Page 82 of The Heartbreak Hotel
“Did you drop your phone into a sinkhole?” she says, stepping out onto the gravel. “I’ve been trying you for the last hour.”
“So you just—” I dig into my pocket for my phone, clocking six missed calls and as many text messages from Mei. And, even more ominously, a handful from Goldie. “Drove here?”
“Yes!” Mei cries, slamming her car door. “I thought you were in crisis.”
I glance at Joss, who’s piling lawn bags into her flatbed. Mei follows my gaze and seems to realize, for the first time, that we aren’t alone out here.
“Hey, Mei,” Joss says, casually. She’s maybe the most self-possessed person I’ve ever met.
“Uh,” Mei says, glancing at me. “Hi?”
“It’s fine,” I say, tucking my phone back into my pocket and moving toward her for a hug. “We’re mad at Henry, not Joss.”
Mei squeezes me. “Okay, noted.”
“Take care of yourself,” Joss says, looking at me as she pulls open her truck door. “Okay?”
I nod, and lift my hand in a wave. Mei and I watch Joss roll down the street. Then Mei looks at me. “What the fuck?”
“Yeah,” I say on an exhale. “What thefuck.”
“Did you talk to Henry? What did Joss say? Are you okay?”
“Come inside.” I hook my arm through hers. “I’m freezing.”
“What is this coat?” Mei asks, angling away from me to get abetter look at it as we move up the front steps. “I don’t hate it, but it’s big on you.”
“It’s Henry’s,” I mumble. “We were talking outside, and I was cold.”
“Hm,” Mei says. “A liar and a gentleman.”
“Indeed.”
“Well?” Nan’s voice greets us the moment we open the front door. She’s standing next to Pauline in the entryway, both of them holding mugs of tea and looking at me expectantly. “What happened?”
“Nan!” Mei says, stepping toward her for a hug. “You’re still here!”
“Leave Lou?” Nan says, smiling at me over Mei’s shoulder. “I don’t think so. Now come in the living room and tell us what happened with that Henry.”
It feels like a soft landing place, here with Mei and Nan and Pauline. The way they usher me to the couch and drop a blanket over me and busy themselves gathering tea and pillows. But I’m talked out—and when my phone rings again, I find myself grateful for the distraction.
It’s Goldie, of course. I pick up against my better judgment.
“Hi,” I say, and Goldie starts talking a mile a minute, her words rushing into each other.
“Lou, it’s Mom. I don’t know exactly what happened but her rent didn’t get paid and she’s out of her place; Mark called me and said she’s ‘flown off the handle’—his words—he doesn’t want her staying with him; this has all unraveled in the last twenty-four hours and I think we need to go out there and sort it. To Ohio. Right away.”
I’ve sat up straighter on the couch with every one of hersentences. Nan, Pauline, and Mei have all stopped what they’re doing to look at me.
“But I sent her the money,” I say dumbly. Like that hasn’t backfired before; like I’m incapable of learning my own stupid lesson. “Enough to cover—”
“Mark said something about being late on her insurance, didn’t you say that was drawing this fall? So maybe it went to that, or maybe she blew it all on something else, Lou, I mean—does it matter? This is the situation. This is—”
“It does matter.” It’s Henry’s money. It’s Comeback Inn money. I should never, ever, ever have let him get involved in this.
“It doesn’t,” Goldie says. “She’s doing what she always does, Lou—when she has enough money, she spends it on something stupid. We know this. Weknowthis.”
She’s mad at herself—I can hear it in her voice. But she’s mad at me, too.
