Chapter 7
“No . . . no . . . please . . . no . . . NO!”
I awoke suddenly, soaked through with sweat, tangled in the sheets, clutching my pillow with tears streaming down my face. My breathing, my panting were so loud in this room, this entirely too-silent room. “Dammit,” I snarled, still clutching the pillow with one hand and dragging the other through my damp hair. “Dammit,” I repeated, a little softer this time as my heartbeat began to slow, the stored-up tension beginning to leave, relaxing my frozen-in-fear joints.
This fucking nightmare. I’d been having it for as long as I could remember but not nearly as often anymore. And usually not after a night spent with my girls. Always the same dream, always the same beginning.
I’d picked up my suitcase and started out walking through the front door of a pretty brick colonial house, just your average house on your average street in average town USA. But on the other side of that door was another door, on another street in another town. I kept pushing through the doors, one after the other, never getting anywhere, never able to stop and settle and breathe. Each time I looked down, I had another suitcase in my hand, stacking up one by one until a mountain of trunks and boxes was dragging behind me.
I finally pushed open the last door, and there they were. A mom, a dad, a dog, a cat. My family. They were waiting for me. Set your bags down, they said. Stay awhile, they said. You have a beautiful room waiting for you, they said, it’s just up that staircase.
But as I started for that staircase, my heart beating fast and a nervous smile beginning to creep across my face, I heard another voice. Loud, authoritative, unflinching.
“A mistake has been made.”
I turned to see a woman, severe in her high-buttoned collar and tight suit, too tight for her to wear comfortably. How does she sit down in that, I’d always wonder, without popping every single button off?
“A mistake has been made,” she repeated, quickly crossing the floor to me.
My hands were slick with sweat as I struggled to hang on to my suitcase. “A mistake?” I heard my own voice ask, tiny and tinny and small and yet, still so hopeful.
“You don’t belong here.”
The family turned away, even the cat, turned away from me and my suitcases. The dog growled, low and slow and in that grumbly way that almost doesn’t register at first in your ears. “Go away,” he seemed to say, “you don’t belong here.”
Now I heard them all saying it, chanting it, singing it. Loud voices, nasty and cruel, razor sharp and thin. You don’t belong here. You don’t belong here.
I ran, suitcases banging against my little-girl shins, which were covered in bruises, not from falling down on the playground but from those never-ending doors, those never-ending suitcases, bruised inside and out and crying, crying so hard as every single door slammed shut behind me and I was alone. In the world. Alone.
Until I woke quick, thrashing in my bed, tears streaming down my face as I whispered the words I always did . . .
“Let me come home.”
Fucking hell I missed that television.
I got out of bed and headed for the bathroom for a cool cloth to wipe my face and neck, the sweat now feeling cold and clammy. I looked at myself in the mirror, knowing sleep was now a goner for the rest of the night.
That nightmare was singularly capable of taking me down, knocking me out, and getting me completely off track. For years it’d been my Achilles’ heel, my soft spot. If I let it in, if I let those damn demons back into my head and my heart, it was bye-bye, Clara. Frustrated at the thought of endless hours lying awake thinking thoughts I truly didn’t want to think, I realized there was only one thing to do.
I hit the gym hard, running on the treadmill until my lungs burned. I needed the sweat. I also needed the focus.
The running had always helped. It shut out the dreams and the memories, my feet slapping the pavement or the grass or the packed sand or the rubber of the treadmill. Right then left. Right then left. A rhythm, a pattern, something that was always there, always constant, always waiting for me when I needed it. Right then left. Right then left. Eventually, if I ran fast and hard enough, it was all I heard.
And then the magic happened. The world fell away, the nightmare itself fell away, and my brain took over. The good part of my brain, the part that helped me plan and create, solve and fix. I thought not about my past and the pain that existed there, always in the past, no pain in the present, never pain in the present, and I focused on my job, my work, my literal salvation.
By the time dawn broke over the Catskills, I had an entirely new approach to the Bryant Mountain House problem.
“So I’ve been going over the bookings for this summer. And the last few years. How do you think you’ve been doing?” I asked.
I was in a meeting with Jonathan, Archie, and a few other members of the senior team, including the heads of guest services and reservations. I’d been somewhat surprised at how cordial Archie had been when I arrived this morning, pleasant even. Maybe we were over the hump, and he’d realized I was here to help, not hurt, his family’s legacy.
Don’t trust it . . . he’s up to something.
“Summer is always our busiest time, with a burst around each holiday,” he answered a bit haughtily. Wearing another perfectly pressed gray suit, it was accented with an orange tie and pocket square today. “We even have a waiting list in case any of the regular families cancel over Memorial Day weekend.”
