Page 40 of Here for a Good Time

But there’s one piece of the puzzle that doesn’t fit, no matter how I flip it, where I try to place it.

He said that “college” had been one of the things that got in the way of him telling me, but that can’t be true.

I graze my teeth over my bottom lip in that spot where his once brushed it.

The spot that I only let myself remember in my least sober moments, like a trinket locked away that I only take out and examine when I’m certain no one will catch me.

He hadn’t even wanted to kiss me. No way he could’ve been in love with me then. There’s just… no way.

There’s a ding, the doors slide open, and the cool metal that’s been pressed into the nape of my neck this whole time digs in. “Move,” Nita orders, although I already am.

As we make our way down the lobby’s hardwood floors toward the reception hall, I’m surprised by how quiet everything is.

I can hear the frogs and cicadas and pattering raindrops that signal the beginning of a storm, but there are no human voices.

When we round the corner into the open reception area, I learn why: there are no humans.

Leila marches ahead, rearranging two chairs so that they’re both facing the ocean. “Take a seat,” she orders, patting each cushion. “The view’s great from here.”

Very conscious of the guns still pressed to us, Zwe and I slowly sit down.

After passing the guns to Leila, Nita and Garima once again go through the motions of untying us only to retie our hands on the backs of the chairs.

When I go to put my hands behind my back, some instinct propels Antonio’s voice to the front of my brain. I try to follow along as best as my hazy, injured, dehydrated memory will let me.

Makes your wrists bigger, his voice instructs, and I line up my knuckles to form a line.

Nita’s making sure my rope is tight, and at this point I can only pray that Antonio’s hack will still work.

“Where have you two been?” Leila calls out to the sudden footsteps that echo around us. On instinct, I turn to see who they belong to, but Nita shoves her shoulder into mine.

“What the fuck!” I cry.

“Eyes forward,” she retorts.

“Bathroom break,” a new female voice says.

Leila rolls her eyes. “What is with you all today? Have you been helping yourselves to the bar?”

“We’ve been drinking a lot of water. Sorry we didn’t want to pass out from dehydration,” the voice replies flatly.

“But the bar’s a good shout. We should’ve thought of that earlier,” another new voice adds.

Leila purses her lips. “Do you also want to run a hot bath while you’re at it? Check out one of the suites? Take a dip in the infinity pool?”

The voices belong to two new cousins, who come to flank her on either side.

My heart skips several beats when I clock the four red gasoline cans they’re carrying. Judging by their posture when they place them on the floor, those cans are all full.

“Sure, if you’re offering,” one woman says. She’s got a buzz cut and is the largest out of the five of them, her tank top and leggings highlighting some serious muscles.

“Fuck me, Faith,” Leila sighs. “We’re so close to the end. Can you please stay focused?”

I recognize the other one’s bleached hair, and, remembering the earlier conversation, place her as Andrea.

“Yes, I agree, can we get this over with?” Andrea nudges one of the cans with her toe.

“The smell is starting to make me sick. Wha—” Her expression turns to confusion when her gaze lands on me and Zwe.

“Wait, what’s going on? Leils, why are they being tied up? ”

“Because we’re going to put on a show for them.” Garima flashes a sarcastic smile. “Why do you think?”

Andrea’s brown eyes widen until she looks like a cartoon character. Blindsided, she stutters out, “No, that wasn’t part of the plan.”

“Plan’s changed,” Leila says.

“And you’re all okay with this? We said no one would get hurt.” Andrea looks around at her other three cousins, who all glance in different directions to refuse eye contact. Nita gives my rope a final tight yank, and, satisfied, starts backing away.

Leila’s the only one who talks. “They know what we look like,” she says, gesturing at each of them.

“But—”

“They know you’re my cousins,” she adds. At that, Andrea shuts up. “If we let them go, all of us go to jail. Think of Raj. You guys just got engaged.”

Andrea’s throat bobs as she gulps. “But we can’t kill them,” she says.

“ We won’t,” Leila says. “The fire will.”

I don’t hear anything after the word “fire.”

This whole time, I had been turning my fists inward like Antonio had demonstrated and trying to free my right thumb, but as soon as I hear the f -word, it’s as though someone’s injected a paralytic drug into my veins.

A fog settles over my skin and seeps under it, turning my muscles ice cold.

I look over at Zwe, whose eyes have also glazed over.

