Page 1 of Black Site

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Libby

There is something so damned sad about plain white walls. They tend to glare back at the person doing the staring. At least, that's what mine are doing these days. Not that I have a lot of time to sit and look at the wall but on mornings like this one, when I wake up all alone and missing my family, the walls seem sad. I roll over in bed and switch from staring at the walls to the popcorn ceiling above me, also white. I'm not sure what time I got in last night but it had to be sometime after three.

My eyes are dry and gritty and if we're just being honest, I should have showered last night and not waited until this morning. I was just so damned tired. My alarm will go off soon and I'm going to drag my half-dead ass up and out of bed so I can go to my first job of the day. I have three.

Six to four, I work at the inn, God I love the Ramseys for cutting me slack and understanding on the days I'm running a little behind. From five-thirty to two I work at the diner. On my days "off" - that's a big joke, as if I have days off - I work in a little gift shop on the outskirts of town from ten to six, which is most weekends. Sometimes I work at the gift shop and then the diner too.

I'm twenty-two years old. I should not feel this damned old. I should not have to put an eighteen-year-old through college. I should be getting drunk on the weekends and fucking everyone on campus. I mean I guess that's what I'm supposed to be doing. It's what everyone on television thinks people my age are doing.

But instead, I am working three jobs to put my baby sister through college so she can have the life I started to have. And I'm too tired to fuck anything. God, it's only been four years since the car wreck that took our mom and dad but it feels like forever. I guess time flies when you're too damn tired to care what time it actually is. The thought of my little sister sends a spasm of pain through my heart. God, I miss her, but I want her to have a better life, and to do that she has to go to college. And it's not like I won't see her over the summer or during long holiday breaks. Still, it hurts to have the house so quiet after four years of listening to her blare her music anytime I was at home.

She's only been gone for two weeks but I feel every day of those two weeks. How in the world am I going to make it through four, or six, or eight years of her being away from me? I drag myself out of bed and hit the shower; I can't do anything about it right now so dwelling on it is just a waste of what little energy I have left. I take the bus to the inn, it's not like my broke ass has a car to roll around in. The car my mom and dad were in was totaled and that was about as close as I've come to owning a car.

The bus doesn't run all the way to the inn, so I have another walk once I'm off. I usually leave my house at four forty-five. I have an hour on the bus and then the ten-minute walk to the inn. Most mornings I can spot the regulars but today the bus seems a little more crowded. I search my mind to think of any festivals or conventions that might be in town to make it so full but I'm so out of touch with stuff that I can't remember if someone said something about it or not.

I have to grab a seat in front of two really scary-looking men with tattoos all up and down their arms. Typically I don't judge - okay, I try not to judge - but something about these guys feels off. When I sit down I pick up hints of an accent. It's Russian I think but the bus is really loud today so I don't hear all of what they say.

My sister and I started learning different languages as a coping mechanism, something we could do together to bring us closer together. Lexi didn't take the deaths of mom and dad well. Not that saying that isn't the biggest duh in the world. I mean who takes the death of their parents well? She blamed me for having to sell the house to cover mom's medical bills. It also didn't help that I was the person who 'pulled the plug' on mom when they told us she wasn't coming back. A decision that still haunts me at night, usually in Lexi's voice, asking me if I'm going to pull the plug on her too if something ever happened to her.

I don't sleep a lot. So I guess all the work I do isn't so bad when all I would be doing sitting at home would be pacing the floors or watching television. I want to believe that somewhere down in the core of who I am that eighteen-year-old is still there, still fun, but I'm not sure if this experience hasn't killed her.

A sentence drifts to me from behind. The men are whispering about taking care of the man in the cast. Ah, that explains it; they are here taking care of a family member or friend who’s hurt themselves. Not that we don't have a lot of different ethnicities in town, the beach is only an hour away and some of the tourist stuff spills over into our neck of the woods sometimes. When the bus pulls up to my stop I think about turning around and wishing them a nice day or a good visit but at the last minute, I can't bring myself to do it. Guess the wreck killed the outgoing Libby off too.

