His back to the hanging lights, Calvin’s face is mostly covered inshadows. Still, Miles sees how he tips his chin down as if embarrassed. Miles’s heart jumps, which is something he should probably unpack.
“See you around,” Miles says, rather awkwardly.
“See you.” Calvin nods, and Miles watches him leave.
What the hell’s going on? He can’t possibly be getting a crush on Calvin. Not that he hasn’t had one on him for the longest time already, but it’s normal to crush on celebrities.
It was much less daunting when he thought he was cute watching him through a screen.
“Jesus Christ,” Miles groans and scrubs a hand over his face. He doesn’t have time to get distracted by silly crushes. He’s got an inn to save.
First things first—he had to establish their social media accounts and a website, apparently.
***
Miles sits by the edge of a pier, swinging his feet back and forth over the water. There are birds chirping as they play in the lake and the newly risen sun casts a nice orange glow on the lake.
There’s a sketchbook on Miles’s lap, open on a blank page. Sulking because he can’t seem to think of what to draw, he plays with a pencil and taps it against the paper.
Over the weekend, he got an email from his gallery manager reminding him that he needs to be in the city for next weekend’s exhibit—and that he needs to paint new things for his wall in thegallery.
Fuck.
He’s trying, really. Miles takes a lot of photos of different places in Ridgeford for inspiration, but nothing works. His mind is blank, and so is his sketchbook. There’s too much on his mind—upcoming payment dues, getting more bookings, the inn’s lack of staff, and Mom’s retirement.
There are some boats out on the lake; the skies are clear, and Milesshouldsketch this. He doesn’t. Every time he puts the pencil down on the paper, he simply doesn’t feel it. Damn, the gallery’s going to kick him out—if there’s nothing up on his wall, then they’re not going to get any profits from him. After all, they did agree to let him take a break from commissions as long as he still sent in original pieces.
Something in the corner of his eye catches his attention, and Miles turns to see Calvin jogging along the shore. He’s a good distance from where Miles is sitting on the pier, and Miles goes unnoticed.
Miles stares, strangely captivated. Calvin has headphones on and is in a hoodie and sweatpants. He wipes off sweat from his forehead and goes past him at an impressive speed. Calvin makes everything look so effortless.
Is there anything he can’t do? He writes the best songs; he plays the guitar, and he can sing. Calvin’s also so incredibly smart that he throws around words like search engine optimization and financial projections—words that go over Miles’s head.
After about a few minutes, Calvin runs past him again, this time in the opposite direction. Miles twirls the pencil in his fingers andwatches. He looks really nice running along the shore with the trees of various shades behind him. It’s unfair how he puts life to everything around him, like he did some days ago when he played at the bonfire. Also, when he was at the roof garden and the hanging lights illuminated his profile in a strangely enticing glow.
It’s not until Miles has sketched him jogging through the shore, trees surrounding him, that he realizes he might have gotten over his artist’s block. At least for now.
Chapter Seven
Mom is no good with computers, and he might just be as terrible. Miles is ready to throw his laptop when Excel tells him for the fifth time that his formulas don’t work. He needs to make an estimate of their projected costs and projected income, but he can’t figure out how. How much can they get if they’re at least fifty percent booked a month? Can they afford to hire more staff? Again, he wonders what would’ve happened if he had taken up a business course instead.
This had all been Dad. No wonder the inn’s in such bad shape, years after he’s gone.
“What’re you doing?”
Miles startles. He didn’t realize Calvin was this stealthy, and he looks up at him wide-eyed from where he’s seated at the lobby lounge. Calvin waits for a response, his hands in his pockets, and Miles is strangely too happy that he’s approached him for the first time.
“I can’t figure this out.” Miles tells him about having to find out how much they should be booking per month, and how all these new costs affect the projection, and other things that make his head spin.
Calvin nudges him. “Move over.”
He takes a seat beside Miles and pulls the laptop closer, and Miles again notices that he smells like vanilla. He must not like the boring generic soap the inn leaves in their room, and Miles is tempted to ask for the brand of his soap because he might be obsessed with it by this point.
“This isn’t right. Look, you won’t even break even like this,” Calvin says, and Miles watches as he corrects some of the columns and formulas. He has no clue what’s going on. Why the hell did Calvin know all this? “What’s this? Why do you need to put so much money into the bank?”
“Debt. These are the loans we’re paying back.”
“Okay.” Calvin clicks around some more. “I don’t know how accurate this is, but you’re supposed to have an occupancy rate of seventy percent every month to return a profit.”
