“This room was given to me, you little shit. I checked in this morning!”
“I’ve been here for days, there’s no way they gave you this room.”
“The card worked!”
“We’re going to the front desk.” I finally opened my eyes, only to be scarred again. Hugh had his arms crossed, but hadn’t done anything else. “You’re still naked!”
“Yeah, what about it? You’re young, but when you get to my age, you don’t care about people seeing your junk.”
The woman that worked at the front desk looked like she could be freshly out of high school. She nearly fell over when she saw Hugh and me coming.
“H-hi, how can I help you?”
I was exhausted and tired. But I wasn’t rude. Before I spoke, I took a breath to calm down. “I think my room was accidentally double-booked. Can I get a new one?”
“O-oh, I’m so sorry.” I expected her to look at her book and give one of us a new room, but she glanced at Hugh instead. “Um, we’re fully booked.”
“You’rewhat?” I looked out at the parking lot. There was just my truck and the tractor. “How?”
“We’re doing some remodeling,” she said. “We only have a few rooms.”
“I guess we’re roomies then,” Hugh said. “I’ll warn you like I warned my first wife. I snore. And fart in my sleep.”
I stared at him for all of one second before I looked back at the woman. “Please tell me this is a prank.”
“I’msosorry.”
It was official. Life hated me. There was no explanation for this happening.
“Come on, roomie. I’ll even let you have the side of the bed near the door.”
“No, no. You can have the room. I’ll figure out another hotel.”
Hugh laughed. “Good luck with that. You’re in the middle of nowhere, kid. Any other hotels all have bedbugs.”
“I’mnotrooming with you. No offense, but I need my alone time.”
“I ain’t thrilled about this either, but you’ve got no other options. It’s not like you made any nice friends who would let you stay with them.” He shrugged and slowly hobbled away.
“Do you really not have any friends?” the front desk lady asked.
“I—of course I have friends.” Under her appraising gaze, I walked away and outside.
“Come on, boy! You gotta catch up.” Hugh had only made it about ten feet.
“You’ve had your shower. Aren’t you done with the room? You have to have a bed at your house, right?”
Hugh frowned. “I’ve got a bad back and the ones here are comfier.”
“But—”
He glared. “I paid good, hard money on this room and I’m using every part of it. You’ll just have to deal.”
For fuck’s sake.“You have a good night, I’ll figure this out.”
“What are you gonna do, sleep in your truck?”
That would be a better option.
