I look up, seeing three women standing at the door and notice a few more outside. I don’t see any other men. My eyes fall down their attire, and next to them, my sister’s clothes at The Hook seem prudish. Hair, make-up, heels…
I shoot my eyes to the guy and see him blink long and hard, looking aggravated. He picks through the paper menus stuffed in the board on the wall and takes out a few from different places.
“Do these restaurants deliver?” he asks, setting them down and pulling a wad of bills out of his wallet.
“Yeah, all of them.”
He holds up the menus with the cash, and one of the girls jogs up and snatches everything out of his hands.
“I want receipts and change,” he orders, not looking at her.
She makes a face at him behind his back and then she disappears outside with the others.
I feel compelled to warn him. This place has an unofficial code of conduct, and Danni’s pretty strict about shenanigans. They’ve scraped by here for a long time, but the town is looking at developing this property. She doesn’t want to give them an excuse to want this place gone.
“This is a pretty quiet, family-oriented place,” I tell him, slowly typing in his name and address. “Parties aren’t allowed, so just an FYI…”
He looks at me, his dark sandalwood eyes almost amused. “They’re my sisters,” he says.
I bite back my smile and focus on my work again. Sure. If those are his sisters, then I’m his mom.
But he certainly seemed pretty annoyed by them like a brother would be, I guess.
I place the keys on the counter—with the old-fashioned, rounded diamonds for key chains—and print off the contract to sign.
“The pool closes at ten,” I tell him. “The ice and vending machines are between the two buildings, and there’s a laundromat across the way there.” I glance at him and point behind him, outside. “Front desk is open twenty-four hours. Let us know if you need anything. And that’ll be two-hundred-eight-dollars-and-forty-two cents, please.”
But as I place a pen on top of the contract and wait for his response, I see that he’s not even listening to me. He’s staring at the neon sign on the wall to his right and the quote written in script…
Well, they’re nothing like Billy and me…
His stern expression breaks into a small smile all of a sudden as he stares at the sign, a mixed look of wonder and confusion on his face as if a memory is playing in his head. I glance at the sign again, Danni’s obsession with 90’s music the bane of my existence all summer. It’s a quote from a Sheryl Crow song, and I never asked her if it meant anything, because then she’d play the song, and I’d suffer.
“Sir?” I say.
He blinks, turning to me, still seeming disoriented for a moment.
“Are you okay?”
He shakes it off and opens his wallet again. “How much is it?”
“Two-oh-eight-forty-two,” I tell him.
He hands me three-hundred-dollar bills, and there’s a sign that says we don’t take bills larger than fifty, but seeing the unnerving pile of cash in his wallet, I don’t feel like ruffling his feathers. I take the money and get his change.
He taps on the counter as he waits, and I realize he’s matching the rhythm of The Distance by Cake that Danni has playing on the speakers in the lobby.
“Oh, don’t do that,” I joke, handing him his change. “You’ll encourage the owner. I’m trying to convince her the playlist is driving away customers.”
He takes the money and shoots me a look. “Nineties music is the best. It’s when people told the truth.”
I curl the corner of my mouth, not arguing further. He clearly drank the same Kool-Aid as she did.
“Thanks,” he says, swiping up the keys.
I hand him back his I.D. and watch him leave. Outside, he doles out the room keys to all the ladies, and after a moment, they all make their way to their rooms. I’m half-tempted to go to the window and see if he goes in with one of them. Or five of them. Very curious.
“Was that a customer?” Danni says behind me, and I glance back, seeing her walk into the office. Her apartment, where she resides with her grandmother, sits behind the office, so it’s easy to run and check on her when she needs.
“Yeah,” I tell her. “He got five rooms for the night, and he’s traveling with at least half a dozen women, so have fun on the night shift.”
She snorts and walks up, picking up the contract. “Tyler Durden?” she reads his name, squinting through her glasses.
I nod, pulling a stray brown hair off her flannel shirt. She even dresses 90s.
“Didn’t you get I.D.?” She makes a face at me. “It’s a fake name.”
“His I.D. said Tyler Durden,” I shoot back. “Why do you think it’s a fake name?”
“Tyler Durden is a lead character in Fight Club,” she spits out like I’m an idiot. “The best movie of the 90s, and one of the best books ever. It’s disturbing that you don’t know that, Jordan.”
