with hers. She traps a belch into silence, but her chest still balloons with it.

“A toast,” Orion says, holding up his bottle, “to friends who don’t listen when you say stay the bloody hell away, you meddling-arse muppets.”

Snickers all around. “To Jules forgetting her song notebook in the rush over here,” Remy says and the toasts alternate between sips, with Gordon saluting Remy’s dad’s delicious food, and Jules acknowledging Remy for putting up with her moody creative spurts.

All eyes fall on me, the new girl with the new cider and old hurts. I try to keep them off the table. They don’t belong with friends like these, who drop everything for one of their own. “To having a better option than Netflix,” I say.

Four bottles tip toward mine. I drink again, feeling warm with sour apple and fizz.

“But a whole summer away,” Jules says after mostly swallowing her roast beef, “without your Miami friends. You must miss them loads.”

“I…” I’m certain I fail at hiding the wave of bitterness that pulls through me.

“Especially that one girl? The blond who was always around when we visited,” Gordon offers.

“Stefanie,” I say.

“Right. Couldn’t she come here for at least part of the time?”

Couldn’t she have told me her life-changing plans? Been honest? “Not when she’s in a remote village in Ghana.”

Eyebrows raise, forks rest, and once again, no one forces details from my heart. If I talk, it’s my choice. Add in the alcohol and the coziness of the small kitchen nook—it opens me. I turn to Orion.

“Not to hijack your night, but still, my friend stood me up for the next two years.” I give them a ten-second intro to La Paloma, and how I practically grew up in the bakery kitchen.

“Stefanie was supposed to be right there with me, like we’ve been since we were kids. Her plan was nursing school and working with us part-time. We were thinking of getting our own apartment next year.”

But this plan has cooled and changed into a completely new recipe. I tell the group about her health aid volunteer work.

“That’s major,” Orion says. “She didn’t lead on about Africa at all?”

“I had no idea. Her whole family came into my bakery twice a week, and nothing. Not until I went over and saw the huge duffel bag and Stefanie’s passport on her desk. “She said I would have tried to stop her from going. But I would have supported her and given her my blessing.” I have to push these last parts out. They want to