Page 14 of Love’s a Script (Hearts Collide #1)

Chapter Fourteen

The doors and windows in the lobby had been sealed to keep out the wind and snow, but they rattled as if they might fly open at any moment.

And as hard as Ruben tried, he couldn’t make out anything in the gray outside.

It left him wishing he’d done as Chesa had and journeyed home last night, but he’d thought one extra sleep in a bed more comfortable than his own wouldn’t hurt.

When Ruben had first arrived, he’d thought the lobby grand with its high ceilings, exposed wood beams, and central fireplace, but that was all lost with so many people packed in there.

“Folks, it’s bad out there,” the hotel manager told the assembled guests.

He stood on top of the front desk and spoke into a megaphone.

His stiff oversized blazer made him look like a child playing dress up.

“We’re watching weather reports closely, and for now, it’s been advised we all shelter in place. ”

The people whined and objected. “You can’t keep us here!” someone shouted.

“You’re right,” the manager replied evenly, “but access to the main road is completely blocked with snow. If you do venture out, there’s no guarantee someone can come get you.”

“But where do the people without rooms stay?” asked one guest who’d arrived on the full shuttle ahead of the blizzard.

The manager said, “We will be offering blankets and sleeping mats for people to use here in the lobby.”

“What about food?”

“We will serve two buffet meals. One in the morning and another at dinnertime. A snack table will be available during lunch hours.”

“Will the ski lift be open?”

The polite professional facade that had governed the manager’s face to this point cracked a little.

“Well, no. There’s a blizzard,” he said.

A ceaseless wave of questions and complaints followed that the hotel manager did his best to address, but at last called for order, saying, “Join a line at the front desk, and one of our staff will help you with your individual concerns.”

As bodies shuffled to form queues, Ruben ended up near the front of one and waited fifteen minutes to be helped. He booked additional days in his room at the regular rate because, as the clerk explained, it was standard hotel policy to charge the same, come rain, shine, or raging blizzard.

“But I do see here you have two single beds,” the clerk said to him. “We can offer a discount if you are willing to share your room with a stranded traveler.”

“I’ll consider it,” he told her and moved aside for the next person in line. He wasn’t eager to room with a stranger, but it felt especially selfish to leave a perfectly serviceable bed unused during an emergency.

“Hey, Ruben!” someone called across the way. A small group of people Ruben had met at the conference waved at him from the middle of the lobby, and he temporarily abandoned his quest to join them.

“This is nuts,” said one TV news anchor with teeth so white they made Ruben think his own looked like pennies in comparison.

“I’m thinking two or three days before we can leave,” Ruben said.

“Well, it depends,” replied a meteorologist from an east coast station. “The snow and wind might subside, but the roads will still need clearing. And we’re not getting prioritized up here. I’d say prepare for four to five days.”

As his colleagues continued to talk, Ruben’s gaze wandered the lobby in search of possible solo travelers, and instead saw tired families, bored friends, bickering couples, scolding parents, and most surprisingly of all, Mary.

She sat on the hearth of the raised fireplace in a beige matching set.

For some reason, he hadn’t expected her to still be here.

Ruben’s feet were moving him toward her before he could properly excuse himself from the group. She was typing on her phone and didn’t notice him until he was standing in front of her. “Bad weather we’re having,” he said past a sudden wave of nerves.

She looked up, dragging her reading glasses onto her head. “Oh, hey! What’re you doing here?”

“Work conference,” he said. “You?”

“I was attending a wedding. Would you like to take a seat?” She scooted over on the concrete, and he nearly declined before noting how she craned her neck to look at him.

Once he was more level with her, they asked after the safety of each other’s loved ones and for a few minutes watched the storm beyond the windows. The noise in the lobby had significantly reduced by this time, but occasional protests at the front desk would bring the volume up again.

“I feel sorry for the people stuck sleeping out here,” Ruben said.

Mary laughed and gestured to a series of bags at her feet. “I’m one of them. I checked out of my room just before the alert went out.”

The thought of Mary curled up in front of the fireplace like a barn mouse, disturbed Ruben. It was completely unnecessary. “You can stay in my room if you want,” he said.

Mary stammered for seconds before Ruben’s face heated in realization. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I should’ve clarified. There’re two beds.”

“Oh! Duh! I don’t know why I thought…” She shook her head and smiled. “Thank you. I accept.”

* * *

“Make yourself comfortable,” Ruben said as Mary looked around his hotel room. The room was standard in size—certainly enough to share—but currently felt like a coffin.

She was rooming with a client, an awkward predicament even without the attraction.

She walked past his roughly made bed to place her bags beside the bed closest to the window.

While she unpacked her few belongings for what she hoped was a short stay, Ruben turned on the television to the news, lessening the pressure to speak.

