I stepped in, still clutching my portfolio. The room held a massive oval table surrounded by swivel chairs and a nondescript man slouching in one of them, feet propped up on the table.
“You must be Leslie!” the slouchy man shouted.
“Lissy.” I stood awkwardly by the door as the British man moved back to a seat at the head of the table, near the slouchy man.
“Oh, sweet damn,” the man sighed. This had to be David Charles . . . nobody else would be so theatrical, would they? “That’s got to be the most impossible name, Lessy.”
“I believe it’s Lissy,” said the British man, who had to be Max Sovanich. “With that ‘I’ sound, yes?”
“I mean, who even heard of that name?” David Charles went on. “I certainly never heard of that name.” He turned to Max. “Have you ever heard of that name?”
“Well, I—”
“It’s short for Alice,” I said. Usually, I do everything in my power to keep people from finding out that I was born an Alice. But in this case, I felt it was better to be an Alice than for David Charles to keep pontificating on the oddness of Lissy.
David Charles gestured broadly. “Alice,” he said. “Now there’s a name for you. A good old-fashioned English name.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Miss Kenway, why don’t you have a seat,” Max Sovanich said, gesturing to a seat near him. “Thank you. I am Max Sovanich, this is David Charles, lovely to meet you.”
“Hello,” I said, nervously sitting down.
“May I?” Max gestured to my portfolio, which I was still clutching in my sweaty grip.
“Oh.” I looked down at it, like I didn’t know what it was. “Sure.” I slid it over to him.
“I’m going to call you Alice,” David Charles said. “If that’s okay.”
It wasn’t okay, but it was better than being called Leslie. Anything was better than being called Leslie . . . or worse, Lessy. “It’s fine.”
“Splendid.”
“Doesn’t really matter if it’s okay or not,” Max said dryly, paging through my portfolio. “He’s going to call you Alice anyway.”
“Yeah, that’s true,” said David.
“Alice Kenway,” said Max thoughtfully, looking upward. “You’re right. It’s terribly British. Terribly.”
“Terribly,” said David, faking a British accent.
I smiled thinly. Okay, we all got it, the name Alice Kenway made me sound like some posh English schoolgirl who stands up straight and drinks tea and calls things “brilliant.” Me, I slouch, my clothes are all too big for some reason and have various stains on them — some from paint, some from chemicals — and I don’t like tea. Lissy Kenway sounded like it should be the name of a little girl, or maybe a hipster. But at least it had spunk to it.
Labels: january brings few faces
