5
Marcel intended to find Wayne after he wiped the croissant crumbs from his shirt. He did.
Somewhere in Ensenada, there was an actor-shaped black hole that had most likely progressed from wine to margaritas and a scripted conversation with a stranger who didn’t realize he’d been cast in a farce, and it was Marcel’s job to be the counterweight. But Wayne hadn’t replied to a text in hours. When Marcel surveilled his boss’s location on Find My Friends, he clocked that there were only two hours left before they had to board the ship. By the time he made it to Wayne’s current location, the group would be on their way back to the cruise terminal.
Which meant, technically—
I’m free.
He said it out loud, just to see how the words tasted. “I’m free.”
Leo grinned at him, and it did something in Marcel’s chest that he decided could be analyzed later. He wasn’t going to waste his two-hour gift overthinking.
They continued walking down First Street at a slower pace. Leo stopped in front of a ceramic pot glazed a deep sea blue. He declared it the perfect home for a zebra plant he’d named Tigger. Then in a ramble that picked up speed and volume as he overcame his embarrassment, he told Marcel about Newton, the fiddle-leaf fig, and a row of cacti in his kitchen window he’d collectively dubbed The Book Club. Marcel laughed out loud, completely charmed.
They passed a stall with hanging t-shirts forming the walls, and Marcel stopped dead. The shirt was a horrifying mustard color, the print faded almost to a rumor, which was more than could be said about the one-hit-wonder band from 1984 whose name adorned the front. A short list of small venues graced the back, many of them lost to the ebbs and flows of the economy.
“I collect these,“
he admitted. “Band shirts. Old ones. Nothing newer than 199.” He scrubbed a hand over his short hair. “A completely frivolous hobby, I know.”
“No need to be defensive,“
Leo said. “I just told you my roommates are all houseplants.”
Marcel found himself laughing again. Twice in an hour, Marcel. This risks breaking a record.
They haggled politely with the owner of the stall, and Marcel still paid too much but didn’t care. The shirt went into the tote bag on top of the backup wedding gifts. And it wasn’t until they were walking up the gangway that he realized he’d spent the last two hours engaged in conversation without Wayne Flagg’s name coming up even once.