I laugh, shaking my head. She might only be a year older than me, but we’re worlds apart in interests.
Fight Club.
My smile falls, and I drop my eyes, turning back to the computer. I’ve seen the movie, but the name didn’t register. And I’ve seen it recently, too, with Pike…
I swallow, my chest growing tight. Dammit. I’ve done really well the last few weeks, turning my attention elsewhere, so I don’t think about him. It was hard at first, but not seeing him every day made it easier. It was right to leave like I did.
But every once in a while, he’ll pop up in my head when I make taco dip for Danni during a long Saturday shift or hear a song or when I see my raincoat and the splatters of mud still on it from him and me playing around. I haven’t even lit any candles, because I don’t know what to wish for when I have to blow them out.
To wish to feel like I did with him gives him power over me again, but deep down, that’s all I still really want.
To feel that good again.
It’ll just have to be with someone else now.
“So…” Danni pulls up another stool. “Don’t your fall classes start up soon?”
I click off the Free Cell game, avoiding her gaze. “Yeah.”
She waits for me to say more, but I’m not really sure what to say. My financial aid came in, so classes are paid for, and I have enough to get an apartment back home, but it almost feels like taking a step backward. He called when I first left, but after a few days it stopped, and there’s been nothing since.
I hate to admit it, but I wonder far too often what he’s doing, if he’s seeing anyone, if he misses me…
If I go home, I may run into him. What will that be like?
I’m proud of myself that I’ve stayed away, but I still feel ashamed that he’s there in my head, lingering all the time. I’m not over him, and until I can blow out a candle and have something better to wish for, I don’t think my head is in the right place to go back yet. I’m scared.
“You know you can stay forever,” Danni goes on. “Seriously. My college isn’t bad at all. You can transfer.”
“Thanks,” I tell her. “But I need to go back. I know I do. I’ve just been putting off thinking about it.”
“You don’t want to see him.”
I meet her eyes, her black-rimmed glasses falling down her nose again.
“I don’t want to be who I was when I left,” I clarify.
“You’re not.” She leans an elbow on the counter, resting her chin in her hand. “You’re allowed to hurt. But you didn’t allow it to keep you down,” she points out. “That’s what makes us strong. You haven’t called him, and we had some fun. He didn’t ruin your summer, because you didn’t let him.”
Yeah. We got drunk at the pond, rocked out to bad music as we raced around town in her ’92 Pontiac Sunbird convertible, and had some pool parties here. I laughed a little.
“And it’s not like he tracked me down, either, so…” I tell her. “I guess we both knew it was borrowed time. It was just a fling. He was right.”
A fling.
A cool story I’ll have fun looking back on when I no longer love him, and I can appreciate it for the sex it was.
I feel her eyes on me, because she knows I’m lying to myself, but like a friend, she lets me dive into my delusion. We need lies to survive sometimes, because the truth hurts too much.
Maybe a transfer would be a good idea, after all.
I stand up. “The printer needs paper,” I tell her.
And without looking at her, I walk into the back office, blinking away the burn in my eyes before she sees. I’m not going to cry. I can’t hide here forever, after all. Northridge is my home, my family is there, and I have to go back at some point. I can do it.
“Hi.” I hear Danni sing-song. “Welcome to The Blue Palms.”
I laugh to myself. The Blue Palms are a set of neon palm trees outside that aren’t real and certainly aren’t native to Virginia. But I like the tropical colors of this place, the retro pinks and blues, and the old-style, beachy charm. It might not have the amenities of the larger hotels, but it’s private, clean, and nostalgic. It has character.
“Uh, thanks,” a male voice says. “Um…”
I open the cabinet, grabbing a ream of paper, their muffled voices carrying on in the lobby. I hope he only needs one room, because for once, we’re about sold out.
“Jordan Hadley?” Danni says more loudly as if repeating him.
I halt with the paper in my arm and the cabinet still open.
“Yeah,” the man says, and I inch closer to the doorway to better hear. “I’m sorry to bug you. Does she work here? I was told she worked at a motel in the area, and I’ve been almost everywhere.”
The vein in my neck throbs, and I can only manage short, shallow breaths.
“And you are?” Danni probes.
“Pike Lawson,” he answers. “A friend.”
My arms give way, and I nearly drop the package of paper.
“Pike…” she repeats. “Like in Buffy the Vampire Slayer?”