“That’s great, that’s really great. But what concerns me are the other weekends, the non-holiday weekends, when bookings seem to be down across the board almost seven percent.”
“Seven percent over last year?” Archie asked.
“Yes.”
“That’s not too bad, I’m sure we’ll make it up by summer’s end. We always have a huge party Labor Day weekend, everyone looks forward to it, almost every room is booked,” Jonathan interjected, but his son looked concerned.
“Seven percent,” Archie repeated.
“Over last year.” I nodded, then pursed my lips together. “On top of a five percent decrease the year before, and a whopping eleven percent the year before that.”
“Well, we’re still recovering from the hit everyone took in ’08, no one was taking vacations that year.”
“Or the year after that,” I added, watching as Archie did some scribbling on his notepad. “Bottom line, even taking ’08 into account, your summertime bookings are down almost twenty-five percent when you compare them with a decade ago. And yet you’ve raised your rates every other year.”
“Well, that’s just in line with our normal rate increase. We’ve always done that, our guests know and expect that even an institution like Bryant Mountain House has to keep our pricing current with the market,” Jonathan answered.
“That’s just it, Jonathan,” I said, passing out some printouts, “you’re now overpriced. At a time when people are still struggling to get back the money they lost in their retirement plans and value is at a premium.”
“But we provide a premium product,” Archie said, two spots of red appearing high in his cheeks. “We can’t possibly offer our rooms at bargain-basement pricing. You mentioned value? The value of a vacation at this resort is incalculable.”
“Actually, it is calculable. Very much so. And while a rate increase is standard when costs are commensurate, you’ve implemented those same increases while your growth has slowed, effectively pricing out the most valuable commodity in the hotel industry—butts in beds.” I looked around the room at eyes that weren’t wide with shock but focused. They were listening. “Those old families are the life’s blood of your resort, no one is disputing that. The fact that you have a waiting list is incredible, bravo. But what happens when those old families are no longer? What happens when those last few dozen matriarchs pass away, and the old family stories and traditions of summers up at Bryant Mountain House are just memories that the younger generation can’t afford?”
“Those rate increases reflect things like the cost-of-living wage adjustments we provide to our staff every single year.” Archie spit these words out in a chillingly quiet way. But now his voice was rising, as well as his body, right up out of his chair. “Maintenance alone on a resort of this size is astounding. If we reduce our rates, how do you expect us to stay in business?” Archie snapped, throwing his notepad to the table.
I stood as well, leaning across the table, challenging him. “By getting your town involved. By getting local merchants involved. By bringing in the people of Bailey Falls and including them in this dynasty, instead of just sitting high up on your mountain and catering only to the wealthy.”
I heard gasps from either side of me, but I kept my eyes solely on Archie’s. He was the key here, the linchpin this entire operation rested on. Jonathan Bryant may have been the CEO and he may have been the one to hire me, but he was retiring. Archie was who I needed. If I didn’t have his buy-in, the rest of the staff would follow his lead and this place, and their entire way of life, would pass into the faded pages of history of what was once great.
I took a deep breath, and continued. “Now, I’m sorry if you think my words are harsh, but based on the numbers, we need to do something significant in order to save this hotel. It starts with what I like to call my Five R Plan. Number one, Refresh. We identify costs that we can offset over the years by upgrading to more cost-effective technology, like the HVAC systems. Two, Refurbish—we look into ways we can update the guest rooms and use some of what’s already there. Three, Rejuvenate and breathe some new life into stagnant areas, specifically with our menus. Revive is number four, not all that is old is boring. Let’s bring back some of the traditions that may have gone by the wayside and couple them with new customs. Let’s revive the partnership this hotel used to have with Bailey Falls in a much more specific and targeted way. And finally, Renovate. The specifics on this are TBD until I can drill down some very specific cost projections, but expect this last point to be a whopper.”
I looked around and saw wide eyes. It was time to make sure they knew they were still very much a part of this. “Believe me, I’m open to any and all suggestions, however outside the box they may be. In fact, the zanier the better, the more outlandish the better, the furthest away from ‘but this is how it’s always been done,’ the better.”
The room was quiet but not a good quiet. I knew it, I’d pushed too far too fast, and now I’d find out I was fired and bye-bye, partnership.
So when it was Archie who spoke first, I was the most surprised. But it made sense, since it was Archie and only Archie who could turn this around. “While I may not care for the method of delivery,” he said through gritted teeth, “Ms. Morgan is correct. We do need to do things differently, and boldly, if we’re to keep this hotel afloat. And as long as your plan does not call for filming an episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians on our mountain . . . then I think we . . . I . . . need to give you the benefit of the doubt and hear your plan in its entirety.”