I arrive at the inn with just enough time to sign in and look over anything I need to do for the rest of the day. It's run by a husband and wife that used to be military so a lot of military men and women choose to stay with us. I hit the front desk just as Marnie comes around the corner that leads into the kitchen.

"Oh hey Libby, I have friends staying in cottage number nine so don't rent that one out okay." I nod, making a mental note. "I didn't enter them in because they're old friends of ours."

I've been working for the Ramseys for almost as long as my mom and dad have been gone. I can tell what she's saying is code for 'they're still active and don't want to be bothered - and by bothered I mean they may still be ‘dark’ so keep my mouth shut that I saw anything or anyone here. It took me months to figure out what was going on but once I did I let them in on the fact I knew. They were cool about it, taking me aside and telling me that some of the 'friends' staying here are undercover or working missions from a safe place. I would be okay if I kept to myself, remembered which cabins were officially off the books, and didn't say a word about what I saw.

So far, it's worked for us. Who the hell do I have to tell anything to anyway? I don't have any friends. When you work as many hours as I do you don't have time to socialize outside of work. And because I work three different places I'm not close to any of the people I work with.

"Number nine, got it Marnie." The rest of the day passed how most of them do. I make reservations, do paperwork that needs to be done for tax time - so much easier to do it a little at a time than to wait right up until the deadline, and make sure the guests have what they need.

I'm caught up in computer work when the phone rings or else I wouldn't have picked it up - the light is there showing me number nine. I do though.

"Hey, who am I speaking to again?" a thick voice that is deep and I'm sure sexy to some causes my focus to snap to the phone. Shit, I'm not supposed to pick up calls from the cabin.

"Um, I'm so sorry." What the fuck am I supposed to do now? I look around for Dave or Marnie but it's just me.

"No need to be sorry, I just wanted to find out who has the prettiest voice I've ever heard, and maybe get your name." His southern accent is strong and I think if I had to guess I would say Mississippi or Louisiana.

"I'm Libby from the front desk." I think the guy on the phone is flirting with me but I have no idea if that's right or not. It isn't like I have a ton of experience dating. I had one boyfriend in high school and I thought we would be together all through college but as soon as I had to drop out and take care of a teen he bailed. "Is there something I can help you with?"

"Now there's a loaded question, isn't it sugar." The guy on the other end of the phone could be a total creeper but he sounds charming on this end. I'm not sure how to answer him so I don't. After the silence stretches on for a little while, long enough to have me squirming in my chair, he finally takes pity on me. "We just need some more towels. There are kind of a lot of us and we tend to go through them."

"Oh, okay. I can do that. I'll be right over." He tells me he'll be watching for me and I hang up and go to grab him more towels. He didn't really say how many he needed but he did say a lot of people were staying so I grab a whole armful. I lock the front desk where we keep the money and cut the answering service on. I'll only be gone for ten minutes at the most.

I walk to the back where all the cabins are and take the path to number nine. I knock and wait for someone to open the door. It takes a little while but the door opens to a man dressed in jeans and a t-shirt. He's a lot older than me and his hair has just a hint of salt and pepper in it, I think. He might be light brown-haired and those are strands of blond in his hair. What gives me pause are his eyes, they are an intense green that makes him seem sexy and dangerous. His black-framed glasses do nothing to detract from how stunning they are. In fact, they only compliment them.

"Can I help you?" not the voice on the phone with me. This one is absolute sin wrapped in velvet and tied up with silk. I lean back a little to make sure I actually got the number of the cabin right and didn't fuck up.

"Um, towels." I hold the towels out for him to take but he doesn't. Instead, he moves his arm in full view so I can see the cast on his arm. Well, fuck now I feel like a moron. I'm about to apologize to him when I hear the voice on the phone shout from another room.

"Is that my towel lady?"

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