Fairwil: Wilfair Book 4

Thing?

Do You Want the Greeting Card or the Real Thing?

Love may be the answer, the balm, the bridge, the joy, the sight, the strength, and a hundred other overly easy aphorisms that fit perfectly on the front of a t-shirt.

But a t-shirt never has room for all of the assorted asterisks love delivers to anyone who experiences it in any of its forms.

Love for your parents, for one. Maybe that could fit on the tee’s sleeve?

Love for place is also important. That could be on the hem.

And love for everything, and everyone, could dot the shirt, like a subtle background pattern.

And love for yourself, your smarts, your character, your can-do? That’s the overall hue.

Falling in love, though, is the topic that tends to dominate the t-shirt aisle, though it isn’t a mystery why.

I knew I was on the way to that kind of love, a new kind of love, for me, at least, because I was indulging in ridiculous t-shirt philosophy. Greeting cards seemed profound to me, and pat slogans, too. Posters with kittens nearly made me well up, and if I saw a teddy bear holding a rose I sighed. I wanted to hug random strangers and compliment everyone I came across and stick bows on bowless things and kiss cats.

Indeed, I hearted the world with a sweet, cloying stickiness that likely made the world, being somewhat sensible and far wiser than myself, recoil.

Or at least deeply uncomfortable.

But the sticky love I felt wasn’t just from crying over inspirational posters and swooning over stuffed bears.

I’d resolved a serious difference with my neighbors, the Overboves, over the swimming pool they owned and my family wanted.

I’d told my parents I had to start making more decisions on my own.

I’d okayed a dog for my brothers, which I hoped would allow them to remain kids longer before graduating to the Old Child-dom, a place I found myself living too early, courtesy of my old-fashioned ways and the busy hotel I called my home.

I’d renounced my Old Child-dom, deciding it was just fine to act my age, which was nearly 20, which, according to my old foe and new friend Monty, meant I was in limbo, neither teenager nor adult.

Limbo’s all right.

It’s giving me time to reflect on where I stand, with everyone, my job, my friends, my life, and myself.

That I had two new employees in my two new neighbors, neighbors who had long been on the other side of the proverbial fence from my family, was a coup and a win.

That my sticky-pawed, kitten-poster, greeting-card feelings were directed at one of them was the twist in the story.

Or maybe not.

The answers were simple: He had to quit his better-paying new job and move out of his childhood home so we could go on a real date, rather than roaming subterranean spaces together in the place where everything that’s ever happened exists in a jumbled, unorganized mess.

Oh, right. That’s happening, too. And finding his parents, to bring them home to the motel they no longer own, was top of our agenda, not the kitten-balloon poster-aphorism love growing between us.

You can fall in love while simultaneously dealing with life, becoming an adult, and helping others, right?

I dare say that’s the only way to do it. Because falling in love when you have the time, luxury, and focus to fall in love can be an experience as thin as a knock-off, slogan-riddled t-shirt.

And when it came to love, I didn’t just want the whole t-shirt store. I wanted the mall. If that meant ditching the simplistic sayings and trappings of the hearts and greeting cards in exchange for learning how to work together, bringing lost people back, and uniting families, then that’s how it would go.

I’d call it a little first, but it felt like a bundle of little firsts, and my math-genius friend Sutton would claim that a sizeable bundle consisting of a lot of little anythings adds up to one big whole.

So, hello, big first.

I’m ready.

Are You Somebody’s This Person, This Person, This Person?

Sneaking back into the hotel was a little less eventful than sneaking out. We didn’t have to pass through the lobby to reach the hallway that led to the stairway that led to the second stairway that led to the storage room that led to The Wilfair’s secret basement, meaning I didn’t have to run into any employees as I slithered slyly back into the building I owned. Gomery and Monty trailed until I stopped before the door to my family’s storage room.

I groaned. The key! It’s upstairs. I’ll go up.

I got this. Monty pulled out a small pin and neatly popped the bolt. When you work at a motel, this is essential knowledge. Especially when guests check out and leave with the key. He pushed the door open to an airless, dark room. Flicking his phone on, he clucked. Disappointing. Where’re the rocking horses? The scary wedding dresses? The monkey with the cymbals? All the cliché stuff you see in movies in a family attic? This is no way to run an old basement, Fair!

Told you it’s boring.

And no one comes here?

Nope. My family has the key, since it’s just our stuff. Like, hotel staff have no reason to visit. Maybe to change the lightbulb every ten years. I flicked a switch to no avail. And clearly that hasn’t happened recently. I flicked the switch again. So. Where’s this other pool? Wait. Where’s your cousin?

