“Okay. I’m doing the right thing, right?” I asked. Because good holy Lord, did I need reassurance.

“Totally. Of course,” Sean replied, nodding emphatically. “You owe him money, you’re paying it back.”

We were in front of Cheetah’s house. Cheetah was a guy who I used to call my friend or my hook-up but in reality had just been the guy I used to get my drugs from. That’s how it worked in that world, though—nothing was serious and everyone was your friend.

“This guy’s name is really Cheetah?” Sean asked, glancing my way. “What kind of name is that?”

“It’s a drug dealer name,” I said. “His real name is Tom Williamson.”

“How generic,” Sean said.

“Exactly.”

Cheetah definitely wasn’t my friend anymore. But years ago, the fucker had been kind enough to pay my rent for a few months when I couldn’t scrape two pennies together to do it myself. Cheetah wasn’t a great guy, but he was generous with his money when he had it.

Sean had been nice enough to come with me to drop off the cash this morning. Sean was just a good friend like that—the kind of guy you could genuinely rely on, guilt-free. Hell, he’d probably help a random stranger on the street move a piano into a seventh-story apartment if they asked him to. I was pretty sure he was the only nice member of the Terrance family.

He was certainly the nicest one I’d ever interacted with.

I walked up toward the semi-dilapidated house, Sean close at my side. We were on the outskirts of town, and I was pretty sure Sean had never even seen this part of Mistview Heights. I was painfully aware of his wealthy upbringing as we approached, and I couldn’t help but think that Sean looked as out of place as a princess at a rodeo.

“It’s okay, Sean, no one’s going to attack you, or something,” I said, trying not to laugh.

He looked at me, surprised, as if he hadn’t realized how obvious his hesitation was.

We were in front of the door now, and I wished I could squirm away. I rang the doorbell, glancing around at all of the discarded cigarette butts littering the soil by the entryway. There was a half-full plastic cup of iced coffee resting under a bush that I knew had been there since I was last here. That had been over six months ago.

Sean scratched the back of his neck nervously as we waited. “Why can’t you just leave the envelope in his mailbox?” Sean asked.

“Because he’d never get it,” I said. “He checks his mail about once every three months, and then throws away ninety percent of it.”

Sean snorted. “Tell me again what you saw in this guy?”

I sighed, shaking my head. “He talked to me about Dutch Golden Age painters. You know I can’t resist that.”

“You really can’t.”

“Say the word Rembrandt and my cock just instantly hardens,” I said with a shrug.

“Gross. I don’t need to know your kinks,” Sean said, slapping me lightly on the shoulder.

“I promise I don’t jerk off to paintings. That’s a little much, even for me.”

Sean covered his smile.

Cheetah still hadn’t answered the door, and I pounded on it harder.

“Cheetah,” I yelled.

“He’s probably either asleep or in bed with his headphones on,” I said. “Cheetah doesn’t do anything else. Two years ago, I once came over to find him wearing nothing but a pink, furry hat, playing bongo drums on his kitchen counter.”

“Dear God, why?” Sean asked.

“He said his ass cheeks enjoyed the nice, cool stone of the countertop.”

“Remind me not to eat any food he prepares.”

“You really shouldn’t.”

I raised my hand to pound on the door again but just then, it swung open.

“Josh,” Cheetah said, smiling serenely. His eyes were bloodshot. He moved to hug me, and I tried to keep my distance as he embraced me. He didn’t even acknowledge Sean, but it seemed like Sean was plenty fine with that. He bent down and sat on the steps of the stoop, giving me a look that said good luck.

“You smell like rotten Doritos,” I said. “And are you ever going to clean up that coffee cup outside? I think the mold is about to start its own revolution.”

We stepped inside the cavernous lair that Cheetah called home, and instantly I was met with reminders of why I’d left this whole world behind. The place was more warehouse than home, with random musical instruments and photography equipment sitting throughout the sparse room. Atop every surface were more cigarette butts, pills, and food.

“Joshy, man, I don’t think Doritos are capable of rotting,” Cheetah said. He was high—maybe just on weed, right now, but I knew him. By the end of the night, he would be on at least four other types of drugs.

