The Pairing

I’m the wrong Flowerday for Monaco, but today, I’ll be good at it.

Everything about this place, from the marble palace to the luxury cars, screams Este. The Princess Grace of it all, the pink glow of family money. My baby sister would swan into Monte Carlo and giggle over Dom Pérignon until someone invited her back to the VIP suite. She’d pick out the archduke of whatever made-up principality by clocking his Loro Piana cashmere baseball cap and be on a yacht by lunch, sun shining on that Flowerday strawberry blond hair.

Fuck it. I could do that for a day.

I slept like shit and woke up feeling like I do riding my longboard home after a long day of inventory: delirious, clammy, careening too fast, head swimming in languages I can’t speak. On the bus, I pulled my bucket hat down low so Kit wouldn’t try to talk to me for the thirty minutes between Nice and Monaco for today’s day trip, and now I’m sitting at our four-course champagne brunch, pretending not to listen as Kit explains our dessert to Dakota and Montana.