“Took You Long Enough”
You think your great big husband will protect you?- fanciful scarves and costume jewelry
- most of you aren’t taking photos of it
- gripped my stick
- men in loose-collared business suits
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“Took you long enough,” Tallulah said.
The last thing I could afford was to show fear. Let her think of herself as the cornered one. “You think your great big husband will protect you?” I sneered. “Does he even know you’re here?”
“He’s in a shop two blocks from here, browsing fanciful scarves and costume jewelry. He doesn’t have any idea what I’m up to. The old-man disguise puzzled him, I’m sure, but he didn’t even ask about it.”
“Or about the other disguises underneath?” I asked.
“He didn’t know about those.” She flushed the toilet. “Men love when a woman pretends to be another woman. I’m surprised most of you aren’t taking photos of it all the time, even though they would just look like normal photos, if the disguises were any good.”
Tallulah approached, seeming to think I was going to let her resume her concealment under my coat. I wouldn’t have much choice if she became insistent, of course. Her combat skills were deadly, even more than her sister’s. But I hadn’t seen Tallulah in so long… Or hadn’t I? Her words echoed in my mind. “Took you long enough.” Her Tessa impersonation was impenetrable. How long had it been the wrong sister? When was the last time I had really seen Tessa?
Was there even a real Tessa?
With my state of mind so shattered, I couldn’t protest her move to reclaim her hiding spot. But I wasn’t much help to her, either, so she gripped my stick, as it were, to plant herself firmly in place and also to get my attention.
“Wait,” I spluttered, “what was all that about my son? Was that just to distract me? What’s your game, Tallulah?”
“We have to get back to the table,” she said. I waddled out of the restroom. Our table now held a completely new group, men in loose-collared business suits. I whispered this news to Tallulah.
“Huh,” she said. “They’re early.”
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