Best Friends & Other Liars

by Heather Balog

  “No, I’m fine,” I say, digging through my bag. “I have a bottle of water in here somewhere.”

  “It’s probably warm,” he says as he leaps to his feet. “Listen. I feel like a drink. I’m going to go to the bar and I’ll grab you a cold water if you’d like. Or I could get you something else?”

  I recall the promise I made to myself about no more alcohol on this trip—I want to enjoy it and remember it—not spend it puking.

  “A cold water would be perfect,” I tell him. He runs off with a nod to join the rest of the crowd three deep, vying for a drink.

  I return my attention to my book, and no sooner do I read a paragraph when I am interrupted again by a shadow falling over the page.

  “Is anyone sitting here?”

  I lower the book, and look up to find Francine in front of me.

  “Hi!” I am surprised to hear the genuine enthusiasm in my voice. “The person who is sitting there went to go get a drink—I’m sure you can sit for a bit. He may be awhile.”

  Francine removes her sunglasses and raises one eyebrow. “He?”

  “Um, yeah. George,” I sweep my hand toward the bar area. “He’s the one with the white hair.”

  Francine laughs and sits. “Yeah, that narrows it down.”

  I look at the cluster of men around the bar and realize that ninety percent of them have gray hair or are bald.

  “True.”

  “Well, when George gets back, I’ll let you finish your date, but I just wanted to ask you if—”

  “Oh, it’s not a date!” I quickly intercept with a nervous chuckle. “He’s just a really friendly guy I met. We’re just talking.”

  “Oh, okay,” Francine says uncertainly. I don’t think she believes me. Do I look like the type of woman who would be on a date in the Caribbean with a guy I just met? I’m definitely not Leah, who is actually on a date in the Caribbean with a guy she just met.

  “Well, anyway, I saw you there and I wanted to ask if you and...uh, Leah…if you guys wanted to join us at dinner. We’re planning to go to the hibachi restaurant. I’ll make reservations for eight o’clock.”

  “That would be very nice,” I reply. “I’d enjoy that.” And I mean it, too. Francine is not someone whose company I thought I would enjoy, but she is a refreshing change from Leah and her high energy antics that I usually endure.

  “And your friend George is welcome to join us as well,” Francine adds, just as George comes strolling up with a beer in one hand and a water bottle in the other.

  “I’m welcome to what?” he asks, handing me the water bottle.

  “George, this is Francine. We met her and her friend Kendall at the beginning of the cruise.”

  Francine immediately jumps to her feet. “I’m sorry. I’ll be out of your way. I just wanted to speak to Violet. I didn’t mean to take your chair.”

  “It’s absolutely fine. Please sit. It’s nice to meet you,” George says, extending his hand out to Francine.

  “I wouldn’t dare impose,” Francine says. “But I hope you’ll join us at dinner.” She grabs her bag and races off, giving us a side wave and a sheepish grin.

  “I hope I didn’t scare her off,” George says, settling back down in the beach chair.

  I shake my head. “No, I think she may be a little on the timid side in general. I like her.”

  “Well if you like her, I like her, too.”

  “Will you come to dinner with us?” I ask. As the words leave my mouth, I do a double take.

  What am I doing? I can’t encourage this guy to come to dinner! He’ll think I like him or want to date him or something!

  “That sounds great,” George replies, face beaming. “I can’t wait to meet your other friend. She sounds interesting from what you described earlier.”

  I chuckle nervously. “Oh, she’s definitely interesting.” I pick up my book and begin to read again, wondering how I’m going to get through dinner with George and Leah.

  LEAH

  “We’re doing what?” I stare at Vi, wondering who this impostor is, and what she’s done with my best friend. “Are you ill?” I reach over to feel her forehead, causing her to slap my hand away.

  “Knock it off. This is difficult enough for me without you making fun.” She sighs as she tightens the robe around her waist and examines the clothes spread out on the bed. “What should I wear?”

  “Ooo, I think you like this guy,” I say in a sing-song voice. She turns to me, flames shooting from her eyeballs. Okay, maybe not for real, but she looks pissed.

  “Seriously, Leah. Cut it out.”