I inspected his long, red hair, which had seemed to be aggregating into various matted chunks on his head.

“When was the last time you took a shower?” I asked.

“Oh, do you like the dreads?” he said, beaming as he turned so I could see the back of his head.

I did not like the dreads.

“Kind of looks like you just… didn’t shower or brush your hair for the past couple months,” I said.

“Well… yeah,” Cheetah said, turning to face me again. “You can’t brush your hair if you want dreads.”

“Right,” I said. “Anyway, I have this.” I pulled out an envelope from the inside of my jacket, unfolding it and handing it over to him.

“Hell yeah,” Cheetah said, opening it up and leafing through the cash inside. After rent and food and the small amount I kept for myself, it was the rest of the money I’d made over the past few months. It was precious to me, and Cheetah just flipped through it like a magazine. “This is dope. I’ve been looking at this new stereo set-up—have you seen the new SVS subs? They are going to be so sick in the back of my car. I can’t wait to drive down the street, have everyone looking at me….”

“You can spend it on whatever you want. The money’s yours, not mine.”

“Hey man, it’s ours,” Cheetah said. “I lent you that money because you were my best dude, Joshy. I’m tellin’ you, you don’t have to pay me back—I understand your situation, and all that shit—”

“I’m going to pay you back, though,” I said, “in full. I promise.”

Cheetah nodded. “Right on.”

The truth was that I was desperate to finally pay Cheetah back for all the money I owed him so that he could finally be out of my life.

Being in this house—this room, everything in it, even the ground caked in cigarette butts out front—was a ticket straight back to the swampy hell I’d been in years ago. I could still remember what I felt like at that time in my life, walking up to that front stoop at night, a half-smoked cigarette in my hand, shivering and waiting for Cheetah to answer the door and get me my fix.

I never did half as many drugs as Cheetah’s other clients, but that hadn’t mattered. I had still been a slave to parties, pills, and nicotine. In high school I’d been the incredibly nerdy outcast, but in the world of drugs and parties, I could fit in as long as I was high, too. It felt like freedom. Cheetah had seemed amazing to me at first—he was a photographer, after all, one of many artists I’d met throughout my time in the art world.

He had told me he was a professional photographer, and as far as I was concerned, that made him the most important fucking person in the world. I was trying to make it as a professional painter or illustrator or anything, and I thought Cheetah had to have the connections I’d need to finally make it.

Instead, he’d just had a lot of drugs, a lot of stolen camera equipment, and an online blog where he constantly posted pictures of parties he attended all around Mistview Heights.

Cheetah was a nobody. Only a few thousand people frequented his photo blog, and he made all his real money selling drugs. I was one of those customers, until just after two years ago, when I’d finally gotten the hell out of the Mistview art scene.

I’d left it all behind. And seeing Cheetah’s house nowadays, sober and clear in the daytime, I couldn’t believe I used to hang out here. I couldn’t believe what I’d been before.

“Hey—Josh, man, I know you’re out of the game, and clean and whatever. But dude… this stuff that I got last night, it’ll blow your mind,” he said. He quickly rushed to the other side of the room, tripping over a camera tripod on his way. He picked up a small bag filled with white powder.

“I’ve got to go, actually.”

He turned back to me, smiling. “You sure you don’t want just one line? You can hang out here tonight, Joshy, there’s nothing much going on—no big party, nothing crazy. I know you swore all that shit off. Hey! You can help me with this photo shoot—”

“No,” I said, trying to keep my voice serious. “I’ll be back in a couple months with more money.”

“Come on,” he said from behind me. “What else do you have to do tonight, anyway? You got nothin’ going on, man.”

“I have to get to work.”

“Work?”

I paused, turning to face him. “Yes. Work. I have a job. You know that thing where you go somewhere, do stuff for someone else, then they pay you? Crazy concept, really—what will they come up with next—”

“You have a real job? Josh Crane? That ain’t no Josh Crane I know.”

I had told Cheetah about my job at least twice, but clearly, he had been too high to remember it.

