A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea and Tomorrow - Laura Taylor Namey Page 0,29
As for the other two, my boyfriend of three years dumped me about six weeks ago. And my grandmother. My abuela.” I meet him face to face. “She died of a heart attack in March. That was her flan recipe tonight.”
“Wow, that’s a lot at once.” He looks at the floor then up at me. “I’m so very sorry. And those aren’t just throwaway words. I get it—loss like that.”
“I know. I still have my mom, though. She and my dad are amazing. They raised me.” My voice wobbles. “But Abuela… grew me.”
Unlike my mass of hair tumbling in thick waves, my hands are small and slight. He reaches tentatively for the one resting near his thigh, covering when I accept with a single nod, bending my fingers into a circled fist. A miniature planet inside the tight gravity of his hold. My eyes drift closed. I’ve missed this. No, not just a guy, alive and warm at my side. But someone, other than family.
Orion listens, too. Upstairs, Flora’s lug-soled footsteps stamp the ceiling. Bits of her muffled phone conversations seep through heating vents. Soon, we finish our drinks and find ourselves strolling the St. Cross neighborhood toward the Crow.
Rain fell while I was away. We walk in tandem, feet striking soaked pavement. But it’s taking longer than when I walked over with his friends. “Is this another way?”
The outline of his smile shifts under the glow of streetlamps. “Longer, yes. Thought I needed it after two slices of flan.”
I toss out a laugh. “You mean three.” We both swerve to dodge an extra-deep puddle. “Sorry again about Charlotte.”
“Yeah. I fancied her, but I’ve already brushed that one off. I don’t play games.”
The word sounds through my head, telling me it’s time to forfeit a game I can’t win anymore, either. Here, against the dark blanket of tree canopies and the strength of old brick walls, I stop playing one with England. Fine, I tell this little medieval town. You’re not so bad. Happy now?
We round a corner I recognize. Passing the church, then the walled courtyard with its saintly, dormant fountain, we reach the inn. Lights shine behind second-floor windows.
Orion stops me at the arbor gate. “You and the others, but mostly you, made my night un-suck, so thanks for that.” He’s so close. The kind of close where anyone passing by could mistake us for a starlit couple, moments away from kissing. But we’re not. We are Lila Reyes from Miami and Orion Maxwell from Winchester.
“May I ask something of you?” The sweet-sour tang of hard cider rolls off his breath.
I flinch and shiver a little. Maybe it’s the cold. “You may,” I say with my own playful jab at his formality.
He snorts faintly. “What I’m about to suggest—I don’t mean to be awkward, Lila.”
Usually when people lead with that, it means awkwardness is following right behind them like a puppy. “You could have said you don’t mean to be British.”
This earns a laugh, both deep and bright. When it fades, he says, “See, even though it’s cold right now, summer is on the rise and so are the temps. And I’d hoped Charlotte would be around to do things with. There’s the cinema and some fun events that come around yearly. And Jules’s band, Goldline, plays all sorts of cool gigs.”
I tense. “You want me to be your stand-in Charlotte?” I am no one’s stand-in anything.
“No. Not at all. I get what you’ve been through. You just broke it off with that bloke. What was his name?”
“Andrés.” Andrés Christian Millan.
His brows jump. “Andrés. Now that’s a marquee name.” I move to duck my head, but his next words are right there, chinning me up. “Lila, what I’m proposing is more like an arrangement.”
“So is prostitution. You’re not helping yourself here.”
Orion exhales heavily. He rubs his face, forehead to chin. “I understand why you turned down my offer the other night—Mrs. Wallace urging me to show you around.”
My bottom lip drops.
“But she was right about one thing. You can’t possibly live in that kitchen all the time. You should get out, and not just by yourself. So my very decent proposal is this: I’ll show you around, and you can be my plus-one. It’s all me asking this time. Not my friend’s mum.”
It’s the same offer, but also, completely different. Tonight, it’s genuine. I try out my answer in my head. Miami will still be waiting even if I do a better job at living where I am,