Chapter 11
Rory
“Just because I haven’t said anything until now, it doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten.”
Colt. Of course he hasn’t forgotten. My life never works out that nicely. I stretch out on my back and roll my head away from him so he can’t read my expression. In the last few hours, I’ve discovered a few things about our time here—things I never knew until now. One, there are only so many things you can do at a run-down hotel when you’re stranded over the holidays. Things like jump from bed to bed, play games with children, tell stories while looking up at the ceiling, and sleep. It’s like living inside one continuous hula-hoop that goes round and round and round with no end in sight.
Currently we’re side by side in the hallway, lying on a patch of carpet underneath a drinking fountain. If one more person leans over me in search of water, I may knee them in the crotch.
“So you want to pull it out now or wait until later?”
I startle at his choice of words, considering the thoughts I just had. But then I realize what he’s asking and groan.
“Later. Right now I want to lie here and wish to die.”
“Later isn’t an option,” he says. “Show me now.”
I come up on an elbow and frown at him. “But you just said—”
“I was trying to be polite, but then I remembered who I’m talking to. No need for false pretenses. You lost the bet, now whip it out and show me.”
I sit up and tuck my legs under me, then grudgingly reach for my bag. He’s right. I lost the bet, and I hate losing. There’s always this tight little knot that forms in the base of my stomach when I lose. It doesn’t matter what’s at stake—big or small—losing is unpleasant when it’s a familiar feeling. Loss is loss when everything else has already been taken away.
There are so many things inside this bag, all of them personal, none of them meant for viewing by anyone other than me. That’s the way it’s been for years; that’s the way I wanted to keep it. Everything in here would invite questions—every photo, every paper, every memento. But I can’t open up, not to a stranger. Not now. Maybe not ever. When someone you love dies in your arms…when you could have saved them but didn’t…it isn’t something you want to revisit. At least not out loud.
I dig inside the bag. My hand brushes against the bottle like it always does, but I quickly move it away. Finally, I find what I’m looking for. The second Colt mentioned his condition of the bet, I searched my brain until it found an answer. This one. It’s safe. As long as Colt doesn’t flip it over and read the back, I’ll be okay. One look at the front, and I’ll take it back from him. One look at the photo, and my debt is paid.
“Here,” I say, handing Colt a small frame. It’s a picture of me at age four, sitting atop my grandfather’s shoulders and clutching his thick gray hair in two fistfuls. This is my favorite picture of us. One, because it represents everything my grandfather did for me. I’m pulling his hair and probably making his shoulders ache from forty pound pressure, but all I remember from that day is the sound of his laughter because he never complained.
Two, because I’m wearing my hair in a long braid, a blue ribbon tied in a neat bow at the end of it. I begged for that ribbon—a cheap piece of satin fabric that he bought for me at a five and dime because blue was my favorite color and I liked the way it felt. I wore that ribbon every day for two years until I lost it at a classmate’s zoo-themed birthday party. The theory was that an animal ate it; it was never seen again and his offers to buy me a new one were met with emphatic “nos.” Back then I was stubborn like that. Still am, some might argue.
And three, because I’m smiling. Such a big smile. So happy. Joy all over my face.
In the hundreds of photos taken of me in the past two years, not one of my smiles is as genuine as this one.
“Is this you?” Cory grins at the photo, but it’s a listless grin. Like he’s trying to figure something out. I want to take the picture out of his hands and shove it back in my bag, but I resist the urge. Sill, I don’t want him to figure me out; I like to remain in the shade.
“It is,” I say after clearing my throat. “Me when I was a little girl.”
“Who’s the guy with all the hair?”
I pick at a piece of lint on the carpet so I don’t have to look at him. “My grandfather.”
I can feel Colt’s eyes on me. He knows there’s more that I’m not saying. I can almost hear the wheels turning inside his head.
“Does he live in Seattle too?”
“No.” One word, so much meaning. I’m the only one who lives in Seattle. The only one who will ever live in Seattle.
He leans forward with his hands clutched in front of him, watching me. I’m picking at more lint.
“Rory?”
I stop and look up.
“You don’t have to tell me. Everyone has their secrets.” Some people would say this like an accusation. Colt says it like he understands. Like maybe he has a few secrets of his own. In a weird way, this makes me like him more. Nothing says camaraderie like two people with rough pasts.
I smile. “Thanks.”
He reaches out to tug my hair, and my heart gives an annoying little flip. It’s one thing to flirt. It’s another thing entirely to actually feel things. “You were a cute kid. Not surprising.”
I laugh it off and point to the photo. “I had a gap in my front teeth and I’m wearing thick glasses.”
“Yeah, that part was unfortunate. Contacts now?”
“Lasik when I turned eighteen. It was practically a miracle. Now I can see like a normal person.”
Colt lies flat on the floor and crosses one ankle over the other. “Normal is boring. Besides, I wear contacts.”
“Let me guess, your lenses are blue. Makes perfect sense.”
He sits up again and brings his face only inches from mine. Does he do this to women often? Try to rattle them with his up-close death stare? It works. I’m rattled and wanting more.
“Baby, these eyes are as blue as they seem,” he says. “No need to fake it.” And there goes my stupid heart again, feeling things. “Let’s do something. I’m bored sitting in this hallway.” Just like that, he’s on his feet. Only this time he shoulders my bag himself and holds one hand out to help me up. I’m unsure about this immediately, but he eyes me so I latch on and stand up. “A bet’s a bet, and you kept up your end of it. I won’t look inside the bag, promise.”