I turned and opened the front door. “I’m going for a promotion this year, too. That means you’ll have your money back even sooner.”

“Josh fuckin’ Crane with a real job,” Cheetah said, standing in the doorway. I walked away, back out into the fresh air, toward the street where Sean was now waiting. Cheetah started laughing behind me. “Never thought I’d see the day. Alright, man, have fun with your real job.”

“Goodbye, Cheetah,” I called back, but I couldn’t bear to turn around again.

I kept silent for a moment as Sean and I had started off down the sidewalk. I was sure that Sean was silently judging me after finally seeing a glimpse of my past, and that he was probably formulating the best way to politely drop me as a friend altogether.

But Sean broke the silence shortly. “Everything go alright?” he asked as we made our way down to the subway.

I nodded once. “Thank you so much for coming along,” I said. “I fucking hate going there alone.”

We had a long bus ride back into downtown Mistview Heights. The train lumbered along, and I tried and failed to keep my past out of my thoughts. There was a time when I would have been on the same page as Cheetah. I had sworn up and down that I’d never get a “real job”—I hated the idea, and I wanted to make my own way in life.

But after years of shitty-paying freelance jobs, pavement pounding, and art commissions that forgot to pay me at all, I’d had enough. I’d painted a vibrant mural in a rich guy’s house, only for him to offer me a four-year-old cell phone as payment. I’d assisted a kids’ painting class at a local museum, and mostly ended up with vomit on my shirt when a boy ate twenty crayons. Men and women who I’d thought were powerful in the art scene had made me promise after promise, and at the end of every month, I had a full sketchbook and an empty wallet. I hadn’t been able to pay my rent.

The Mistview Heights art scene had failed me, or I had failed at it—I didn’t know which one was true. It didn’t matter. But what I knew for sure that my life was better since I’d cleaned up my act and ditched art for good two years ago.

There weren’t as many high highs, but there also weren’t the plunging lows. It had been a blur of sex and drugs and wild men, but my life now was better. Simpler.

I was working as a busser at a French restaurant when I’d met Sean Terrance. He was a regular and by far the kindest customer we had. He took the time to talk to me when no one else did, asking me about the food and eventually about me. I had sworn off the Terrance family long ago, but Sean was different.

And then Sean had told me about the job opening at the Terrance Hotel. I had to laugh when he told me I could finally be the sassy maid I’d always dressed up as for Halloween.

Housekeeper, I should say. The Terrance Hotel staff would balk at calling it “maid” work—that didn’t fit into their classy reputation. But it didn’t matter to me what it was called. It was a steady, honest paycheck. It let me live a simple life. I’d work whatever shifts they assigned me that day. I’d go home, heat up some cheap soup, and read by the window.

Nearly my entire paycheck went toward paying for the ridiculously steep rent. It got me an apartment with two roommates here, but could buy an entire house in other cities. But I liked being close to work, and it was worth it to me to live in a shoebox. I didn’t need much more. And my roommates were only slightly insane.

I slept better now than I had my whole life, now that I actually did physical work and wasn’t popping Adderall at all hours of the night. It was weird to say, but I guess I actually liked my life. Even though my teenage dream of an art career hadn’t worked out, I didn’t much miss it, so long as I never, ever thought about it.

And the best thing of all was yet to come. The housekeeping manager at the hotel, Grace, had told me privately that she was planning to retire at the end of the year, and would be recommending me as her replacement.

I’d almost cried with joy at the opportunity. It would mean getting a substantial raise, benefits, and more job security than I’d ever had in my life.

Since Grace had mentioned the potential promotion, I’d been working my little ass off more than ever before. I didn’t care what it took. I wanted this one small success. It would be the first time in my life I’d ever gotten a real, major promotion, and I wanted it something fierce.

But the best thing about working at the Terrance Hotel was that the customers, staff, and management mostly ignored me. I could be on my own, left to my thoughts as I completed my daily tasks. I could think about achingly stupid things, like what my escape plan would be if zombies attacked the hotel, or awful things, like how I’d been single for as long as I’d been clean and that no one was waiting at home in bed for me.

