story time: the euro summer I learned what a “professional girlfriend” really is

Okay, so sharing the story of the summer I learned what it really means to be a professional girlfriend. So I was in Mykonos with one of my best friends. It was her birthday, so I took her to Scorpios for dinner, and it's just the two of us sitting at a table. It is a scene. It's super fun. I will say I'm like low key surprised by the very blatant transactions that are happening all around us. I mean, like the next table, there are women coming up to the table. There's two guys kind of like dining alone. There's a negotiation that happened and I was just like, oh wow, like this? Okay, we're doing this now. She gets up to go to the bathroom at one point, and this guy just like slides into her seat across from me. He's like, I've been like watching you all night, blah, blah, blah, very charming. I was honestly like, dude, like bold move. That's congratulations. Then she comes back and it's awkward. She's like, dude, get out of my seat. We've got like several more courses coming. He leaves. So we finish our dinner, he's back, and he comes back with like five friends. They're all staying on a boat, obviously, if you know, you know. And they have this girl with them who is one of the girlfriends, I assume. She's super friendly. She's also from New York. And she sits down, starts chatting with us. By the way, it's at this part of the night when we are like very clear about the fact that like we both are in serious relationships. I'm married and she has a serious boyfriend. We're just like, you guys are cool, but like this is nothing else is gonna happen here. Also, I'm not wearing a wedding ring because I don't usually like to travel with it. We're we're like 35. It's her birthday. And they're like, when I say their jaws fell on the floor and they were just like, oh my god, like, wait, why aren't you home with like your eight children? Like, what the f*ck? And so they're like their heads are just exploding. One of them is like, well, listen, if it weren't for my religion, we would be together. And I'm like, yes, also my husband and the fact that I don't wanna be with you. But fine. Nothing weird is happening because we've got this like cool girl there. So we decide to go out with them. We go to this club in town. What could go wrong? That's when the wheels start to fall off the evening. Now we're the second place. It's very crowded and we're waiting to get in. They're like, sorry, we're at capacity. This girl who's in our group starts like going off. She is screaming at the doorman about how they are staying on a 2,000 meter, so that would be 6,000 feet yacht. Don't you know who we are kind of thing, which was honestly like low key hilarious. We were like, are you staying on a cruise ship? I'm sure your boat is big, but I don't think it's that big. But finally, like they do let us in, which really just goes to show like perseverance is rewarded. So we get in and like honestly we're having a great time. The drinks are flowing. I am now like 85 whatever I'm drinks into this night. We're hanging out with the girl. She's super cool. Honestly, the guys are just like busy with all of the women who are like flocking to them. Like we are fully like part of the entourage, and we are fine with it. There's this woman who comes up to me and she's kinda like, what are you doing here? I'm like, I'm just like here with my friend. Like, how about you? And she's like, oh, like I'm working here. And I'm sort of like, huh, cool. There's also a point in the night when one of the women that we came with is like telling me the story about her friend, who was also there and I guess left. I was like, where'd your friend go? She's like, can you believe it? She offered to this guy for $1,000. And like, that's just embarrassing. Like I can't be seen with her. What? Like you know what I mean? Like literally, what? So this is my first clue that like something is maybe a miss here. Then they wanna go back to the boat. So they're like, we're going back to the boat. It's like 3 in the morning or something. Also, like we're jet lagged, so we're like, feels like 7 PM to us. No problemo. My friend, in a rare moment of lucidity, is like, no, we're not going back to the boat. We don't do that. Which like literally winning, because I was fully ready to be like, yeah, why not? Like no problem. You have a tender, right? You'll just take us back. She hooked us up there. One of the guys stays out, the guy with the girlfriend stays out. So they're still there. We're like, no worries, we'll just stay with you guys, we'll keep partying, no problem. More drinks, blah, blah, blah. It's now 4:00 AM and the clubs are closing. So we're sort of like, are we going home? I think we we most likely are. But the girlfriend is like, I know about this great after party. And at this point, I'm like, mmm, I don't know that anything good is happening. Oh, the other thing, turns out this girl is not his girlfriend. They just met earlier that day. So we're in like Mykonos Old Town, which is like a bunch of like very cute like whitewashed houses, but it's like, like, windy. It's like a rabbit warren. So we go outside this house and it's very quiet. Also, the girl who had showed up earlier, like the one who stopped me and just like said hi, was there. I'm like at this point, I'm like Mayday! Mayday! This is bad, we gotta leave. But one of the guys is going into this place with her. My best friend is also like, oh, like let's go. And I'm like, dude, no, we're leaving right now. I don't know what's happening. It's honestly, like, probably nothing, like too bad. I'm pretty sure they were just going to go do like some dr*gs. But I was like, no, we're out of here. We leave. Meanwhile, I'm like afraid for this guy who's like kinda going into this house, but I think maybe it's fine. One of his other friends had given me his number, so I'm like calling him at 5:00 AM. Low key already worried about him. And I never heard back from them, so who knows?