Lucky Break by J. Minter

city’s swank Oriental Hotel. It had been around forever, and over the years had seen all of Thailand’s glitterati spin through its golden doors.
    Speaking of spinning, Feb was starting to make me dizzy with all her pacing back and forth.
    â€œFeb, can I—”
    â€œFlan, I haven’t eaten in seventy-two hours and fourteen minutes and Idon’tevenknowhowmanyseconds. I really can’t deal with—”
    â€œI was just going to ask if I could help with anything for the party,” I jumped in before she said something she regretted.
    Feb paused, snapped her phone shut, and said, “Actually, there is something you can do.”
    Before I knew it, she had led me into the walk-in fridge in the large gleaming hotel kitchen. She stopped in front of six boxes full of coconuts and six boxes of the biggest, ripest mangos I’d ever seen in my life.
    â€œOuch,” I said, when Feb slapped my hand after I reached into the box to examine one of the fantastically pink pieces of fruit.
    â€œLook, don’t touch,” Feb said brusquely. “They’re for tonight. Ugh, I’ve got a million things to do,” shesaid, looking down at her PDA, which looked so out of place in her henna-tattooed hand. “Let’s see. We
have
to have a signature cocktail. You can come up with something on the fly, right?”
    It was a good thing I wasn’t holding a mango, because I would have dropped it. “Me? Bartending?”
    â€œNot bar
tending
,” she said, sounding only slightly impatient. “Bar
inspiring
. Isn’t that what you do? Patch mentioned something you whipped up for some Thoney party….”
    Camille and I had concocted a really delicious Virgiltini for January’s Virgil event. And my friends always said that I made the best acai spritzers (the secret was to line the rim of the glass with real dried acai berries crushed with sugar). But I’d never stopped to think about the fact that I actually had a gift for concocting delicious and refreshing drinks. I loved that Feb made it sound like cocktail commander was my obvious terrain.
    â€œWe just need a pretty face behind the drink. It’ll market better,” she said.
    â€œYou can take a girl out of a Manhattan PR firm …” I joked.
    â€œHa-ha,” Feb said, motioning for me to help her carry a box of coconuts. “So what do you think?”
    â€œWell,” I said, looking down at the boxes of fruit.“In this kind of sticky heat, people want something light.”
    â€œSo no coconut milk?” Feb asked. Her face seemed to fall. We
were
looking at six huge crates of coconuts.
    â€œI’ve got it,” I said finally, thinking of what my friend Ramsey, the captain of my field hockey team, was always telling us to drink before practice. “We’ll go with nature’s biggest thirst quencher: coconut
water
! Blended with ice and mint and a dollop of mango puree. We can call it … Thai-riffic.”
    â€œShe’s a genius,” Feb said to the team of Thai chefs putting on their aprons. “Okay, now we divide and conquer,” she said, turning back to me. “I’ll make sure the music’s cued and the candles are lit. You find the bartenders and spread your refreshing gospel, okay?”
    â€œJust one question,” I said, looking down at myself and realizing one very big hitch in the plan. When I’d showed up in my jeans and casual Theory tee, I’d envisioned having time to make it home and change. “Am I going to wear this to the party?”
    Feb threw her head back and started laughing hysterically, telling me all I needed to know.
    A half hour later, I had just made a sample virgin Thai-riffic cocktail for the bartender to taste, when Feb shoved a hanger under my nose. I held it out in front of me to examine the short silk sheath dress. Thecut was simple; the print was anything but. It was white with dashes of black,