Fire . Fire. Fire. It’s echoing in my head in Leila’s exact inflection.

Another puzzle piece slots into place.

There’s nowhere to hide or run, apart from right in the ocean.

She had told us their plan. Right to our faces. There was always going to be a fire.

“Why are you doing this?” Everyone’s heads whip in my direction. I blink, barely registering the tear that rolls down my cheek. “We didn’t do anything! Please let us go!” I yell, moving from denial to anger to bargaining in the span of five seconds.

Leila doesn’t even flinch. “You just have bad luck, I guess.” She hands two cans to Nita and Garima. “Start pouring.”

They take one each, walk to opposite corners of the reception area, and begin pouring gasoline all over the floor. The smell takes a second to hit, but once it does, it overpowers everything else.

“Leila, please, don’t do this. Let us go, please,” Zwe also begs.

But Leila acts as though he hasn’t said a word. She picks up the third can and hands it to Andrea.

Andrea.

“Andrea, you don’t want to do this,” I say, straining my neck so I can make eye contact.

She squirms at my using her name, and when she does look at me, she looks terrified.

Maybe even remorseful. “Please, our parents are waiting for us at home. We have cousins and siblings, too. They’ll all be wondering what happened. Andrea—”

“Andrea.” Leila steps right in my line of vision, eyes narrowed into slits, jaw hardened, furious that I’ve addressed Andrea directly.

When I strain my neck to try to see Andrea again, Leila swiftly shifts the gasoline can still in her hand so the spout is pointed in our direction.

“Say my cousin’s name one more time, and I will douse both of you. I dare you to test me.”

I’m so desperate that I want to test her, but then I look at Zwe, and remember that I’m not the only one at risk here. So instead, I lower my gaze to the floor and helplessly watch a small trail of gasoline from one corner of the room snake its way parallel to my feet.

“Go to the boat, Drea,” Leila is saying. “Have it ready. We’ll join you soon.”

“You said…” Andrea says softly, not finishing the sentence.

“They’ve seen our faces,” Nita reminds her. “You have to choose between them or us.”

Andrea doesn’t reply, the gasoline-saturated air going still. “I need to get my laptop from the security office” comes her answer at last. “I’ll be back in ten.” I hear her sneakers squeaking away from us.

So this is it. This is how it ends.

With immeasurable effort, I lift my head, watching, as if in a dream, Leila covers the reception desk and couches in gasoline while Faith takes the last can.

My eyes land on Zwe. What I wouldn’t give right now to feel the steady weight of his palm on my shoulder.

I’ll miss you, I think.

I am going to miss it all. So, so much, I think, and begin soundlessly crying.

A loud crack of thunder, so close it sounds like it struck right in the middle of this room, makes us all jump. “Right on cue,” Leila says.

“You really didn’t want to hurt anyone.” At this point, I’ve disassociated so much that I barely recognize the raspy voice as my own.

But a part of me that’s realized something pushes on in one last attempt, past the fear and compelling desire to give up.

“That’s why you wouldn’t let us return to the reception area and free everyone, right?

Because you were worried the staff might get caught in the crossfire.

There’s a difference between burning a hotel and murdering people.

Please. You can still let us go.” I don’t know where everybody else is, but they’re like Leila’s second family, and I know she wouldn’t hurt them.

If they’re still in the same building as us, then—

“You’re right, I do care about the staff, and I can promise you that they’re all fine,” Leila says. “You two, on the other hand, are strangers to me.”

“Why?” I don’t know why I ask it, but I suppose it’s true what they say: desperate people do desperate things. “What did we do? This isn’t fair.”

Leila cocks her head, studying me for so long and with such intensity that I stop crying, stop moving altogether, like prey futilely hoping that they haven’t been spotted when they clearly have.

She doesn’t look like she has a threatening quip on the tip of her tongue.

My stomach flops as I watch her anger steadily accelerate.

Even her cousins have gone quiet. I’ve obviously said something wrong, something that’s turned me into her sole target.

“Not fair?” Still firmly staring me down, she points behind her, at the beach.

“Do you think it’s fair that my parents were told they couldn’t renew their vows at the spot where they got married?

Is it fair that some billionaire swooped in and suddenly my whole family was forced to relocate to the top of the mountains, like sheep herded away?

From the home that they’d been in for generations? ”

Nita loudly clears her throat. “That’s enough, Leils. We said we wouldn’t—”