She smiles and rests her chin on her hands. “It would be nice to get out of the city for a little while. No one warns you about the smog in LA, especially when we’ve got wild fires raging. It’s awful.”
I hold myself back from telling her that, actually, everyone who reads the news knows about the smog and wildfires in LA.
“Don’t tell me you miss North Carolina?” I say.
We both know she sped out of here for the bright lights of Manhattan after high school graduation and never looked back. About a year ago, she gave up on getting acting jobs in New York and moved to LA to do voice-over work.
“Just because I left doesn’t mean I hate it here.” There’s a hint of defensiveness in her tone, but she’s still smiling. I may have underestimated her acting skills. “I miss my family, of course.”
Of course? We’ve hardly spoken in recent years, and I know she’s not in close contact with our brother, Jack. She talks to my parents on the phone, but I would guess it’s mostly when she needs money. I don’t call her on her BS though because I don’t have the energy to be snarky today. I’m coming off of two days of working twelve-hour shifts in the ER, and what I wanted to do this afternoon was take a long nap.
The waitress shows up at our table and asks if we’re ready to order.
“Just give us a few more minutes,” Olivia says sweetly. “My sister needs time to look at the menu. Thanks.”
I pick up my menu and study it, not wanting the waitress to leave.
“I can make up my mind quickly,” I say.
“No hurry, I can come back in a minute,” the waitress says, oblivious to our tension. “I guessed you two were sisters. You look so much alike.”
We do resemble each other, although Olivia got the perfect teeth, and I got the generous bra cup size. Olivia smiles warmly at the waitress, which is another surprise. She used to hate it when people said we looked alike because she thought I was ugly. At least that’s how I interpreted it when she rolled her eyes and gagged in response to comments about our likeness.
We spend several minutes discussing the menu choices, a nice neutral topic, and I start to feel bad about my poor attitude toward my sister. She’s clearly trying to be pleasant and even asks about my work, a topic she has zero interest in. I want to let go of my resentment and mistrust, but every time we’re together I regress to who I was in high school. Something about Olivia pushes all my buttons.
“Thanks for inviting me to lunch today,” I say, after we’ve ordered our meals.
She runs a finger through the condensation on her water glass.
“There’s something I want to ask you.”
Record scratch.Here it comes. If she needs cash, she goes right to the Daddy and Mommy ATM so this must be something else. Maybe she needs some clean urine for a drug test or my passport so she can leave the country for a while. Nothing would surprise me coming from her. She looks much more together than she has in years, but looks can be deceiving.
The last time she asked me for a favor was four years ago when she called me to post bail for her. She claimed she was in the wrong place at the wrong time with her then-fiancé, the Russian oligarch, and they just happened to get caught up in a drug bust in a fancy hotel suite. He had friends in high places to spring him from jail, but she spent two nights locked up until I posted bail. Then I paid for her lawyer, who was able to get the charges dropped. My parents still don’t know about the incident.
“Okay,” I say skeptically. “What is it?”
She holds up her left hand, and on the fourth finger is a diamond engagement ring. She wiggles her fingers at me as if I couldn’t see that giant rock from outer space. She’d been keeping one hand hidden under the table until now so she could do a big reveal.
“You’re getting married.”
I attempt to keep the derision out of my voice, but it’s difficult. At least I manage not to snort. This is my sister’s third engagement. The first one at age twenty to a fellow actor ended in his-and-her restraining orders, and the second one, to the Russian oligarch, ended when Olivia chucked her engagement ring off the Brooklyn Bridge. Apparently, she thinks the third time will be the charm.
“Aren’t you going to congratulate me?”
She rests her hand on the table, and I can’t blame her—it must be tiring carrying that massive stone around all day.
I work hard to muster up any sort of enthusiasm. “Congratulations. Who’s the lucky man?”
This should be good. The last boyfriend she had in New York, a doofus named J.J., was an MMA fighter who dumped her when he got a spot on a reality dating show calledLove at First Fight.
“He’s a tech entrepreneur and a legit genius,” she says. “He’s actually in Mensa.”
I’m guessing that by tech entrepreneur she meansguy who sits around all day in his Mom’s basement playing video games. And I’ll believe the Mensa claim when I have proof.
“Wow.”
“He was profiled in theTimeslast year.”