Over here, said a voice from behind some boxes. There were sounds of large items moving. Gomery had turned on his own phone light and was now pointing it at a far corner. So this might be something. The tile over here forms waves. It continues under this wall.

I’ve never seen that. But then there’s been an old trunk over there forever. How’d you move that thing? It’s huge.

Have you ever seen that guy’s arms, Fair? He can move stuff, said Monty. By the way, I winked at you right then, to imply I know you’ve seen ‘em. But it’s dark, so I’m sure you didn’t see me.

Gomery stood. We need to take this wall down. Somehow. Monty, where’s my mom’s pickax?

Utility room.

Can you go get the pickax and maybe a sledgehammer? Gomery turned to me. Is it all right if we take down part of your hotel?

Uh. Can we put it back together? I pulled at the tight waistband of Monty’s pants. I was still in his comfort wear, and still a little damp-headed, after taking a leap into the motel pool.

Not after the pickax has its way. This wall will be down for good, or in shreds, at worst. There’s probably only old brick behind it, but this is a false front, so I’m curious about what’s on the other side.

You always are, I observed. I’ve never had new employees, or people soon to be employees, uh, ask if they can destroy part of my hotel. But you know how I like little firsts. So. Okay. My insides tickled.

Going, said Monty. We’ll see if Alex stops me as I whistle my way back into Wilfair with a pickax. If he doesn’t – honestly, Fair, you should probably can him. Oh, can I have your phone, Mer? I need extra light for that scary stairwell. He took his cousin’s phone, then picked his way to the storage room doorway. Wait. I just realized it’ll be pitch black in here, without my phone or yours or this flashlight. So I better be sure to take them all with me. And with that, Monty and our only light glimmered down the hallway.

It was completely silent and completely dark. So silent I could hear dust motes settling in my hair.

You said the tile is waves?

Blue waves, said the voice from the corner.

Can I see?

Monty took all our light.

Right. I was quiet. I can hear the dust motes, like. Falling on me.

Are you sure they aren’t atoms?

They might be. I’m not sure I have all my atoms tonight.

Me either.

Yes.

Yes to what? he asked.

To the two questions you want to ask me.

And those are?

Does it have to be under the diving board? Nerves, in my head, and all over.

Does it?

Well. Probably. But definitely not in a storage room where, like, everything I don’t use anymore is stored. I don’t require a ton of symbolism in my life, but if you want a balloon bouquet to symbolize our great escape, I’ll ask for the diving board for our kiss.

What’s the second question I want to ask you?

You want to ask me if you can try anyway?

Seconds later I heard a box slide, then a quiet ouch, then the squeak of a trunk. And then he was in front of me.

I’m dying to kiss you, Fair.

I’m dying to kiss you. Whoa. I just said ‘I’m dying to kiss you’ instead of saying ‘I’m dying to be kissed,’ which is, like. Totally what I would have said before. Taking ownership. Total revelatory moment.

I’m nearly one-hundred-percent sure you’ll narrate some of our more interesting moments, because that’s what you do, and frankly I’d be disappointed if you didn’t. But I need to tell you that, by this point, Monty is back at the motel. Which means we have all of three minutes. And then in a matter of days, you’ll own the motel and employ me, and standing up against you in dark rooms will be out of the question.

I lifted his necktie, pointed the bottom up, and placed it in front of my mouth. If your lips touch the tie, I’ll start making a beeping sound. Like a car backing out of an alley.

Keep talking like that, because that is incredibly romantic. And then he slipped off his glasses.

Are you taking off your glasses?

I’d like to put my face close to yours, without plastic or glass in the way. And then he placed his hands on either side of my head and pressed his lips against the plumpest part of my right cheek.

It made me feel good and it made me feel warm, as all the books and movies that make romantic promises promised it would. But I was not content to feel content. A part of me, the part of me able to access memories, the part that kept in touch with the thousands of past Fairs, wanted to go back and tell the Fair staring out her window and the Fair complaining in the motel lobby and the Fair bickering in The Redwoodian’s hallway that it was all going to lead to this. The thousand little endings I believed riddled my story, time and again, turned out to simply be a thousand little middles.

This, too, of course, was another middle of our story, but as middles go, it was unusually provocative and mind-poppingly exciting.

Then all internal-dialoging ceased when he kissed the tip of my nose and then the bridge.

Beep! Beep!

I wasn’t near the tie, he said, not moving his hands.

I know. I got so excited I said it. I’m so excited because I’m so excited.

Are you here? Now?

I’m just, like, thinking about what I might tell some future Fair about this.

Fair!

I’m here. It’s now. Gomery.

