Chapter
1:
"—or
I promise you, we'll turn right around and go back to Paterson!" the woman
behind the wheel of the burgundy minivan was shouting as it pulled up beside
me. She had her head turned towards the backseat, where I could see three kids,
two boys and a girl, staring back at her. A vein in her neck was bulging,
looking not unlike the interstate, thick and unmissable, on the map held by the
man in the passenger seat beside her. "I am serious. I have had it."
The
kids didn't say anything. After a moment of glaring at them, she turned to look
at me. She had on big sunglasses with bedazzled frames. A large fountain drink,
the straw tinged with lipstick, was parked between her legs.
"Welcome
to the beach," I said to her, in my best Colby Realty employee voice.
"May I—"
"The
directions on your Web site are garbage," she informed me. Behind her, I
saw one of the kids frog-punch another, who emitted a stifled shriek.
"We've
gotten lost three times since getting off the interstate."
"I'm
so sorry to hear that," I replied. "If you'd like to give me your
name, I'll grab you your keys and get you on the way to your rental."
I
turned, reaching into the small rattan bin that held all the envelopes for that
day's check-ins. Miller, Tubman, Simone, Wallace . . . Webster.
"Heron's
Call," I read off the envelope, before opening it to make sure the keys
were both in it. "That's a great property."
In
reply, she stuck out her hand. I gave the envelope to her, along with her complimentary
beach bag full of all the free stuff—Colby Realty pen, giveaway postcard, area
guide, and cheap drink cooler—that I knew the cleaning crew would most likely
find untouched when they checked out. "Have a great week," I told
her. "Enjoy the beach!"
Now,
she gave me a wry smile, although it was hard to tell if she was truly thankful
or just felt sorry for me. After all, I was standing in a glorified sandbox in
the middle of a parking lot, with three cars lined up behind her, most likely
full of people in the exact same kind of mood. When the final stop on a trip is
paradise, being the second to last is no picnic.
Not
that I had time to really think about this as they pulled away, signal already
blinking for their turn onto the main road. It was three ten, and the next car,
a blue sedan with one of those carriers on top, was waiting. I kicked what sand
I could out of my shoes and took a deep breath.
"Welcome
to the beach," I said, as they pulled up beside me. "Name,
please?"
"Well,"
my sister Margo said when I came into the office, sweat-soaked and depleted,
two hours later. "How did it go?"
"I
have sand in my shoes," I told her, going straight to the water cooler,
where I filled up a cup, downed it, and then did the same with two more.
"You're
at the beach, Emaline," she pointed out.
"No,
I'm at the office," I replied, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand.
"The beach is two miles away. People
will
get to the sand soon enough. I don't see why we have to have it here, too."
"Because,"
she replied, in the cool voice of someone who had spent the day in
air-conditioning, "we are the one of the first impressions our visitors
get of Colby. We want them to feel that the moment they turn into our parking
lot, they are officially on vacation."
"What
does that have to do with me standing in a sandbox?"
"It's
not a sandbox," she said, and I rolled my eyes, because that's exactly
what it was, and we both knew it. "It's a sandbar, and it's meant to evoke
the majesty of the coast."
I
didn't even know what to say to this. Ever since Margo had graduated from East
U the year before with a double degree in hospitality and business, she'd been
insufferable. Or more insufferable, actually. My family had owned Colby Realty
for over fifty years; our grandparents started it right after they got married.
We'd been doing just fine, thank you, before Margo and her sandbox or sandbar,
or whatever. But she was the first one in our family so far to get a college
degree, so she got to do whatever she wanted.
Which
was why, a few weeks earlier, she had this sandbox/Tiki Hut/whatever it was
made and put it in our office parking lot. About four by four feet, with
waist-high walls, it was like a wooden tollbooth, with a truckload of
playground sand dumped in and around it for good measure. Nobody questioned the
need for this except me. Then again, no one else had to work in it.
I
heard a snicker, muffled, and looked over. Sure enough, it was my grandmother,
behind her own desk, making a phone call. She winked at me and I couldn't help
but smile.
"Don't
forget about the VIP rounds," Margo called out, as I headed in that
direction, chucking my cup in the trash on the way. "You need to start
promptly at five thirty. And double-check the fruit and cheese platters before
you deliver them. Amber did them and you know how she is."
Amber
was my other sister. She was in hair school, only worked for the realty company
under duress, and expressed her annoyance by doing everything in as slipshod a
way as possible.
"Ten-four,"
I replied, and Margo exhaled, annoyed. She'd told me ten times that it sounded
so unprofessional, like trucker talk. Which was exactly why I kept saying it.
My
grandmother's office was right at the front of the building, with a big window
looking out onto the main road, now packed with beach traffic. She was still on
the phone but waved me in when she saw me in her doorway.
