THE SADDEST GIRL SINCE THE SONG DYNASTY

WORSE THAN EACH OTHER - PART VIII

Two days later, in the afternoon before Lala's hate-committee, having alienated most of the people she knew in South East England, Lady Zhao had had to blitz Ander's phone to even get him to respond; wanting to do something other than sit in her small student room alone, she then followed up with a multi-pronged assault on his inertia (him claiming, "I probably need to be by my computer all tonight..."), utilizing enthusiasm, guilt, enticements and threats to get him to agree to come out that evening and help her with something.

Lady Zhao saw herself as a kind of irresistible force when it came to persuading potential any kind of person for any reason to spend time with her. It was like a game, one in which, if she lost, she would be angry with herself for days. Ander presented himself as a challenge, as an immovable rock. Luckily, Lady Zhao was both resourceful and willing to do anything.

Her pretext was convoluted and ridiculous. Lady Zhao said that she had somehow accidentally conveyed the idea to a cousin of hers back in China that she was going to be in America at some point during her year abroad. Unwilling for whatever reasons (Lady Zhao provided two weak ones during her assault on Ander's phone memory) to correct the cousin's misunderstanding, she claimed she needed to buy a fake souvenir to take back as a gift. She said she had somehow promised this after being asked.

But unknown to Ander, no such false impression had ever been conveyed, and no such promise existed; the cousin Lady Zhao was referring to wasn't even entirely real – the person's description was a haphazard amalgamation of two different relatives. It was a falsity about a misconception, a lie about a sort-of-lie. And to add an extra layer of absurdity to the scheme, the nature of Ander's supposed role, the justification Lady Zhao was giving as to his essential part in her plan, was that he could spot the idiosyncrasies of American and British English and thus eliminate the possibility that the imaginary cousin might catch Lady Zhao out about their imaginary miscommunication. He was there to provide authenticity.

She wanted to go by the cinema to buy a Hollywood movie t-shirt. Ander would assess and assure Lady Zhao there wasn't a u lurking around in some title or tagline that had been culled by the New World's linguistic reformers, or some Briticism hidden on a label or in small print.

Ander messaged, "Does your cousin speak English better than you? Because if you can't tell, then surely..."

"Why don't we go for some pizza after? My treat. To say thanks, because this would be such a big help for me. Ander?"

Ander's freezer was freshly out of breaded fish, the one meal he had gotten used to making, so he agreed.