And I quieted my mind. And I quieted my heart. And I quieted my body, the best I could, because tiny asteroids made of pure fizzy energy were darting around it and colliding. And I didn’t wonder why it felt good to have someone’s mouth press against random parts of my face.

And I didn’t wonder if I tasted slightly of pool water and tears and ketchup. And I didn’t wonder why it felt good to have someone’s beautiful, slightly weathered hands on the sides of my head. And I didn’t wonder why it felt good when someone’s knees and thighs pressed against your own knees and thighs.

And I didn’t even count the times he kissed my face. Old me, the me before The Redwoodian’s fireplace, probably would have, the better to catalogue each and every one for obsessing over later.

I took the moment as its whole rather than the sum of its parts, probably the first time I’d ever done such a thing.

Old me would have asked him if I tasted like ketchup.

Old me would have talked about all my atoms going haywire.

Old me would have continued to beep.

Old me would have laughed.

Old me would have antsied.

And I knew I still had all the old mes in tow, and they were good, and I’d probably revisit them on occasion. They’d need to advise all my new mes on my quirks and habits.

But my new mes were now in the driver’s seat, chauffeur’s cap on.

New me remained calm.

New me widened my mind to the moment.

New me didn’t obsess that this person would be unavailable to me as a boyfriend in a matter of days.

New me understood that life is flow and things change and there aren’t happy endings but a happy continuum. New me understood that maybe one day, even soon, I wouldn’t be shielding my mouth from his via the bottom of a necktie. Maybe one day, even soon, I’d be in my bathing suit and he’d be in his and we’d be warm and wet and hidden from the world by an old diving board.

New me gave myself over, something I’d always struggled with in all areas of my life.

New me stopped old me from saying, Gomery, I just gave myself over, because old me really wanted to tell him.

And both old me and new me agreed that his kisses, even though they were of the cheek and forehead variety, felt better than both mes had ever anticipated. They were just what kisses should be: a slight pucker at the outset, a firm press, a soft moist mwah as he drew back each time. I was no kiss expert, but I would have told anyone under oath that he was putting a ton of feeling and care into each one.

Are you all right?

Why? I asked.

You haven’t told me that your head is a rocket and you haven’t bew-bew-bew’d and you haven’t rrowred and I’m pretty surprised that the beeping ceased, because a minute ago I thought the beeping might be the soundtrack to all of this.

Gomery, I just gave myself over.

Down the hallway a door creaked.

Fair, he said, his voice urgent. His hands moved from the sides of my head to just below my ears. The heels of his hands cupped my chin, the move I’d seen in countless movies that signaled someone was about to get a full-on mouth kiss.

Beep, I whispered as the tip of his nose touched mine.

And then he almost imperceptibly kissed his necktie. The fabric barely brushed my lips.

I just got kissed by a necktie. I think?

That wasn’t our kiss. Or even a kiss, said Gomery. I’m rockets. I’m completely rockets.

My atoms, I agreed.

Someone whistled a lazy tune outside the storage room. I’m a-coming down the hall with a pickax, oh, yes, I am, sang Monty. So anyone who is doing anything should think about wrapping it up, woobie la la. Or not, I don’t care, I’m an open-minded individual, doo doo doo.

I’ll see you again, soon. Months? Weeks? Very soon, I whispered to the man I’d now see every day, several times a day.

Gomery placed his long hands flat on both sides of my face, put his forehead against mine and said nothing. A moment later he did.

This person. This person. This person, said the person who was now my this person.

And then every atom that was mine and every atom I borrowed spun out into the storage room, into the stairwell beyond, through the Ferris wheel and into the Los Angeles dawn.

I’m a-tryin’ to think up more lyrics to indicate I’m about to walk in the storage room, with my big manly pickax, oh, yes, I am, but now I’m bored with this song, doobie doo. It needs sound effects, so I think I need to get to know someone who creates sound effects for a living, if she’ll ever call me, because that went kind of weird before, with the coffee, so she might not call me, which would send me into a spiral of misery, doobie doo.

Gomery let go of my face, and every asteroid in my chest changed its errant pattern and zoomed directly into the sun of my heart, incinerating upon impact. And then the outer space inside my chest once again grew dark and all of my inside stars seemed very, very far away.

Monty stepped into the storage room and shone his flashlight in our faces. Now. Who in here wants to work out some tension and pickax the hell out of an old wall?

I do! shouted Gomery.

Me! I yelled.

Mmm hmm. I knew I should have made up more lyrics. Fair, you’re going first, because seeing a woman wielding a pickax while rocking my comfort wear is a fantasy of mine. The fact that we’re about to find a pool on the other side, and I’m gonna save the day and my family’s motel, was not part of the fantasy, but you can bet it will be. Oh, unsexy protective goggles’ll have to be part of the fantasy, too, since we’re all about safety first at the motel. Except when we’re not.