But finally, I was slightly in control of my own life. I was like a shadow, and that was how I liked it.

“I swear, this place looks like a damn castle on rainy days,” I said, staring up at the Terrance Hotel as Sean and I walked up.

“It may as well be a castle,” Sean said. “My parents do run it like one.”

“You’re not wrong about that,” I said. “You’re doing something with your mom here today?” I asked. Sean didn’t usually visit the hotel—he had a tutoring company of his own, and he liked it that way—but today he was dropping by.

“She says she has a ‘surprise’ for the family,” he said, eyeing me warily. “When my mother has a surprise, you know something’s up.”

“Maybe she’s gonna tell you they’re turning the place into a nightclub,” I said. “Rich people beware, the new Terrance Hotel is a rave club. Clothing optional. Must have neon hair and multiple piercings.”

“Yeah, that sounds like my mom,” Sean said. “You know she just loves her rave music. Can’t get enough of the pounding bass.”

“She’d probably bulldoze the whole hotel before she’d ever let a person with green hair inside.”

We were at the front of the building now, and I said goodbye to Sean for the day, watching as he walked in through the big front entryway. The building towered over Collinbrook Avenue, twenty stories of stone and ivy. Even I had to admit it looked like something magical. Every balcony housed deep green plants that wound their way around the corners of the building, and the windows were ornate in a way that didn’t exist in new construction. The rest of the street was like everywhere else in Mistview, bustling with people and restaurants and walk-up apartments.

But the Terrance Hotel turned heads. The big iron gates at the front of the building opened up to the front courtyard of benches and trees and fountains, and then the giant wood double doors led wealthy guests inside.

I didn’t use that entrance, though. I made my way around to the back of the building and used a small back door, painted black but fading, mottled with stains. It was the service entrance, accessible only through an alleyway that led to a parking lot.

I was working the noon to eight o’clock shift today, and nearly all of it would consist of cleaning guest rooms.

Sure, it was a cleaning job. And yeah, working for Caroline and Robert Terrance was more than a little soul crushing—they were like Mr. and Mrs. Cruella DeVille incarnate, both of them treating me like a bug more than a person.

But most days, I didn’t have to see them. I went from room to room, listening to light music on my shitty little radio, tidying things up. Most of the other guest room attendants were easy to get along with, either single moms making extra cash to raise their families or people like me, with nowhere else to go.

Today, though, when I walked inside the small housekeeping room, ready to grab my cart and start the day, I almost jumped out of my skin. Mason was waiting for me, sitting up rigid-straight as always, his icy blue eyes penetrating through me like little overcharged lasers.

If Caroline Terrance’s own personal assistant was waiting for someone in the housekeeping lounge, everyone knew something big or something bad was going to happen. Sometimes it meant a celebrity was visiting the hotel and we had to provide special accommodations, and other times it meant that someone was about to get fired.

Two other housekeepers gave me glances of support before quickly rushing out of the lounge.

“Josh,” Mason said, his eyes darting down to his phone and then back toward me. “Glad you’re finally here.”

I checked the time. “M-Me?” I asked. “What’s going on?”

“The top-floor suite,” he said, his eyes boring into me. “It needs to be clean as soon as possible. VIP coming in today and the guests who stayed there last night seemed to have a penchant for jelly beans. Can you get it done?” Mason wasn’t unkind by any stretch—he just had so much pent-up energy that it spilled over into every word.

“Of course,” I said, depositing my bag into my designated locker at the side of the room. “Jelly bean cleanup. Got it. I’ll pretend I’m an Oompa Loompa.”

“Good,” Mason said, not laughing at my attempt at a joke. “He’s going to be staying in the suite for at least a month,” he said.

“Wow. Who the hell is it, Oprah or something?”

But I was pretty sure Mason didn’t even hear my reply. He was already tapping out some heated email or text message on his phone. Mason always seemed like he was about to explode—he was polished, professional, and extremely good at his job, but I knew that Mrs. Terrance pushed him to his breaking point near-constantly. I couldn’t blame him for being tense.

He let out a long breath after putting his phone in his back pocket and then finally looked back up at me. “Thank you, Josh. You’re a treasure.”