  “Then why are you getting all dressed up?”

  “I’m not getting all dressed up. I’d like to look nice. That’s all. I like him as a friend only. Just the same way I like Francine. And we are having dinner with everybody that I consider a potential friend. Is that a crime?”

  “No, of course not,” I reply, trying—and failing—to hide my smirk. “Go with the white dress.” I point to the pile of clothes.

  “That’s not mine. That’s yours.”

  “So what?” I reply with a shrug. “It’s not like you’ve never borrowed my clothes before. You borrowed a dress a few nights ago.”

  Vi lifts the dress off the bed and gazes at it skeptically. “I don’t know, Leah. It’s kind of skimpy. You know I don’t wear anything like that.”

  “That’s why it’s perfect.”

  “How many times do I have to tell you that I don’t like—”

  “Stop,” I wave off her protests. “Listen, you would never wear something like that at home, right? Well, why not wear it here? You’re Violet 2.0 here—you’re definitely not the same person you would be at home. Violet 1.0 would never accept an invite to dinner from someone she didn’t know. And she would definitely not invite a guy she hardly knew to come along. Hell, you might actually be Violet 3.0.”

  “Stop teasing me,” she says with a frown.

  “Seriously, Vi. Wear the dress.” I shoo her in the direction of the bathroom. “Hurry up and shower. We’re going to dinner in less than an hour.”

  Reluctantly, she strolls to the bathroom carrying my white dress. She closes the door and in three seconds, I hear a high pitched scream. I fling open the bathroom door to find Vi naked, staring at herself in the mirror in utter horror.

  “What? What’s the matter?” But even before I finish that sentence, I realize exactly what the matter is. The skin on Vi’s back and chest can best be described as...zebra-like. Half of her body is its normal pasty white color and the other half is red. Like poisoned apple in Snow White kind of red.

  “I am a mess!” She covers her face with her hands and leans over the sink, bawling.

  “Didn’t you reapply the sunblock?”

  “Of course I reapplied the sunblock!” she wails.

  “Okay, okay,” I say, stepping into the bathroom. “We can fix this.”

  Vi removes her hands from her snot infested face and gapes at me. “How on earth can we fix this?”

  I reach around her and rummage through my bag on the counter. “Ta-da!” I hold up my bottle of self-tanning lotion and Vi wrinkles up her nose.

  “Fake tan? No way, Leah.”

  “Oh stop, it’s really subtle. Not like what you’ve got going on right now.”

  “Gee, thanks.”

  “Stay still. I’ve got to make sure the lines are even.”

  “I really don’t want to—”

  “Stay still,” I repeat.

  She grumbles as I squeeze the lotion into my palm. As the lotion touches her skin, she recoils.

  “I told you to stay still!”

  “That’s really cold!”

  “Stop complaining. Let me do this. I have to get ready for your date, too, you know.” I grin wolfishly.

  “Leah.” Vi’s voice has that warning tone again, but it’s more half-hearted than angry.

  After a good half an hour of meticulously applying tan lines to my best friend, I wash my hands and
push her out of the bathroom so I can get showered and ready for the evening. I exit the bathroom twenty minutes later to find her drying her body with a hair dryer.

  “What on earth are you doing?” I ask, towel drying my hair. I’m not going to have any time to do anything more with my hair today. I spent way too much of my prep time blending Vi.

  She holds the bottle of tanning lotion out to me. “It says make sure you’re thoroughly dry before getting dressed.”

  “It’s fine,” I tell her, eying my white dress laid out on the bed. “Although, maybe you should go with that black dress you wore the first day.” I definitely don’t want brown spots inside my white dress. Just in case she’s really not dry yet.

  Vi audibly breathes a sigh of relief. The black dress is much less revealing, and much more Vi’s style. And it covers up a lot of the sunburn patches.

  We quickly get dressed and head out of the room at five minutes to eight.

  “Where are they meeting us?” I ask, pausing in the hallway to adjust my heel.

  “The hibachi place, Francine said.”

  “Oh, okay. Hibachi.” I’m not the biggest fan of hibachi. Vi knows that, but...oh well...can’t have everything, right?