He handed me the eyewear and I slipped the bulky plastic gear over my head, taking care not to catch my damp hair on the elastic. A piece of cracking plastic pinched the top of my nose. I turned toward the cousins and adjusted. Weddy, I said nasally, and gave a thumbs-up.

"Unsexy protective goggles are so fantasy," agreed Gomery, who didn’t sound like he was joking.

I discovered three things wielding the pickax. One. I was a natural. Two. Swinging a pickax hides the fact you’ve been sweating like a first-time jogger over completely non-pickax-related events. People will just call it pickax sweat and be done with it, not knowing it was really sweat from being face-stroked and called this person multiple times by your own this person.

And three? There was no pool behind the wall. But there was a door with a carved dolphin.

Heeyaw! I ripped, putting the pickax into the wall for the eleventh time.

Sorry, Mer, I don’t think you’re getting your shot. There’s something poetic though about Fair Finley destroying her hotel, so I’m willing to let her have all the fun.

Guys. Guys. I panted. I see a dolphin.

A real dolphin? Man, those are some smart mammals. Well, not if he got stuck behind the wall in your storage room, but maybe he was down here trying to get it on with this other dolphin he worked next door to and couldn’t really officially date, and he accidentally got stuck.

A carved dolphin. I marveled.

We’re close. Monty raised the flashlight. Blue-wave tile and a dolphin. That ain’t a dentist’s office on the other side of that wall.

It’s a door, I panted, pulling the plastic eyewear down around my neck.

Gomery drew near. You’re right. Let’s get the rest of this wall down. We began ripping the old plaster with our hands, tearing and dropping chunks at our feet. He’d reach for another shred of wall and I’d already be on it, shredding. And then I discovered a fourth benefit to this particular exercise: People who are dying to kiss but haven’t should find a false wall and rip it down together, bare-handed and wet with perspiration.

Moments later we peered through the shreds.

One pool, coming right up! Monty pushed his way to the dolphin door and again pulled out the small pin.

Are you abetting this criminal? I asked Gomery.

For twenty-one years, he smiled as he held the door for his cousin. More dust drifted in the already mote-laden storage room.

Careful, Monty! Be safe, please.

Safe? Pah! I pah the word ‘safe’ right in safe’s face! said Monty.

I’m liable for you, in this hotel.

I’m going to add that term to my protective eyewear pickax fantasy. Will you talk about violation of statutes, too? Discuss breach of contract? Because those are good alone-time words for me. Seconds later, Monty jimmied the lock open. The door gave with a groan and a cobwebby puff.

Stairs, I breathed.

Stairs, said Gomery.

Miss Finley, no need to be jealous that me and Mer are living with our own super-secret crouton stairway, ‘cause you’ve got your very own set!

What?!

Monty turned the flashlight beam to the ground. Blue-tile stairs led downward into a pitch-black room. Highly crumbly. Very old. Potential for falling is high. So, who’s going down first?

Are You in the Middle of Your Happy Ending?

Anything down there? I asked, hurrying down the crumbling steps after the cousins. Methane and dust made for a nearly unbreathable mix as we neared the bottom.

Well, Fair, it turns out you do have a ‘pool.’ You’ve had one this whole time, called Monty.

I heard sarcastic quotes around ‘pool’ there.

He turned his flashlight on a half-built hole in the ground. It was tiled, partially, but unfinished. Dirt and debris caked the bottom.

Oh wow, I choked. Breathing. Eck.

Methane pocket, somewhere. Product of living near the tar pits. I wonder if that’s why they left it unfinished, Gomery half-said, half-coughed. But look.

The same blue tile at the top of the stairs covered the walls. Waves foamed and ceramic octopuses frolicked.

What publicity for The Wilfair! clapped Monty. "You found a pool with priceless tile work and were able to hand the motel and pool next door back to its rightful owners."

Monty, I coughed.

What? This is the pool you wanted! Everyone wins and no one has to be sad!

Except my guests, swimming down here. I brushed some dust.

It’s crummy now, but a few bucks—

Several hundred thousand bucks—

And bam! You got your pool.

Tell me, Monty, how I’ll supply the thing guests want most.

Free drinks?

Sunshine.

Monty stared up at the dark space above us. Install a skylight.

That’s what people on vacation dream about, sitting under a murky ceiling hole.

And there are a few stories above this room. Before you even reach ground, added Gomery.

People back then were crazy, said Monty, all disappointment.

People in the future will say that about us. I coughed. The dankness of the room, and floating grit, seemed more pronounced than when we first entered.

