Page 77 of The Heartbreak Hotel
I nod, and Nan raises one eyebrow. “Alone?”
In the split second of my hesitation, Nan makes a satisfied littleharrumph.“You were with Henry, weren’t you?”
I splutter, already feeling heat in my cheeks. “How did you know?”
“I may be old,” Nan says, tapping her brow, “but my eyes still work. You two are like magnets underwater—drawn to each other, pushing everything else out of the way.”
I laugh, my first real one in days. “Okay.”
“He’s a catch,” Nan says, shrugging. “So are you.” I nudge my knee against hers and she adds, “Why a ‘mixed bag’?”
“Just some family stuff.” I offer her a small smile. “I’m sure you know how it is.”
“Yes and no,” she says, surprising me. I expected her to agree, to brush it off—Of course I do, orWho doesn’t?“I knowmyfamily’s stuff. But I expect yours is different, as are all of our problems.”
“Yeah,” I say, letting out a breath of a laugh and twisting my fingers together. “You’re right.”
“So?” She leans toward me, raising both eyebrows this time. “What’s going on?”
“Nan,” I say, smoothing my palms over my jeans. “We don’t have to—you’re here foryou, yeah? How did your first Thanksgiving without Teddy feel?”
“Don’t call upon my dead husband to change the subject, Lou. If you’re upset, we can talk about it.” She waves a hand toward her open door, the house beyond it. “Isn’t that the point of this place?”
“Yeah, foryou,” I say. “For the guests.”
“Well,” Nan counters, “it’s us two here right now.”
I think of Rashad, back in October—that predawn morning we spent on the couch together. How much I needed him then.
“I had to help my mom with some bills,” I tell Nan. “And it was stressful.”
Her hand moves to cover mine where it still rests on my leg. Her skin is warm and papery soft. “That does sound stressful. Were you able to be open with Henry about it? Lean on him for support?”
Too much so, I think. If I’m honest, it’s another reason I’ve been avoiding him the last few days: shame.
“Yeah,” I say, straight down at my lap. “And it feels kind of embarrassing, because he’s had some stuff going on, too, and I can tell he doesn’t really want to talk to me about it. So I feel like I’m asking too much, or Iamtoo much.”
“My dear.” Nan squeezes my hand. “There could never be too much Lou in this world.”
I look up at her, exhaling on a smile. “Thanks.”
“And sometimes we have to show people how to love us, or how to trust us, or how to care for us—by giving them that gift first.” She shrugs. “It’s not fair. But it’s okay to go first. It’s bighearted and brave.”
What if, I think,we never meet in the middle?What if I wind up back where I’ve always been: giving and giving and giving with such imbalance that the person I love knows all my softest places, all the ways to bend me? What if this ends like Nate? Like my mother?
I don’t say any of this. But almost as if I did—as if she heard me loud and clear—Nan adds, “Your openness is yoursuperpower, Lou, not your weakness. Don’t let the world convince you otherwise.”
Pauline arrives the next afternoon,her knock jaunty and complicated, like the secret code of a child at a tree house door. It snowed overnight and she’s in a down parka that reaches her knees. When I open the door Custard’s framed across the street behind her, tail wagging as he watches us from his fenced-in front yard, paws hidden in the snow. I think of Henry back in August—the afternoon sun in his eyes, his fingers combing through Custard’s fur. The longing feels like a corset, flattening me.
Pauline’s in her midforties and frustrated after a string of duds (her words, from the lengthy email she sent me after booking). I have a feeling she and Nan are going to be fast friends. As soon as she sees me, she shouts my name like we’ve known each other for years.
“Welcome,” I say, ushering her over the threshold on a smile. “How was your journey?”
“Easy as pie.” Pauline lives in Utah, and drove over the state line for her four-night stay. “Gorgeous weather on 70. View after view after view.”
“I do love that drive,” I say. “Did you—”
“And look what I found at the gas station in town!” She thrusts a newspaper into my hands and unwinds a scarf from around her neck. As she shakes out her perfectly blown-out hair I look down at the copy ofTheEstes Park Trail-Gazette, marked with today’s date.