I sigh, relieved to be free from the weight for a while. “Okay, where are we going?”
I adjust my cap and shove my hand in a pocket. “You’re the bored one. Lead the way.”
* * *
“You should be a party planner.” I make an X on the paper in front of me. “No, on second thought—a cruise ship director. That way when people run out of things to do you could entertain them with a quick game of shuffleboard or a wild rendition of Celine Dion karaoke.” I draw another X. “Colt Ross—meeting all your entertainment needs with nothing but a pen and paper.”
He draws an O and glares up at me. “We’re stuck in a nasty hotel with a few hundred smelly people, but you are welcome to come up with a better idea. Duck duck goose, again? Hangman, maybe? You, dancing on top of this counter all by yourself while I toss quarters at you?” He taps the countertop a couple time and his eyes light up, so I mark another X and draw a straight line. There. I’ve won all eleven games so far. Dance around that, jerk.
“Why would I do that? Tic tac toe is riveting so far. Plus I keep winning, so there’s that.”
He flips the paper over and begins drawing little lines. “Hangman it is. I’m sick of losing.” He lays his pencil down and pushes the paper toward me. “Start guessing, chick. Though I’m not sure you’re going to like what it says.”
Three minutes later, I’m staring at Rory Gray sucks at life and her pictures suck too. Clever. Super mature. The dumbest game of hangman I’ve ever played, so why am I laughing? “If you’re going to play that way, then now it’s my turn.”
It takes him two minutes, faster than me which means he wins. But if I have to lose with Colt Ross sinks with the Titanic while holding tight to a shuffleboard stick, I’ll take losing any day. I drop my head on the table and fight a wave of giggles. Before I’m finished, he slaps me on the head with the paper.
“Your turn again.” Rory has a stupid laugh and she needs to brush her teeth stares up at me.
“I just brushed my teeth,” I protest, breathing into my hand to check. I smell nothing. Bad hygiene is a very real fear of mine, but I think he’s lying. I hope he’s lying. I’ll be so embarrassed if he isn’t lying.
“Trust me, it’s been a few hours.”
Maybe he isn’t lying.
I yank the paper to my side of the table and draw little lines, then shove the sheet in front of him. Oh yeah well you need a haircut is the only thing I can come up with, but it isn’t even true. I’ve always liked longer hair on men, and I especially like the way it looks on Colt. He’s trying hard to be unpretentious and blend in, but I can tell he comes from money. Maybe it’s in the way he carries himself or maybe it’s those ridiculously overpriced jeans that I immediately recognized as Prada, but Colt isn’t as grunge as he’s trying to appear. When I read a simple That was lame want to quit playing this game? I breathe a sigh of relief. It was lame, even if I haven’t stopped laughing once.
With a smile still firmly planted on my face, I drop my head to the table. “I’m so bored and it’s Christmas. I shouldn’t be here. I should be…should be…”
“Should be what?” he says. I look at him through the bend of my elbow, unwilling to raise my head all the way. Curls fall into my vision. Colt studies them with a soft smile on his face. I think he likes them. I know I’m not going to ask. “What would you be doing right now if you were home?”
I drag myself up to a sitting position and consider how to answer. There are two versions of this scenario, really. There’s the Los Angeles version, where I would be hosting a Christmas Eve party at home, a party involving a hundred strangers who each arrive with various bottles of wine that I will never drink and who oooh and ahhh over my fake tree and fake fireplace arrangements and fake gifts on display that no one will actually open. That party would go well into the evening even though it’s Christmas Eve, but that’s the thing about the Beverly Hills elite; everyone has a nanny to tuck the children into bed. Whether parents are home or not, Santa arrives on time and provides a wide array of child-appropriate gifts to open Christmas morning. Your regular Norman Rockwell setting with a few major adjustments.
And then there’s the Seattle version, the version that involves me hopping the red-eye Christmas morning and getting to my apartment in time to watch A Christmas Story on repeat, eating pre-packaged rum cake and drinking a cheap bottle of Merlot I picked up at a corner store because I left all those expensive bottles of wine back at my LA apartment. And then on Christmas afternoon I might pull on a new sweater I bought myself and visit the local theater to catch a new movie or drive downtown to look at the lights. Los Angeles is a whirlwind; Seattle is solitary. I love Christmas, but I hate my options. Still, both are better than this.
At least that’s what I keep telling myself.
“Not much,” I say. The words fall flat, though the way Colt looks at me I think they’re hanging in the air between us. His head is tilted to the side and his gaze is especially focused on my forehead. If his look had a title, it might be You’ve Never Had a Good Christmas and Someone Needs to Give you One. A long title, a bit ordinary, but it would be mostly correct. My experience with the holiday was good up until six years ago.
“Then we need to change that.” He stands abruptly and pulls me with him. “Let’s find something Christmassy to do, something that doesn’t involve a pen and paper.”
“The paper thing leaves out unwrapping gifts, I guess. That doesn’t sound very Christmassy.”
He holds up a finger with one hand and readjusts my backpack on his shoulder with the other. “Correction, no paper used for drawing things like crossword puzzles and word pictures.”
“Does that mean you’re going to buy me a gift?”
He hooks an arm around my shoulder and pulls me in, casual like he’s a big brother or a second cousin I haven’t seen in years. I find myself thanking God for all the fellow stranded passengers making noise around us. If not for them, he might hear the slam slam slam sound my heart is making.
“It means I might steal one for you. Now let’s go.”
A Christmas thief. My hero.