Bentley: Your “cabin” was a refurbished hotel room…
Me: You’re one to talk. You spent summers at Princess Prep IN A LITERAL CASTLE.
Bentley: And I grew up to be a fuckin’ queen. Get over it.
Me: You’re being VERY UNHELPFUL RIGHT NOW.
I sayright nowbut I do mean over an indeterminate period of recent time. Bentley and I were joined at the hip in high school, existing on a wavelength above everyone else, but ever since my reputation started taking a rocky turn, she’s begun putting distance between us, and it hurts.
Her next message is a link to the Wind River Inn. The image attached is the bright-white exterior, all stunning porches and a slideshow of its loudly wallpapered (probably haunted) rooms. Duh, how had I not thought of this myself.
Bentley’s last text reads:Don’t say I never did anything 4 u, matty bb
***
“I’m sorry, Mr. Prince, but there’s no room at the inn,” says Rosalie, the elderly innkeeper wearing owlish glasses, from behind the reception desk. I gape at her, and she snorts to herself. “Sorry! I’ve always wanted to say that to someone.”
My eyes narrow. “I’m not looking for aroom. I’m here for asuite.” She doesn’t seem to be comprehending the difference. “I don’t require anything fancy. Just a king bed, a claw-foot tub, a sitting area, and if you have one with a view, that wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, but if you don’t, garden-facing is fine.”
Rosalie blinks back at me as if I’m from another dimension and then steps aside, doing a Vanna White gesture to the wall behind her. There are at least a dozen empty hooks where brass keys usually hang and sway, tagged with room numbers. I’ve been here before when my parents checked in during Thanksgiving, and I’ve never seen that wall depleted in my life. “No rooms. No suites. No vacancy, sweetie.”
“Are you serious?” I hope my incredulity conveys that something must be done about this. Though in fairness, this isn’t the kind of place I can flash my parentage for favors. Mom went from hopeful town youth with shiny prospects to bestselling urbanite author and never looked back. The town has never quite forgiven her for that.
Except Rosalie, who took her business annually.
But whatever. I’ll make like Mary and Joseph and sleep in a manger behind this former carriage house if I must. Anything to not be sharing a room with that human snowblower. Those close quarters will force me to crack.
“Unfortunately, I am serious,” Rosalie says. “Joking aside, a local lawn architecture company is launching a walk-through Christmas light exhibition, and it’s drumming up a lot of interest online. All part of the big town-revitalization plans or whatnot. We were booked solid by last weekend. Everyone wants to be there for opening night. Lots of out-of-towners are making a weekend out of it.”
I bite the inside of my cheek until I taste blood. This was my only hope. I assumed since they knew my parents here they could bill the suite to the last card on file. Which, now that I consider it, may have expired at this point.
“What’s your availability for Monday?” I ask, hoping for some certain reprieve to look forward to. She completely ignores my question, enraptured by another thought.
“You remind me of your mother when she was young,” Rosalie observes, resting an elbow down in front of her. Like Grandma, people here refer to Mom asyour mothermore often than not. Anna Winston-Prince is practically forbidden. “One time, maybe when she was thirteen or fourteen, she burst in here saying she’d had a fight with Lorna and Doug and was looking for a place to hide out. She was a ball of teenage angst, almost adorable, entirely frightening. I had girls of my own, so I knew the drill.” She tucks a wispy hair behind her ear.
“I said, ‘Okay, if you can’t pay, you’ll have to work off the room. Do you understand?’ She said, ‘Sure. I’ll do whatever.’ I took her right back into our kitchen and showed her the sink piled high with the plates from the breakfast buffet and said, ‘You said you’ll do whatever, right?’ She took one long, hard look at those dishes covered in hollandaise and said, ‘You know what? I just forgot I have a book report due tomorrow,’ and fled here like a bat out of hell.”
Rosalie’s laugh is so booming it makes her rosy cheeks jiggle. I’m unamused by her trip down memory lane. Her apologetic eyes make my stomach sink even lower. “I wish I could offer you a similar deal, but my hands are tied. Let your parents know that the next time they’re in town, we’ll prepare the singular suite for them well in advance. No dish washing necessary.”
“Sure, yeah. Will do.”
Rosalie dips into her office, leaving me alone.
Dejected and out of options, I don’t let the door hit me or my bruised ego on the way out.
While lost in thought, considering how to get back to Grandma and Gramps’s house—walking: not my favorite option, after seeing the havoc it’s wreaked on my fresh-from-the-box boots—I don’t notice a patch of pesky black ice right in front of me.
Suddenly, I’m graceless Adam Rippon, slipping and sliding down the front walk, arms flailing. My life—once fantastic, now a joke—flashes before my eyes. I grab for the rickety sign to keep myself upright, but the terrible tread on my boots has me speeding away before I can grasp it.
“Matthew?” comes a voice that makes my predicament even more unfortunate. I don’t have time to look up before I’m bumping chests with a certified snoring extraordinaire. The force of my body knocks Hector backward and backward further, until we both tumble into a melting snowbank, landing with me on top of him in an ungainly sprawl. “Oof!”
The blow knocks the wind out of me. It’s seconds before I’m opening my eyes to ensure I haven’t killed a man. Thankfully (or not thankfully, depending on how you look at it), Hector is breathing, glaring up at me from beneath his wayward beanie.
“You cause chaos everywhere you go, don’t you?” he snidely remarks. It’s so like what one of my married exes said to me on that fateful day at the Fire Island beach when I was broken up with.
“You’re chaotic, Matthew. And we don’t need that energy in our life any longer…”
I cringe. That comment stings worse than the cold or any scrapes I may have sustained from that spectacular fall.