  “Listen, if I have to look like a leprosy patient, you can eat some hibachi.”

  “I didn’t say a word,” I reply, holding my palms up in mock surrender. After all the arguing we’ve been doing, the last thing I want to do is fight with Vi tonight. We only have a few more days left on this vacation, and our fighting has ruined most of it so far. This must be what it’s like to be married—thank God I never got married.

  “And if you had been around, you could have told Francine that you didn’t like hibachi yourself.”

  Is she looking for a fight? Seriously, this really must be what it’s like to be married.

  “Vi, you told me to go with Nick. I said I would—”

  “I know I told you. It’s fine.” Vi is twirling her hair around her finger nervously. “I didn’t mean to snap at you. It’s just...having dinner with people we don’t know. It’s difficult for me.”

  “But you spent all afternoon talking to George, remember? You told me about all the chick flicks he liked to watch?” I roll my eyes just to demonstrate how lame I think this is—whoever heard of a guy who enjoyed romantic comedies?

  “I know, but—”

  “And the other night you hung out with Francine, right?”

  “I guess…” Vi doesn’t look convinced. This is a big source of stress for Vi. She absolutely hates socialization of any kind. I’m surprised she didn’t spontaneously combust during the previous interactions with these people. While I’ve had a lot of other friends over the years, I think I’ve been Vi’s only steady friend.

  “It’s going to be fun. I’m going to be with you the whole time.” I grab her arm and pull her toward me.

  “You’re not going to run off with Nick tonight?” she asks, an attempt at sarcasm. Then she waves her hand in the air. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to start.”

  “It’s fine, Vi. Don’t worry about it.”

  “Hey, you never told me how it went today. How was your date?”

  Again I am overcome with that giddiness from my teenage years, whenever the boy I liked at the time looked at me or talked to me or asked me out. I can’t help but let out an adolescent-like giggle that makes me cover my mouth with my hand.

  “Leah!” Vi is staring at me wide-eyed. “What happened on your date? Did you kiss him?” Her voice is teasing.

  Not only did I kiss Nick, but there was some pretty heavy making out in the cavern underneath the waterfall. I’ve never experienced kissing that made me weak in the knees—at least not in my adult life—but I swear when Nick’s lips touched mine, my knees nearly buckled and he had to grab my arm before I slipped and drowned in a foot of water. I can’t remember the last time a guy gave me butterflies by just looking at him, and the whole time I was with Nick, I felt like I could barely breathe. I didn’t want the day, or that giddy feeling, to end.

  “A lady never kisses and tells,” I reply with a smirk.

  “Ha! Since when are you a lady?”

  “Starting today. I’m a lady starting this very moment.”

  “Leah! That’s not fair!” Vi shoves me playfully. “You know I have to live vicariously through you.”

  I shake my head. “You don’t have to. You can live out your fantasies with this guy tonight.”

  Vi turns bright red. “Seriously. Stop. Don’t talk like that in front of him. I don’t want him to get the wrong idea.”

  “Oh forget it then, Vi. He’s a guy. He already has the wrong idea.”

  We push open the doors to the restaurant and I immediately begin scanning the room for Kendall and Francine…and the guy.

  “Great,” Vi mumbles, coming up behind me.

  “Do you see him?” I ask, craning my neck—the restaurant is really crowded. Not to mention, smoky from the hibachi grills. One of the many reasons I don’t like hibachi places. Along with the fact that I had a really bad date at a hibachi place a few years ago. I had to take my date to the ER for third degree burns that night. Oh, and plus, it takes too long for them to cook it and my blood sugar plummets. Remember, Hangry Leah is not fun to be around.

  “There he is,” Vi says, trying, but not succeeding, to keeping the nervousness out of her voice. “And there’s Francine and Kendall, too.” She points to the table in the back, just beyond the smoky haze.

  “Well, let’s go get ‘em, tiger.”

  Vi doesn’t budge. I slap her on her butt to get her moving.

  “Hey! That’s not necessary.”

  “I think it is,” I reply, not waiting for her as I weave my way through the tables toward our dinner companions. Violet reluctantly follows my lead. I can hear her hyperventilating behind me.

