Page 4 of The Hotel Nantucket
Lizbet pulls back a few inches. Her mind lands fancifully on a trip to the dentist when she wouldn’t have to worry when Janice, the hygienist, tells her it’s time for a full set of X-rays. “Wow.”
“I’m happy to give you Xavier’s e-mail.” Eddie snaps his fingers. “Didn’t you tell me your father owns a hotel in Wisconsin?”
Lizbet’s father manages a retirement community in Minnetonka, Minnesota. As a teenager, Lizbet used to pull numbers for the bingo games and escort the residents to their hair appointments at the salon. One year, she judged the butter-sculpture contest.
“Something like that,” Lizbet says.
Eddie nods slowly. “Xavier wants someone with a background in luxury hotels.”
Lizbet blinks. There is no way she can make the Rising Sun Retirement Community sound like the Four Seasons.
“But he also wants someone who has dealt with the Historic District Commission and the Nantucket selectmen.”
“Me,” Lizbet says.
“And who can charm the chamber of commerce.”
“Also me,” Lizbet says.
“The hotel has quite a tattered reputation to repair.”
“Agreed,” Lizbet says. “I assume you’ve heard the rumors about the ghost?”
“I don’t believe in ghosts,” Eddie says. “And Ineverlisten to rumors.”
Ha-ha-ha!Lizbet thinks. At least one of those statements is a flat-out lie.
“Xavier has his work cut out for him,” Eddie says. “There’s a lot of competition at the high end—the Beach Club, the White Elephant, the Wauwinet. I told him I wasn’t sure there was another seat at the table, but he was adamant, and he does have deep pockets. The hotel will open in June, and according to Xavier, it’s going to be the finest lodging this island has ever seen. But he needs the right person at the helm.”
Lizbet nearly leaps out of her chair, she wants this job so much. “I’ll send Mr. Darling my résumé tonight. Do you think you might…put in a good word for me?”
Eddie presses his fingers together in a way that seems contemplative, and Lizbet hopes he’s remembering all the times he called the Deck at the last minute and Lizbet found him a table, even when they were crazy full with a wait list. Eddie always requested table number 1 and Lizbet granted that wish when she could (that David Ortiz was sitting there one night and Ina Garten another wasn’t Lizbet’s fault!).
“I won’t put in a good word,” Eddie says. “I’ll put in agreatword.”
The next week, Lizbet interviews with Xavier Darling over Zoom. Although she thought shecrushed it—dropping the name of the chairman of the zoning board to underscore herlocal connections—Xavier’s demeanor gave nothing away. Lizbet figured someone like Xavier Darling would have a short list for the position that included people like the GMs from Wynn Las Vegas and the XV Beacon Hotel in Boston. However, only two days later, Xavier Zoom-called Lizbet and offered her the job. She was calm and composed as she accepted, but the instant she pressed the Leave Meeting button, she jumped up and down, victorious fists raised over her head. Then she collapsed in her chair and wept tears of gratitude.
The secret of change is to focus all your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.
Lizbet had a proverbial clean slate.
She visualized a Hollywood production assistant snapping shut the clapper board as the director shouted:Take two!
On the morning of April 12, Lizbet is, unfortunately, back tofighting the old—specifically, she’s remembering how it wasChristinawho called her to explain away the sexting (Those texts are nothing, Libby, JJ and I were only kidding around)—when she gets a message from Xavier Darling; he’s requesting a meeting. It’s six thirty a.m.—Xavier, in England, is oblivious to the time difference—and Lizbet sighs. She was planning to get on the Peloton. But she has agreed to be at Xavier’s beck and call, so she pulls a blouse on over her workout tank, drapes her braids over her shoulders, and fluffs her bangs.
Join meeting with video.
“Good morning, Elizabeth.” (Xavier refuses to call her Lizbet, even though she has asked him to twice, telling him that the only person who called her Elizabeth was her late grandmother.) Behind Xavier, Lizbet sees Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, a view so iconically London, it might as well be a Zoom background.
“Good morning, sir.” Lizbet tries not to worry about his stern tone of voice, though she briefly wonders if today is the day the hammer drops and the hopes she has invested in the hotel will collapse, the whole thing a belated April Fools’ joke.
“I’m calling to shed some light on things that might have been unclear.”
Lizbet steels herself. What is Xavier going to tell her?
“You’ve never asked me—in fact, no one has asked me—why I bought this hotel. After all, I live in London and I’ve never visited Nantucket.” He pauses. “Have you wondered about this?”
Lizbet has, in fact, wondered, but she chalked it up to her understanding of the very wealthy: They buy things because they can.
