Although her jaw aches, Sarah plasters on another smile, hoping it reaches her eyes as most of her face is covered. Unlike the officer and the tow truck driver, Caleb doesn’t seem surprised by her appearance. He regards her steadily with deep-set blue eyes that never drop below her neck.
“Caleb, this is Miss—I can’t pronounce her last name. This is Sarah.”
“Welcome to Sweetside, Sarah.” The corners of Caleb’s eyes crinkle, and Sarah imagines his square jaw smiles with very straight, very white teeth. “Let’s get you in the truck. You must be freezing.”
“Remember, Miss Sarah, you’re not to leave the motel for two weeks. I’ll be checking up on you. Don’t make us board you in.” The officer thumps the plywood in the back of the truck.
With his mask on, she can’t tell if he’s joking. She nods, her mouth dry. Caleb opens the passenger-side door for her, and she climbs into the cab. There’s no going back now, but there was no going back hours ago when she got into her car and started driving.
Caleb slams the door and waves at the police officer, then gets into the driver’s seat. Sarah hugs her backpack to hide the frightened staccato of her heart. For months, it had only been her and Ben in 650 square feet, and now she’s trapped in a tiny space with a man again.
After Caleb pulls off onto the highway, he turns up the heat in the truck. Sarah whimpers gratefully as her toes begin to thaw. “I couldn’t help noticing you’re not dressed for the weather,” he says.
He’s so close that Sarah can feel his voice vibrating inside her ribcage. She hugs the backpack tighter. “It wasn’t snowing in Toronto when I left,” she lies. She’d been in such a hurry to flee that she’d stuffed her feet into the first pair of shoes by the door.
She tries to calculate if she has enough cash to pay for the motel as well as food delivery. They might trace her cards. “What’s your nightly rate?”
“Don’t worry about it. We’re paying for hydro anyway until the end of the month. Heat’s gotta stay on so the pipes don’t freeze, so it doesn’t make a difference to us if you’re there to enjoy it.”
“Thank you. That’s very kind.” She’s not used to kindness.Kindnesssends her arms tensing around her backpack, wondering if the truck is going too fast for her to jump out of it.
Caleb smirks. “Don’t think I’m a saint. It’s also out of guilt. I’m guessing Uncle Isaac gave you a hard time. I bet Jerry was an asshole, too.” He shakes his head. “Sweetside was paranoid about strangers even before the pandemic. And I imagine since you’re—” He waves his hand toward her.
“You don’t care that I’m Chinese?” she says lightly. Smile. Make it a joke, so they don’t think you’re accusing them of anything.
“I went to college in Toronto. I know there’s a world outside Sweetside. And,” he adds, the corners of his eyes crinkling again, “I don’t get my news from the comments section.”
She relaxes a little, but the sooner she gets behind a locked door, the better. Caleb’s friendliness could still be an act. She’s well-acquainted with deceptive charm.
“So, tell me about yourself, Sarah,” Caleb says. “What do you do?”
“I’m a freelance writer. Mostly marketing copy, and some editing.”
“Oh, that’s good. So you won’t have been affected much by the lockdown.”
He doesn’t notice her smile waver.
The town sign emerges from behind the snow on the side of the road.WELCOME TO SWEETSIDE POPULATION 1,500.Someone has spray-paintedSTAY OUTunderneath in furious red strokes, and Sarah feels like they’ve written the message specifically for her.
Caleb sighs. “Well, I’m sorry you’re not experiencing the best hospitality Sweetside has to offer. Here we are.”
A low-slung shape appears ahead. A roadside motor inn, the mainstay of tourist routes that predates hotel franchises and loyalty programs. Sarah passed many of them during her flight up Highway 11. It made her nostalgic for the road trips she’d taken as a kid through cottage country, Ba-Ba at the wheel of the car, Ma-Ma flipping through the Ontario tourism guidebook with all the accommodations within their price range highlighted. Sarah and Graham would sit in the back, separated by the picnic cooler. At the time, she’d never noticed anything unusual. Now she wonders if the locals peered at her family with the same suspicion as Jerry and Officer Isaac. Maybe that was why Ba-Ba preferred motels to hotels, because you never have to pass other people in a hallway.
Caleb takes the next exit, rumbling off the road into the deserted parking lot. To Sarah’s relief, the motel is not actually called the Suicide Motel. An unlit monolith of a sign proclaimsSweetside Motelin a retro script. Below it, black movable letters spell outCLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE STAY SAFE.
The building itself is single-story, cast from the same mold as the motels Sarah remembers staying at as a child. White aluminum siding stained grey by the darkening sky, the peaked roof crusted with snow. Each unit is marked by an orange door and a concrete planter filled with frosted, dead flowers. It might have been cheerful, if not for the frigid weather and air of abandonment.
“I’m afraid wifi’s been turned off, but otherwise, everything’s still on. You came just at the right time,” Caleb says, and Sarah fights off a bitter laugh. “In a couple weeks, the water will be shut down too. We thought about keeping it open, but our housekeeper’s in the hospital, and I don’t think anyone will be taking advantage of ski season this winter anyway.” He parks the truck and twists the key out of the ignition. It jangles against a half-dozen other keys as he hooks the carabiner keychain on his belt loop.
“Are you sure I can’t pay you?” She doesn’t want to be indebted to anyone, especially now.
“Oh, don’t worry about us.” He climbs out of the truck and comes around to the passenger side to open her door. Sarah clambers down, ready to run from this too-considerate man if she has to.
“We don’t really need the money,” he says, and then she sees the house.
The house lurks a little distance behind the motel, on a rising slope crowned by tall trees. In the fading twilight, Sarah makes out red brick, high gables, and gingerbread trim. The number of gables betrays that the house is large, but beneath the imposing pines, it resembles a dollhouse.
A hulking silhouette stands in a lighted window on the second floor. The hairs on the back of Sarah’s neck lift, and it’s not just from the cold.