And like that, he was off like a rocket, surely going back to attend to whatever Caroline Terrance needed next.

I headed up to the suite and found that Mason hadn’t been kidding—the place looked remarkably trashed. A family of four always seemed to make more of a mess than rock stars or bachelors. There were indeed jelly beans all over the floor, bedsheets in the bathtub, a broken glass and a TV remote that looked like it had bite marks in it.

The room was going to take work, but I could whip it into shape.

It almost felt like a challenge, trying to take the room from horror show to perfect in as little time as possible. As I worked, I opened the big windows at the corner of the room, letting in the sound of light rain. Mason came and checked on me once every hour, which, even for him, was excessive.

What kind of VIP was going to be staying here? For God’s sake, it seemed like I was preparing for royalty.

But after a few hours, the room looked impeccable. I called Mason to let him know, and the relief in his voice was palpable.

I went to close the windows at the edge of the room, and when I looked down, I saw what had to be the VIP in question: a black car had pulled up, and Mr. and Mrs. Terrance themselves were outside waiting. The only times I’d ever seen them wait to personally greet guests were when celebrities or politicians came by.

From up high, I couldn’t tell who it was getting out of the black car. It was a young man with sandy brown hair, but that’s basically all I could see. He gave a half-hug to both Mr. and Mrs. Terrance. What kind of celebrity would hug them? And just behind Mr. and Mrs. Terrance were Sean and his sister, Alora, who also got hugs.

I closed the windows and headed out of the room, pushing my cart back to the service elevator and down to the basement. After dropping the cart off at the lounge, I realized that I was too damn curious. I typically didn’t care about the VIP guests, but if Mr. and Mrs. Terrance needed their kids to show up, it had to be something big.

So I headed up the stairs to the lobby. I walked down the long, pristine hallway, and before I even turned the corner to the main entryway, I heard Mrs. Terrance going on and on about “arrangements.”

I stopped at the edge of the room, far enough away that I wouldn’t be noticed. The whole Terrance family and Mason were all sitting on one of the big couches near the edge of the room, by the grand piano. Alora, Mrs. Terrance’s daughter, was on her feet, her high heels clicking loudly on the marble floor as she gesticulated. Clearly she was upset about something, but everyone else was ignoring her.

And just then, the VIP in question turned to the side, looking up at Alora to calm her down.

I squinted, trying to decipher who it was.

Why did that face look so familiar? It had to be some actor, some person I knew from TV….

And then Mrs. Terrance’s voice cut across the room, loud and clear.

“Adrian, don’t bother with her. We need to attend to business.”

A cold realization rolled through me.

Adrian. Adrian fucking Terrance. All at once, memory came flooding back: Adrian and me, sitting in the garden of this hotel, so many years ago. How he’d been my first kiss—then my second and third and tenth kiss, all in one night.

How incredibly intense that night had been, right before I’d gone to art school and Adrian had… disappeared forever.

And yet here he was, in front of my eyes.

Of course, I’d thought of Adrian a lot in the years following that night. And when I’d met Sean, I’d remembered my time with his brother—but Sean mentioned that Adrian would never come back to town for any reason other than Christmas, and so I’d put that thought away. I figured I’d never see him again.

But seeing him in person again was a completely different thing than memory. He was really here, in the flesh.

And Adrian was a man now, through and through. He looked like everything I wasn’t: polished and businesslike in a perfect suit, and every bit as athletic as he always was. I reached up to smooth out my hair instinctively, even though no one was looking at me. Sure, I’d grown a little since high school, and doing this job was a good daily workout, but I was still lanky and awkward in my mind.

He was gorgeous.

It would have been great if the ground could have swallowed me up at that moment, or if the hotel could have collapsed around me.

I reached out to the wall to steady myself, and saw that Mason had caught sight of me standing there. He gave me a strange look, and I disappeared back around the corner before any of the others could see me.

Adrian Terrance was here. The man who had stolen my heart and ripped it right out, all in one night. I could practically still remember what he had felt like.

And now, it was like seeing a ghost.