"Well,
yes, Roger, I sympathize, believe me," she was saying as I pushed some
brochures aside to sit down in the chair opposite her desk. It was messy as
always, piled with papers, file folders, and several open packs of Rolos. She
always misplaced one after opening it, only to do the same with the next, and
the one after that. "But the bottom line is, in rental houses, door
handles get a lot of use. Especially back door handles that lead to the beach.
We can fix them as much as possible, but sometimes you just have to replace the
hardware."
Roger
said something, his voice booming from the receiver. My grandmother helped
herself to a Rolo, then extended the pack to me. I shook my head.
"The
report I received was that the handle fell off, inside, after the door was
locked. The guests couldn't get back in. That's when they called us." A
pause. Then she said, "Well, I'm sure they could have climbed in through a
window. But when you're paying five grand for a week, you can claim certain
privileges."
As
Roger responded, she chewed her Rolo. The candy wasn't the best habit, but it
was better than cigarettes, which she had smoked up until about six years
earlier. My mother claimed that when she was a kid, a constant cloud had hung
in this office, like its own personal weather system. Weirdly enough, even
after multiple cleanings, new curtains and carpet, you can still smell the
smoke. It's faint, but it's there.
"Of
course. It's always something when you're a landlord," she said now,
leaning back in her chair and rubbing her neck. "We'll take care of it and
send the bill. All right?" Roger started to say something else.
"Great! Thanks for the call."
She
hung up, shaking her head. Behind her, another minivan was pulling into our
parking lot. "Some people," she said, popping out another Rolo,
"should just not own beach houses."
This
is one of her favorite mantras, running a close second to "Some people
should just not rent beach houses." I've often told her we should have it
needlepointed and framed, not that we could hang it up anywhere in this office.
"Another
busted handle?" I asked.
"Third
one this week. You know how it goes. It's the beginning of the season. That
means wear and tear." She starts digging around on her desk, knocking
papers to the floor. "How did check-in go?"
"Fine,"
I said. "Only two early birds, and both their places were already
cleaned."
"And
you're doing the vips today?"
I
smiled. The VIP package was another one of Margo's recent brainstorms. For an
added charge, people who were renting what we called our Beach Palaces—the
fanciest properties, with elevators and pools and all the
amenities—got
a welcome spread of cheese and fruit, along with a bottle of wine. Margo first
pitched the idea at the Friday Morning Meeting, another thing she'd instituted,
which basically forced us all to sit around the conference table once a week to
say everything we'd normally discuss while actually working. That day, she'd
handed out a printed agenda, with bullet points, one of which said "VIP
Treatment". My grandmother, squinting at it without her glasses, said,
"What's a vip?" To Margo's annoyance, it stuck, and now the rest of
us refused to call it anything else.
"Just
leaving now," I told her. "Any special instructions?"
She
finally found the sheet she'd been looking for and scanned it quickly.
"Dune's Dream is a good regular client," she said. "Bon Voyage
is new, as is Casa Blu. And whoever's in Sand Dollars is there for two
months."
"Months?"
I said. "Seriously?"
Sand
Dollars was one of our priciest properties, a big house way out on the Tip, the
very edge of town. Just a week would break most budgets. "Yep. So make
sure they get a good platter. All right?"
I
nodded, then got to my feet. I was just about to the door when she said,
"And Emaline?"
"You
looked pretty cute in that sandbox this afternoon. Brought back memories."
I
smiled, just as Margo yelled from outside, "It's a sandbar,
Grandmother!"
Down
the hallway in the back storage room, I collected the four platters Amber had
assembled earlier. Sure enough, the cheese and fruit were all jumbled up, as if
thrown from a distance. After spending a good fifteen minutes making them
presentable, I took them out to my car, which was about a million degrees even
though I parked in the shade. All I could do was pile them on the passenger
seat, point every A/C vent in their direction, and hope for the best.
At
the first house, Dune's Dream, no one answered even after I rang the bell and
paged them from the outside intercom. I walked around the extensive deck,
peering down. There was a group of people around the pool below, as well as a
couple walking down the long boardwalk to the beach. I tried the
door—unlocked—and stepped inside.
"Hello?"
I called out in a friendly voice. "Colby Realty, VIP delivery?" When
you had to come into people's houses—even if they'd only just moved in, and
then just for the week—you learned not only to announce yourself, but do so
loudly and repeatedly. All it took was catching one person unaware and
partially clothed to bang this lesson home. Yes, people were supposed to let it
all hang out on vacation. But that didn't mean I wanted to see it. "Colby
Realty? VIP delivery?"
Silence.