  We reach the table where Francine and Kendall are deep in conversation with the man at the table, Vi’s “new friend”.

  “Hi guys!” I call out, causing them all to look up.

  “Hi, Leah!” Kendall replies jumping to her feet and hugging me. “So glad you guys could come!”

  Francine gives me a weak smile—no hug from her—seems about right. I turn my attention to our male dinner companion and instantly recognize him.

  “Well, if it isn’t Mr. George Washington.”

  “Hello,” he says, rising to his feet and clasping my hands in his. “It’s wonderful to see you again.”

  I hear a sharp intake of air behind me, and then Vi says, “Why do you two know each other?”

  VIOLET

  All the air has been sucked out of the room—and it’s because of Leah’s presence...as usual.

  “How do you...when did you…” A series of unpleasant thoughts play through my mind, including one that has Leah dating George and doing heaven knows what with him.

  That’s ridiculous. She hasn’t dated everyone. Maybe she knows him from work? Or maybe...oh and this is the best scenario, he’s her psychologist. Or her psychiatrist. Which one is he again?

  “How do you know Leah?” Kendall asks.

  “Leah and I met on the bow of the ship a few days ago,” George says.

  “I was planning to throw myself over the side,” Leah says as she tucks her dress under her body and plops down in the chair.

  “What?” I gawk at her as I sit down in the empty seat next to George. “What are you talking about?”

  “Yes, Leah was playing Kate Winslet on the side of the boat, and I was Leonardo DiCaprio,” George says with a grin.

  “It was all very romantic,” Leah says as she spreads her napkin on her lap. George blushes and suddenly becomes fascinated with unfolding his own napkin.

  “What? Why? How?” I am aware that I am stammering, but I can’t seem to stop. It feels like tenth grade all over again, when I had a crush on Joey Gamberini and then Leah started going out with him. I mean, she didn’t know about my crush, but it still annoyed me. Not that I have a cr
ush on George or anything, but man, I saw him first. As a friend, that is. Or at least I thought I saw him first. Apparently Leah saw him first as well.

  “I’m joking, Vi,” Leah whispers in my ear. “It’s a joke. It was not romantic at all. I have absolutely no romantic feelings for him whatsoever. He’s all yours.”

  “I don’t want him, for the hundredth time, Leah,” I hiss at her. A little too loudly I guess because suddenly the entire table is staring at me.

  I feel heat creep up my neck.

  Ugh, I just can’t handle social situations. I should just crawl into a hole and not come out. No matter how much Leah begs.

  “So, George Washington. Save any more damsels in distress since I last saw you?” Leah asks, attempting to relieve the tension.

  “Your last name is Washington?” I can’t believe Leah knew his last name before I did. And that his last name is Washington.

  He chuckles nervously. “Just call me George.”

  “Okay, George,” Leah says, seductively smiling. “So what have you been up to today?” She leans closer to him.

  I want to elbow her. It looks like she’s flirting. Even though she’s probably not doing it intentionally—I think it’s her default mode around men. Come to think of it, I think the only man that she doesn’t turn the charm on for is Richard.

  “Well, pretty much the same thing as everyone else on this ship. Had a lovely day at the beach. Although, I probably should have put more sunblock on.” He waves toward his nose, which I notice for the first time is bright red.

  “What a coincidence! Vi here is also burnt to a crisp. Although she resembles a burnt-to-a-crisp zebra. At least your sunburn is even.”

  I can feel my blood boiling momentarily until I realize—she’s trying to help me. She’s starting a conversation with George so I don’t have to start a conversation with George. Or Francine. Or anyone at the table, really. I can just interject at any point in time. Like right now.

  “Okay, thanks Leah, for telling everyone my dirty little secret,” I say.

  “Ha! You’re not the only one!” Kendall says, pulling down her shirt to reveal a bright red boob. I avert my eyes, but George’s jaw hangs open. Francine pokes at her plate (that’s empty) with embarrassment. Leah acts like nothing crazy has just transpired at all. And for her, it probably hasn’t. She works in the city, after all. The things she sees on a daily basis have made her completely immune to people pulling out their boobs at a table full of strangers in a hibachi restaurant.