So It Went Like This by C. Spencer

Author:C. Spencer [Spencer, C.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books
Published: 2023-03-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

Billet-Doux

Kennedy

There’s the door, or is it? And can’t they hear…the plumbing, the shower, the valves clashing shut as I reach for a towel, flustered and wishing my heart, now sprinting, would calm down. Relax. At least you’ve rinsed your hair and aren’t coated in soap or shaving or anything like that. In fact, you look good, I realize as I glance past the mirror. You look incredibly good, actually, which I’ll credit to last night, to things, this robe offering little more in the form of coverage than a towel. But it’s eight o’clock, and who has time to decompress let alone wake up enough for, well. When I answer, it’s not even her.

Instead, it’s a delightful man in a terry cloth bucket hat, all bronzed up with a pearly white grin as he chimes, “Room service!” only to make his peppy way in, remarkably alert alongside my had-a-late-night aromatic coma. Alongside my wakeful only enough to slip a tip into the palm of his hand.

“But…” Did I order this? I think to myself, and clearly sensing my confusion, he hands me a card-sized note, then sets a breakfast spread on the table, under which I take a seat and pause to read. But it’s not typed or embellished or embossed or anything like those business cards you find forked in delivery flowers. And yet, there are flowers, a pale bouquet wrapped in burlap, which feels humbling, energizing as he seals the door shut, departing in a blink. In a breeze.

As I tuck my hair back instinctually to draw it out of my face. Good morning, she writes. I was thinking about what you said and wondered if you might want to… I pinch the tip off a dessert cake that he’s left with me. Because I’ve tried and tried and I can’t get you out of my mind. Which flips my pulse into some stupid loopy falling-in-love out-of-touch young-dreamer sort of thing until all I can do is lie on my back in wistful solitude as I’m taking every bit of this in amid the virginal flavors of lemon-lavender cake and cinnamon scones and the most ambitious double shot of espresso. My mood composed. Cool. Confident. Clear. Knit in a summer breeze.

Stilled like this in thoughtless concentration for a good hour at least, or until I’m caffeinated and my hair’s had time to dry. Which prompts me to reshower in order to get just the right style. Then I settle on this bikini, which complements, under a comfortable cotton shirt and a loose pair of shorts before heading out, wondering whether it’s the caffeine or adrenaline that’s now causing this rush.

I reach the bottom of the staircase, where the common room is feeling much more in line with my mindset, piquant, white but not overly bright—more subdued—with alabaster shiplap. I hadn’t noticed. It’s disguising a door that’s now ajar to reveal a narrow back staircase. And over there, the subtle drift of a curtain as it balloons, as it deflates.

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