When she took her toiletries to set out in the bathroom, she closed the door behind her. To her reflection in the three-way mirror, Mary whispered hollow things like “You got this” and “Don’t make it weird.”

She returned to the bedroom and found Mayor Laurie on the TV.

Mary stood beside her bed and watched the mayor speak from a podium in a city-branded tracksuit and cap, repeating facts and advisories she’d heard all morning.

However, things turned strange when he ended his address crooning a verse of “Baby, It’s Cold Outside. ”

“There goes your guy,” Ruben said from where he sat at the foot of his bed.

Mary turned, aghast. “My guy? My guy ? Why is Mayor Laurie my guy?”

“You passionately defended him during the radio interview. I assumed you were a fan.”

“I was defending my industry, not him specifically,” she said. “I don’t like him and definitely didn’t vote for him. He literally doesn’t believe dinosaurs ever existed.”

“Damn, I forgot about that rumor.”

“I can never forget,” she said. “He is forever linked in my brain with dinosaurs. Like peanut butter and jelly. Or Bonnie and Clyde.”

With the record settled, hunger led Ruben and Mary out of their room in search of breakfast. They arrived at the hotel restaurant to find it past capacity with people having loud, unmodulated conversations around reconfigured tables. It looked and sounded like a mall food court.

“We’ll have to get here earlier next time,” Ruben said. They waited their turn at the buffet and made do with the small desert plates that remained. Once food was procured, they searched the dining room for a place to sit.

“Over there at the far end near the window,” she said, and they approached the two occupants of the table—a middle-aged couple from Arizona named Jillian and Allen—and asked if they could sit with them.

“Of course!” said the husband and wife who sported matching tie-dye T-shirts and sunburnt noses.

They talked over each other, completing or correcting the other’s sentences.

Quickly, Mary learned how long they’d been married, the names of their adult children, and the places they’d traveled to.

“Did Kilimanjaro in 2018, Sydney in 2015, and we absolutely adored our ’09 visit to the Galápagos Islands,” said Allen.

“We try to do these outdoorsy trips every couple of years together,” Jillian explained.

“An enviable hobby,” Ruben said. “Hopefully there’s still a natural world to see by the time I retire.”

“Matamata,” Mary said before thinking.

Ruben looked at her, surprised. “Yeah, how did you—” He smiled. “Right, I forgot.”

“And how long have you two been together?” Jillian asked after studying them.

“Oh, it’s not like that,” Mary said.

“I’m too much of a skeptical smartass for her,” Ruben said, garnering amused snorts from the actual couple, and Mary found herself smiling as well.

“And have you two started preparing?” Allen asked.

“Preparing?” Ruben said.

“Yeah, for when things get worse.” Allen conspiratorially dropped his voice.

“There’s no one coming in or going out for who knows how long.

That means the food we’ve got is all we have.

Supply will decrease, and people will begin to fight for resources.

It’s day one, and you can already feel the tightening of the belt.

We’ve been here all week, and the breadbaskets have never been that sparse. ”

“I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about,” Mary said.

“Maybe. But our advice? Start stashing,” Jillian said as she and her husband pulled from the inner pockets of their winter jackets, Ziplock bags filled with scrambled eggs whose heat was clouding the plastics.

“Oh, wow,” Mary said, forcing her expression neutral. “That’s…resourceful.”

“The goal is to put off cannibalism for as long as possible,” Allen said.

“Cannibalism? That’s a day-forty resort,” Ruben said, looking similarly put off by the couple’s bags of mush. “We’ll be off this mountain long before we’d have to even think about eating each other.”

Allen shrugged. “I guess we’ll see.”

A woman in a toque who’d been making the rounds to the tables in the dining room appeared at theirs.

Her wide stance and the clipboard she carried gave her an air of authority.

She introduced herself to them as Elizabeth and explained she’d been authorized by hotel management to coordinate entertainment for the guests during this snowed-in period.

“We’re stuck here for a couple of days, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have fun,” Elizabeth said with unfaltering enthusiasm.

“There’s a table in the lobby with different sign-up sheets for activities and classes being offered by fellow guests.

I’m personally looking forward to the Zumba class tomorrow morning.

If you have an activity you would like to spearhead, let me know and?—”

A commotion at the buffet station drew everyone’s attention. A tall man held a slice of pumpernickel in the air out of reach of a much shorter man.

“I got to it first,” shouted the shorter of the two.

“Then why am I holding it?”

“’Cause you’re a thief and your arms are freakishly long!”

The tall man responded to the insults by dragging his tongue across the debated bread, sending the shorter one into a rage. There was shoving and a string of expletives before capable bystanders were driven to finally step in.

“And there we go,” the Arizona husband said, self-satisfied. “The infighting for resources has begun.”