“Okay.” I took in a deep breath. “I didn’t tell you this on the first night that we saw him, but I didn’t tell Linh either. I just didn’t want you guys making a big deal of it while we were there in front of him.”
The faint smile on Adriana’s lips was getting fainter. “What? Just tell me,” she said, dropping her hands from around Harry’s neck.
I let go of the long breath. “Daniel’s my teacher. Was. My teacher. I had him for English my senior year in high school. And I had a huge crush on him then. Everyone did.”
Both Adriana and Harry stared at me now. “What?” Harry shook his head and blinked. I ignored him to wait for Adriana’s reaction. Her full lips parted slowly and more and more until her jaw hung wide open.
“Oh. My. Fucking. God!” she shrieked with laughter. “And I was airing out your sex life in front of him? That’s amazing!” She was in a fit of giggles now and Harry was back to laughing though he probably wasn’t sure about what — all he needed to know was that Adriana’s arms were now winding behind his back, her hands slipping into his back pockets. “I’m so sorry, Nina. It was so much fun though! And hey, it got you drinks with him, so I was essentially your wingwoman that night!” She squealed, throwing her head back onto Harry’s shoulder. “God, it would’ve been even better if I’d known who he was!” she laughed, though it slowly began to wind down as realization gleamed in her hazel eyes. There was a pause. “So, you told Em who he was that night?” she asked.
Uh oh. “Yes.”
“Does Linh know?”
“I had to ask her to get Daniel’s number for me after he got into it with Ben at my brother’s graduation party. I couldn’t just ask around, it would be suspicious.”
Adriana nodded, her gaze elsewhere now. Harry, however, looked at me with an expression that said, You’re in trouble.
I closed my eyes for a second. “You’re mad that I told you last.”
Adriana didn’t miss a beat. “I’m mad that you’re still acting fucking weird around me.”
“Later,” Harry said quickly, removing Adriana’s hands from his pockets and backing away to the other end of the bar.
“You’re not dating Ben anymore,” Adriana pointed out though she still didn’t look at me, busying herself with bashing a big clump of ice cubes apart with the metal scooper. “So why are you acting like I’m still some crazy slut who you have to avoid? I know he didn’t like me, Nina. I know he thought I was a bad influence on you and that I’d make you cheat on him or something, or that I’d turn you into a lesbian — I don’t fuckin’ know. But you’re not dating that asshole anymore so think for yourself for the first time in three years and stop letting him brainwash you and tell you who to like and what to believe. I’m not a dangerous person, I’m your friend. I’m the person that you were your real self with, and don’t give me that shit about how you spent only eight months out of twenty-one years being crazy with me because those were the only eight months that you weren’t living under someone else’s roof and letting them dictate everything you did and said and wore. You told me that you hated your mom’s snotty brunches, Ben’s bougie fundraisers, all those stuffy places he brought you where you couldn’t be yourself. That you missed just having a beer at a crappy bar and watching the Mets game. That he didn’t have your stupid, silly humor and it made you feel self-conscious. I remember these things.” Her laugh was bitter. “Total shocker, right? Since I’m supposed to be the drunk chick who blacks out every night because she’s only good for partying.”
I was silent. My skin prickled and my head buzzed. My body was telling me to be angry for being told off, but everything Adriana said was true. I just couldn’t admit it yet or say anything at all because while it was true, it stung like a bitch to hear. She cocked an eyebrow at me.
“And let me guess — you’re moping because your teacher won’t hang out with you again. He got into with Ben and now he’s scared of getting into more trouble, right? So let me tell you what to do.” She stabbed the pile of ice with the scoop so that the handle stuck out from the middle. “Forget him. If he’s too scared to see you because it’ll upset the stuck-up assholes in your town, then he doesn’t deserve to see you. Forget about him and just live again. For you, not for Ben or your mom or this guy who’s too obsessed with his image to get to know you better when he obviously wants to. You’re twenty-one. You’re beautiful and you have friends who love you. There’s nothing you need to be torturing yourself about right now. Be yourself, stop letting people control you like you’re a puppet or a mindless idiot and have some real fucking fun again. Please.”
Since I couldn’t put my thoughts together before our shift started, the next few hours were quiet between me and Adriana. I had said something along the lines of “I’m sorry,” but I couldn’t help following it with, “There are things I need to explain to you so you’ll understand why I was with Ben for so long,” which Adriana snorted at. And inwardly, so did I. Staying with someone like Ben for the sake of my parents’ financial security was beyond inane, and I knew it.
And so we went through the motions of a shift without speaking to each other. Harry kept giving us looks, shaking his head and muttering “women” before going about his drink making.
It took till past midnight for the silence to be broken. I was returning to the near empty dining room from the walk-in fridge when Adriana rushed to me, pushing me back towards the kitchen doors as panic darted about her eyes.
“Nina. He’s here. Table ten.”
“What?” I looked up and past her, my stomach lurching when I noticed Ben just ten yards away with two others who sat facing away from me. “Shit,” I breathed.
“Jenn says we can’t kick him out,” Adriana whispered apologetically, cursing our manager under her breath. Once a waitress among us, Jenn usually had the girls’ backs, but apparently not tonight. Adriana offered an explanation though. “It’s ‘cause he’s here with Joey Mills.”
Of course Ben brought Joe Milakovich. Any friend of Joey Mills’ was a friend of Todos Santos’. He was a VIP and regular whom everyone loved for dropping e
xorbitant amounts of cash and tipping thirty percent every time. He also worked at Kinsley Weiss, the same hedge fund as Ben and had brought him in three years ago, on what Ben had proclaimed to be his first and last visit to a place so “cheap and shitty.” On that night, I’d caught his eye and he’d taken my number before leaving after one beer and saying something about how the chairs in our dining room didn’t even match. After his early exit, he’d promptly texted me to meet him after my shift at an address in Chelsea. It ended up being a posh, three-star restaurant, to which I showed up in wearing my ketchup-stained work T-shirt.
The following day, Ben had an Elie Saab dress messengered to Todos Santos with a handwritten note on where to meet him for our second date. Then, I was charmed and impressed by the fact that he’d picked something so pretty for me. And so expensive. I wouldn’t have guessed that within a year-and-a-half, I’d hate him for dressing me.
“It’s your section but I took the table,” Adriana said, instinctively reaching to squeeze my arm when my jaw clenched. “Are you gonna be okay?”
“He’s coming here,” I murmured, staring past her as Ben ambled over.
She sucked her teeth. “No he’s not.” She spun around, marching three steps toward him so he’d stop before reaching me. “This is the kitchen. Bathroom’s that way,” she snapped, nodding towards the left.
Ben eyed her skimpy outfit. “That’s not what I’m looking for, Adriana, but thank you for your help. You can step aside now.”
I seethed. “Don’t talk to her like that.”
Both Ben and Adriana turned to look at me, Ben lifting his brows with a look of amusement. “I didn’t even say anything,” he laughed. “And trust me,” he eyed her little shorts, “I could.”