Quickly, I moved up to the third-floor kitchen, where the views were
spectacular. On the speckled granite island, I arranged the platter, chilled
bottle of wine, and a handwritten card welcoming them to Colby and reminding
them to contact us if they needed anything at all. Then it was on to the next
house.
At
Bon Voyage, the door was locked, the guests most likely out for an early
dinner. I set up the platter and wine in the kitchen, where the blender was
still plugged in, the carafe in the sink smelling of something sweet and
tropical. It was always so weird to come into these houses once people were
actually staying there, especially if I'd just been in the same morning to
check after the cleaners. The entire energy was different, like the difference
between something being off and on.
At
Casa Blu, the door was answered by a short woman with a deep tan, wearing a
bikini that was, honestly, not really age appropriate. This was not to say I
knew how old she was as much as that, even at eighteen, I wouldn't have
attempted the same skimpy pink number. There was a white sheen of sunscreen on
her face, a beer in a bright yellow coozy in her free hand.
"Colby
Realty, VIP delivery," I said. "I have a welcome gift for you?"
She
took a sip of her beer. "Great," she said, in a flat, nasal tone.
"Come on in."
I
followed her up to the next level, trying not to look at her bikini bottom,
which was riding up, up, up as we climbed the stairs. "Is it the
stripper?" someone called out as I stepped onto the landing. It was
another woman around the same age, midforties, maybe, wearing a bikini top, a
flowy skirt, and a thick, gold braided necklace. When she saw me, she laughed.
"Guess not!"
"It's
something from the rental place," Pink Bikini explained to her and a third
woman in a shorty bathrobe holding a wine glass, her hair in a messy topknot,
who were looking down from the deck at something below. "A welcome
gift."
"Oh,"
the bathrobe woman said. "I thought this was our present."
There
was a burst of laughter as the woman who let me in walked over to join them,
looking as well. I arranged my platter and bottle, put up the card, and was
about to leave discreetly when I heard one of them say, "Wouldn't you just
love to take a big bite of that, Elinor?"
"Mmmm,"
she replied. "I say we dump dirt in the pool, so he has to come back
tomorrow."
"And
the next day!" Flowy Skirt said. Then they all laughed again, clinking
their glasses.
"Enjoy
your stay," I called out as I left, but of course they didn't hear me.
Halfway down the stairs to the front door, I glanced out one of the big
windows, spotting the object of their ogling: a tall, very tan guy with curly
blond hair, shirtless, wielding a long, awfully phallic looking pool brush. I
could hear them still whooping as I went out the door, easing it shut behind
me.
Back
in the car, I pulled my hair up in a ponytail, secured it with one of elastics
hanging around my gearshift, and sat for a moment in the driveway, watching the
waves. I had one more stop and plenty of time, so I was still there when the
pool guy let himself out of the fence and headed back to his truck, parked
beside me.
"Hey,"
I called out, as he climbed up into the open bed, coiling a couple of hoses.
"You could make some big money this week, if your morals are loose enough
and you like older women."
He
grinned, flashing white teeth. "Think so?"
"They'd
devour you, given the chance."
Another
smile as he hopped down, shutting the tailgate, and came over to my open
window. He leaned down on it, so his head was level with mine. "Not my
type," he told me. "Plus, I'm already taken."
"You
should tell her that. I think she takes me for granted."
I
made a face. "I think it's mutual."
He
leaned in and kissed me. I could taste the tiny bit of sweat above his lip. As
he pulled back , I said, "You're not kidding anyone, you know. You are
fully capable of wearing a shirt when you work."
"It's
hot out here!" he told me, but I just rolled my eyes, cranking my engine.
Ever since he'd taken up running and got all cut, you couldn't keep a top on
the boy. This was not the first house that had noticed.
"So
we still on for tonight?"
"Emaline."
He shook his head. "Don't even try to act like you've forgotten."
I
thought hard. Nothing. Then he hummed the first few bars of "Here Comes
the Bride," and I groaned. "Oh, right. The cookout thing."
"The
shower-slash-barbecue," he corrected me. "Otherwise known as my
mother's full-time obsession for the last two months?"
Oops.
In my defense, however, this was the third of four showers that were being held
in preparation for the wedding of Luke's sister Brooke. Ever since she'd gotten
engaged the previous fall, it had been all wedding, all the time at his house.
Since I spent much of my time there, it was like being forced into an immersion
program
for
a language I had no interest in learning. Plus, since Luke and I had been
together since ninth grade, there was also the issue of everyone making jokes
about how we'd be next, and his parents should go ahead and get a two-for-one
deal. Ha, ha.
"Seven
o'clock," Luke said now, kissing my forehead. "See you then. I'll be
the one with the shirt on."
“I have no clue,” Cheung replied. “Sir Charles, his blood
work is clean, but when I looked at his DNA we realized there was something
very wrong.”