His eyes pierced mine, the challenge clear in those indigo depths.
“To be fair, the Kardashians would bring a tremendous amount of coverage to the resort, one tweet from Kim alone could—”
“Ms. Morgan, I think I speak for everyone when I say not on your life.” But he said it with nasty smile, like he’d just tasted something terrible.
“Okay then, let’s get to work.”
We broke for lunch around noon, and an enormous amount of work had been accomplished. I could feel plans beginning to take shape. Everyone had a scratch pad full of notes, dry-erase boards covered the walls with parking lot questions and to-do lists, chairs had been pushed back and rearranged, and by the end even Archie had taken off his jacket, loosened his tie, and rolled up his sleeves.
Which just made my eyes flicker back and forth almost nonstop to his forearms. I was a sucker for a nice forearm.
Forget the forearm.
No, you forget the forearm.
Wonderful, now I was literally, and most adult-like, fighting with myself.
When we broke for lunch, I headed over to the picture window at the far end of the conference room overlooking the lake. Stretching my arms over my head, I could feel my back crackle and pop. Hard work wasn’t always good for the spine, but luckily my current job site included a world-class spa. Occupational hazard and all.
“Ms. Morgan?”
“What’s up, Mrs. Banning?” She’d had some of the most interesting ideas so far this morning. It was nice having someone on my side.
“I just wanted to tell you, I’m really glad you’re here.”
“Well, that’s nice of you to say, Mrs. Banning, I’m glad to be here.”
“Oh please, call me Hilda.”
“Only if you’ll call me Clara. This Ms. Morgan stuff is for the birds.”
She shot me a mischievous look. “Jonathan likes things a bit more relaxed, although once he retires I have a feeling Archie will want us to return to a more formal working environment.”
I laughed. “Well, we’ll just have to show him how much fun it can be to loosen up a bit, right?”
“If you don’t mind my saying so, you already have,” she said, lifting her chin in the direction of a laughing and smiling Archie, who was worlds away from the buttoned-up aristocrat I’d met yesterday.
“He has to loosen up, at least in the way he’s thinking about this place, or he’ll lose it.”
She looked stunned. “Oh, is it really all that bad?”
I looked at her sadly. “I’m afraid so. Not this year, maybe not the next, but if we don’t get things turned around . . .” My voice trailed off. They needed to know, they needed to see what was coming. And as I spoke, my gaze was pulled back to Archie, who had pulled away from the rest of the group and was now pacing in front of all the notes I’d left on the dry-erase boards lining the walls. “I’m sure it’s not easy for him to hear that, he seems like he lives for this hotel.”
“Yes, I think you’re right. You know, he’s just never been quite the same since his wife passed away.” Her face clouded in sadness. “I’ve known him since he was a baby, he literally grew up here with his parents, coming and going from this huge hotel like it was one giant backyard. I feel, we all feel, actually, that he needs this hotel to succeed almost more than anything. Ashley would’ve wanted that for him.”
“Ashley, his wife, right? Had they been married long?” I asked, my cheeks heating. Much as I had no business knowing the details, I couldn’t help digging to try to find out what made this guy tick.
“Married only a few years, but they’d been together forever. Known each other since grammar school, high school sweethearts those two, why, he even proposed here down on the croquet field at the end of a game one evening. Their lives were fully wrapped up in each other, and wrapped tightly with this hotel too.” She sighed then, remembering. I pushed my luck.
“How’d she die?”
Her face blanched. “Cancer. Ovarian, which then spread to her liver. Came out of nowhere, by the time they knew what it was, it was almost too late.” She blinked. “She never stood a chance.”
“How old was she?”
“Thirty-two.”
I gasped. “Jesus Christ, she was only thirty-two when she passed away?”
Mrs. Banning nodded, but then suddenly her eyes widened and a look of shame crossed her face, before she looked down toward her feet.
I knew he was there before he spoke.
“I realize you think you have access to anything and everything that has to do with the Bryant family, Ms. Morgan, but let me be the first to tell you that my wife”—I felt a hand on my shoulder, turning me around. His face was pale, his eyes absolutely blazing—“my wife is off-limits.”
“Of course, I was only—”
He cut me off, waving a hand in the air. Without taking his eyes off me, he said, “A word, please, Mrs. Banning.” Not a question.
And with that, he turned on his heel and exited the room, Mrs. Banning hot on his heels.
I’d not only gotten her in trouble, I’d literally lost every nanometer of ground I’d finally gained with Archie.
Fuuuuuck.