And despite my fierce determination to tell Marianne “I told you so,” I adore everything about it.
A few minutes (and several near-accidents) later, we turn past a loose donkey whose chewed lead rope dangles proudly from his neck towards a delapidated crescent-shaped building dwarfed by the modern condo complex behind it.
“Here you go!” our smiling driver says after he unloads our bags onto the curb. “Paradise Cove!”
“Are you… sure?” Marianne asks, walking up to one of the chipped plantation shutters.
“Quite sure,” he says.
I dig into my pocket for the small stack of Fijian cash I took out at the airport.
“Termite’s Paradise, maybe,” Will says. “This building looks condemned.”
“I’m sure it’s nicer on the inside,” I tell him cheerfully as the cab pulls away. “TripAdvisor praised the accommodations as ‘adequate!’”
“I hope you have higher standards for your dates than your hotels,” he shudders, clutching his bag to his chest like it might contract rabies. If I didn’t love him so much, I might not be able to get over the fact that wild-hearted Marianne fell in love with such a city boy. She and I share an amused look as he grabs Marianne’s bag for her and leads the way inside.
Fortunately for Will, the lobby is a slight upgrade from the exterior, even if it is full of half-functioning standing fans and linoleum tiles.Unfortunately for Will, the man waiting for us at the counter is an absolute Fijian god. Marianne, who’s never had a talent for hidinganything,ogles at him openly as he takesour bags behind the counter, his very prominent arm muscles flexing as he lifts them like they’re no heavier than a box of pasta.
“You should talk to him,” Mer elbows me in the ribs. “From the way he’s handling that suitcase, I can tell he knows his way around a?—“
“I’m good,” I stop her before she goes allFifty Shadeson me. “At this point I think I’m closer to joining a nunnery than going home with someone who looks likethat.”
Marianne rolls her eyes. And by eyes, I mean her whole head.
“Stella, it’s been like, four months.”
I grimace.
“Umm…”
“More?!”
“Things weren’t exactly hot and heavy with Dr. Voldemort before we split,” I tell her. She responds with a dramatic sigh.
“It’s worse than I thought. You’ve gotta get back in the saddle, stat! What better way to start off the vacation than a little Fijian romance?”
“You’re relentless,” I tell her. In the thirty minutes we’ve been here, her hair has completely succumbed to the humidity, and it puffs out from beneath her sunhat like a copper-colored seagull’s nest.
“Andyou,”she says, adjusting her hat to accommodate it,“are boring! When are you going to let yourself have some fun?”
Since we can’t check in til three, we decide to leave our bags at the front desk and head out to the pool. We’re the only guests outside, and it’s not hard to see why- the water has a layer of green foam on top that makes it look more suited for a crocodile than actual human bathers.
“Anyone interested in a dip?” I joke, sliding my flip flops off and plopping onto one of the rattan lounge chairs. Some of theweave snaps as I settle in, smacking my elbow into the armrest with a loud bump.
“Hard pass,” Marianne says. “I think I’m behind on my tetanus shots.”
“Is there a reason we couldn’t book the Hyatt tonight?” Will asks as he tries to cover every inch of his lounge chair with the ratty blue towels he borrowed from the front desk.
“Spare me the hotel conglomerate worshipping, Will,” I sigh. “Every one of those places is the same—no soul, no character. Just a concrete block of manufactured relaxation.”
“I’ll remember that when I’m sipping my soulless margarita from the charmless swim-up bar tomorrow,” he says, turning to Marianne. “Why did we let Stella choose the place again?”
“Because it’s the only way I could get her to come. Just be counting your blessings we’re not sleeping on some Craigslister’s couch, honey.”
“That was afun trip!”I protest, a sudden memory of Marianne ripping on a stranger’s harmonica in a grungy Nashville bar flooding my mind. “And Jarredstillsends me email invites to every one of his puppet death metal shows.”
Marianne and I used to travel all the time in college. There was nowhere too far for her just-shy-of-vintage station wagon to take us: no town too obscure. Neither of us are from the Midwest, so we made it our mission after two weeks as roommates to explore as much of the surrounding area as possible: Nashville, St. Louis, and every one of the Great Lakes. We never had more than a hundred bucks between us, but we still made things work. That was before I got sucked into the spontaneity graveyard that is fully-funded academia. Now, the furthest I travel is Evanston to hit the DMV with the shortest lines.
