The Moon and More(25)
Author: Sarah Dessen

“Honestly,” Margo said out loud, adding a couple of cluck-cluck noises as she tapped away at her computer. “Can’t you keep him dressed in public, at least?”

“It’s not up to me,” I said, glancing at the girls again. They were here for a wedding, or so they announced when they’d come in a few minutes earlier. We were used to the kind of pre-vacation exuberance that people let loose after being cooped up in a car for a few hours: voices raised, footsteps hard, the lid to the ice cream cooler being banged, not eased, shut. Everything took a beating in high season.

“Have you stayed with us at Fancy Free before?” Rebecca, one of our reservation specialists, was saying to them now.

“Never,” the tall brunette who first noticed Luke replied. She had that deep brown tan that you just knew was cultivated in a bed all winter. “We usually go to Hilton Head. We could barely find this place! Leave it to Tara to decide to get hitched in the middle of nowhere.”

Margo tsked again, shaking her head. I agreed with her, sort of—not only did these girls show up demanding early check-in, now they were insulting our beach—but she still sounded like an old woman. Then again, as long as she was distracted by them she wasn’t noticing that I was here and not out in the sandbox, where I was technically supposed to be.

The front door banged and Luke came in, pulling a shirt over his head as he walked. He had a sheaf of papers in one hand.

“Oh, no,” too-tan Melissa said to him as he passed her. “Don’t do that!”

Luke yanked it the rest of the way down, then smiled at her. “Sorry?”

“Your shirt,” she replied, nodding at it. “You don’t really need it, do you?”

“Afraid so,” Luke told her. “No shirt, no shoes, no service. You know the drill.”

“I hate rules,” she said, smiling at him. Her friends, behind her, exchanged looks as he kept walking, over to my grandmother’s open office door. She was on the phone, so he stopped just outside, smoothing his hair down with one hand.

“Hey,” I called out, my voice low. He looked over, surprised; he hadn’t seen me. “What do you need?”

He glanced at the girls, his face flushing slightly, then held up the papers. “Invoices from my jobs this week. Carl said I needed to come by and get a check.”

“She might be on forever,” I said, nodded at my grandmother, who was talking shop with one of our more chatty owners. “Come on over to my mom’s. Are they readable, at least?”

“Yes,” he said, sounding annoyed. I doubted it, though. We both knew his handwriting was the absolute worst.

As he followed me across the office, I was distinctly aware of the girls watching not only him but me as well. I was not the jealous type, but that didn’t mean I didn’t notice. I said, “Your fan club just keeps growing.”

“Hardly,” he replied. “They’re on vacation, would look at anybody.”

“Not everybody’s putting on a show, though.”

I felt him slow his steps, and instantly hated how petty I sounded. More and more lately, we kept hitting each other with these little jabs. Like we were siblings or bickering friends, not a couple supposedly in love. “It’s hot and I work outside, Emaline.”

“I know.”

My mom was behind her desk, bent over some papers, a pen in one hand. A fountain drink cup from the Gas/Gro was sweating through a napkin beside her. “Hey,” I said, and she looked up. “Luke needs a check.”

“Doesn’t everyone.” She sighed, waved him in, then looked at her watch. “Aren’t you due to do check-ins?”

“Just about.” Luke handed her the invoices and, as I expected, she squinted at them like they were written in Sanskrit. “But Grandmother said she had an errand for me to run first, so I was waiting around.”

“Remind her of the time. You need to get out there,” she said, reaching for the checkbook she kept in her bottom drawer. To Luke she said, “Dear God, this is practically illegible. Is that a six or a b?”

I shot Luke a look—he ignored me—as I went back to my grandmother, through the office, which was now quiet. It was three, though, which meant people would start showing up in rapid-fire style soon. Luckily, she was off the phone now, busy opening a Rolo.

“I have to start handing out keys,” I told her. “Did you need me?”

“Yes,” she replied, reaching down for a Park Mart bag beside her. “The owners of Foam Free apparently didn’t trust us to purchase a new doorknob for the property, so they dropped off their own. Maintenance is already there. Can you run it over?”

“Sure,” I said, taking it from her. “Anything else?”

She shook her head, and I headed out to my car and Foam Free, an older property a few blocks down from the office. It should have been a short, easy trip, but I got bogged down en route and coming back by a fender bender on the main road. By the time I pulled back into the office lot, there was a line of cars backed up from the sandbox.

I groaned out loud, already picturing how pissed Margo must be, having to fill in for me. When I got out of my car and sprinted over, though, I found Morris instead, squinting at the box of welcome packets like they were written in code.

“Baker,” a man in a Mercedes, clearly annoyed, was saying to him. “Bay-kurr. B-A-K-E-R.”

“Right,” Morris repeated, still looking. S-L-O-W-L-Y. “Ummm . . .”

I reached around him, finding the envelope, then grabbed it and the complimentary Colby Realty bag and handed them over. “Here you go, sir. Have you stayed with us at the Jolly Pirate before?”

“No,” he said, taking the bag and envelope from me.

“It’s a fantastic property. Our number is on there if you have any questions or problems. Have a great week!”

He grumbled a goodbye, then pulled away, making room for a Cadillac packed with people.

“What are you doing here?” I asked Morris.

“Margo was freaking,” he replied, helping himself to a water bottle from the cooler.

I didn’t doubt this, but it still didn’t answer my question. “Yeah, but why were you here in the first place? Looking for me?”

He shook his head as the Cadillac rattled to a stop beside us. “I came for my other job.”

“McAdams,” a red-haired older woman with a deep tan announced from the passenger seat of the Caddy, skipping a greeting entirely. “We’re renting Sea Door.”