I never realized how much shit my parents must’ve swallowed over the years, how many tight smiles they’d kept locked on their faces as some sunburned dude on his fifth Coors Light yelled about a room that was too warm, or sheets that were too rough, or—and this one has actually happened to me—that the ocean “didn’t have enough waves.”
But hey, there’s a reason they call this the “hospitality business,” so I’m as hospitable as can be when, just a little before sunset, the couple staying in room 104 casually lets me know that they left the two bikes that visitors are allowed to use to explore the area in the little nature preserve about a quarter mile down the beach.
“It was too sandy to ride them, and it was too hot to pushthem,” the woman—I think her name is Michelle—tells me, her perfectly plucked brows puckered like this is somehow my fault.
I smile back, hoping it doesn’t look like a grimace. “Yeah, that’s why we advise guests to stick to the roads or, if you’re in the nature preserve, the boardwalk.”
“Wish we’d known that!” the man replies cheerfully as though I myself had not told them exactly that when they checked the bikes out this morning. Edie had been there, too, and had added to be sure to return the bikes to the porch because the forecast was predicting rain this evening.
I glance toward the front windows now, and while the rain hasn’t started falling, the clouds outside are heavy and dark, almost swollen against the few rays of the setting sun. It’ll be dark by the time I get the bikes back to the inn, and probably pouring if the rising wind and thick smell of ozone are anything to go by.
I’m tempted to just leave them there, let them rust, let them get stolen, who gives a fuck? These people, Todd and Michelle, are the first to even want to use the bikes in months, and while they hadn’t been expensive, every time I saw them sitting on the porch with their cute baskets and jaunty little bells on the handlebars, I thought of me and Chris picking them out at the Walmart over in Gulf Shores, me giggling as I’d attempted to test the bike out in the deserted aisle.
Guests are going to love it,Chris had said.They can ride into town to grab dinner, ride down the beach where the sand is packed firm enough. It’ll be one of those little touches, you know?
You’re really getting into this innkeeper life, I remember saying, and then he’d grabbed the handlebars and kissed me, his lips curving into a smile against mine.
I’m really getting into thisinnkeeper, he’d replied, and I’d groaned at how cheesy it was, but we’d laughed and bought thebikes and I’d even put stupid little ribbons in the same shade of pink as the Rosalie Inn on the backs of the seats, and then less than a year later, Chris was gone—no longer into innkeeper lifeorthis innkeeper—and all I had was a business drowning in debt, a mom who needed expensive care, and these two fucking bikes.
Well, I guess I’d had them up until Todd and Michelle dumped them in the swampy nightmare that is the nature preserve.
So now I smile at the two of them, even giving a stupid littlesalutethat immediately makes me want to kill myself.
“No worries!” I tell them brightly. “I’ll send someone to go grab them.”
The someone is going to beme, but let them think I’m above that kind of thing as innkeeper, let them think my “staff” is more than me, Edie, a couple locals who clean the rooms, and Louisa the night shift girl, plus our one maintenance guy, Ray, a man I’ve seen sober exactly twice in the three years I’ve been running the inn.
Thunder rumbles somewhere in the distance, and I bite back a sigh as Todd and Michelle blithely turn away, heading back to their room, where they’ll probably watch the storm roll in and shiver with delight at being inside to watch it rather than out in it, pushing two fucking bikes over sand for a quarter of a mile.
Edie meets me by the front door as I’m grabbing a Rosalie Inn–branded poncho from the rack, her pierced brow lifting as she nods in Todd and Michelle’s direction.
“They didn’t bring back the bikes,” she says in a low voice, and I give her a tight smile.
“They didn’t.”
“Gen, leave them.”
“Can’t” is all I say in reply, which makes Edie frown at me, her hands coming to rest heavily on my shoulders.
“You can, you just won’t because you’re the most stubborn person on God’s green earth.”
“Guilty,” I say, slipping the poncho over my head, and Edie’s eyes dart from me to the door, then over to the coatrack where the other ponchos are hanging.
“I’ll come with you,” she says, already reaching, but I stop her with a hand on her arm.
“Edie. The bottom is going to fall out any minute. Weather like this always makes you nervous, and youhatedriving in the rain, so go ahead and get yourself home before it starts. No sense in both of us being wet and miserable.”
I don’t add that she’s already on overtime, and while she’d never, ever insist I pay her that, I’d never, evernotdo it, so I try not to keep her past her regular hours if I can help it.
“I’m not going to let you drag two bikes up the beach just because I don’t like bad weather, Geneva,” she says, but another crack of thunder has her flinching, and I pat her shoulder, moving past her.
“Look, if it ends up being too much, I’ll abandon them on the beach for some kids to find, okay? More trouble than they’re worth anyhow.”
Edie doesn’t look convinced, but she’s going to let me have my way—she always does.
“Ooh, where are we going?”
Both of us turn to see Lo floating into the room, her hair up in a messy bun on top of her head. No sundress tonight. Instead, she’s wearing a pair of navy capri pants and a striped top, slip-on sneakers squeaking on the hardwood, and without waiting for me to answer, she crosses the lobby to stand with me and Edie.
