3
Marcel stood on the upper pool deck with a cooling coffee in one hand and his tablet in the other. His to do list refused to shrink no matter how hard he glared at it. Below him, on a lounge chair in a stripe of late-morning shade, Leo Colter was reading.
Don’t.
Marcel did not have the budget, professionally or personally, to keep track of anyone other than the man who signed his paychecks. But he couldn’t help but clock Leo arriving on the pool deck with an iced coffee and an e-reader. He staked out a chair with the serene confidence of a man who had decided he wasn’t going to be a part of anything today.
Wouldn’t that be lovely?
He took a sip of lukewarm coffee, too cold to be hot, too hot to convince himself he’d lost his mind and decided to go for a cold brew. Focus. His to do list wouldn’t get any shorter playing Peeping Tom.
Wayne appeared on the pool deck in a linen shirt unbuttoned to a strategic latitude. He scanned the deck, spotted Leo, and changed course for the bar.
Here we go. The Flagg had been raised.
A mimosa was dispatched via waiter. Leo accepted the drink, toasted the general direction of the bar without looking up, and returned to his book. Marcel allowed himself exactly one small, private smile.
Undeterred, Wayne came around the pool, claimed the lounge chair next to Leo, and got to work. Marcel watched, but he’d seen this show play out a hundred times. Flight attendants, costars, the occasional husband or wife. They all eventually said yes to whichever rendition of Wayne they most wanted to believe in. Nobody could even get mad about it because Wayne himself earnestly believed in whatever adaptation he’d assumed in that moment.
Leo held out longer than most, but he eventually succumbed. He turned off his e-reader and set it next to the mimosa.
Marcel’s phone buzzed. The pastry chef. The fifth call since breakfast. And Winnie, the wedding planner Daniel and Alyssa had hired, was still draped over the martini bar like a wet scarf, crying about the guy who’d broken up with her in an Instagram Story as she boarded the ship. Lovely. Fear not. Wayne Flagg will send in his personal assistant to save the day.
He answered the phone on the third ring. “Marcel Lattanzi. No, that substitution isn’t going to work. Here’s what’s going to happen.”
Down below, Leo laughed at something Wayne said.
Don’t look down. You’ve seen this film before.
He walked away.