Why the hell did they even start to build a stupid pool down here? The popcorn box kicked a concrete chunk into a shadowy corner

Indoor pools were once, like, the rage. Maybe my great-grandfather did it to compete with yours, once he saw he’d made a mistake not building his own. By the time he realized there was no space left on the corner, he went underground. Literally. But then they stopped. Methane leaks. No sunlight. Ghosts. I don’t know.

You’ve got octopuses down here! On the walls! Keeping Wilfair guests from these beautiful, creepy wall octopuses is mean! gestured Monty. Uh. Octopuses? Octopi. Octopuses.

Monty. No. I crossed my arms, letting my body language back me up on my decision.

His head hung. I’m sad. I wanted to be the hero. I wanted this to be our happy ending.

Maybe we’re in the middle of our happy ending and we don’t know it, said Gomery.

A happy ending might take years to play out. It isn’t just the kiss before the credits, I agreed. And why do you even want to keep the motel? You never have time. You never have money. I’m sorry, I know that’s impolite, or whatever, but you don’t. So why can’t I pay you more than you make now? Why can’t I give you some extra hours in your days? Why keep a place you don’t even want?

Because it’s mine!

That’s an empty reason. Nobody likes everything they have. The important thing is to keep the stuff you really love!

Have you ever had something taken away? No, you have not. Even in the dark, Monty’s scowl was audible.

Yes.

Fair Finley, not getting something she wanted! What’s the next fairytale you’ll tell?

You know what’s worse than having something taken away? Never having had it. Or getting close then giving it back. Just saying, ‘Nope, I’m going to choose the greater good here, because I’m, like, so noble.’ And your heart is crumbling, like this ridiculous pool, and you’d like to kick the greater good, hard, right in the back of the pants. Because you’re selfish and you’re lonely and you know your big good choice is going to spawn a hundred little bad choices, personal choices, like jumping in freezing pools with mint dishes. Because you gave away what you really wanted right before you got it. That’s worse, Monty, then handing over something you don’t even really like.

Quiet fell over the crumbling room.

You started strong there, but when you got to wanting to kick the greater good in the pants, your whole movie speech unraveled. If I was writing that, I would’ve ended it there. Now hold me, boss. Make me not cry. Monty opened his arms and I stepped in for a formal, employee-employer embrace that quickly lost its lofty air.

Gomery cleared his throat. Methane management has improved. You could revive this pool.

I turned inside Monty’s arms to face him. Do you not want me to buy Motel Fairwil now?

I want you to do what you want to do.

I’m taking the motel.

Choosing a thing over a person. How compassionate, Fair, complained the popcorn-box’d person.

What’s that mean?

You’re taking the motel but not the man.

The man’ll be around, said Gomery.

That’s the problem. I sighed. Remember that one time we stood next to that old pool?

Yes.

Remember I said I want you both to have a life, and enjoy the extra time and money that’ll come from working for me, because you deserve it?

So true. Those last two guys who paid us? The necktie nerd and wannabe filmmaker? Good riddance. Cheap jerks, muttered Monty.

What I didn’t say was, I kind of don’t want that for you, too. I don’t want you guys to suddenly have awesome lives because that could be, uh, not fun for me, if. If, If Gomery were to meet someone and like her. And that happened because the lady who likes you, this lady right here, was able to gift you with, like, time, and a life, and new opportunities.

Puffing yourself up there, Fair, joked Monty.

And I feel selfish for even thinking I don’t want you to fully enjoy your new lives. I want you to be happy. I just want to be a part of your happy. And if I have to watch what I helped engineer, at close range, work out, without me. I’ll be thrilled and devastated. Conflicting concepts. One space.

I’m sad, Monty said again. I’m the owner of a busted VCR and a potential broken heart courtesy of this red wine date deal not happening with Clementine Hwang. I don’t know which is worse.

Why not tape a note to the lobby door? Addressed to ‘The Mysterious Stranger Who Left Us the Busted Videotape Recorder’? Gomery suggested. Maybe whoever left it for us, the World’s Basement intern or the Rainey-Palomo sisters, can replace it.

That’s not all of it, sighed Monty. The lovely lady of my dreams might let my cousin buy her a glass of red wine on his twenty-first birthday, and yet my heart is crying hot heart tears over this pool business. I wanted this moment to be different, but instead I discovered a solution that is more of a problem. Isn’t that life, though? What we want and what actually happens always splits at some unseen fork in the road. Reality, pah. It always acts with total impunity!

Did you really just say ‘impunity’ at six o’clock in the morning?

Twenty-four hours a day can’t hold all I have to offer, Fair.

The murky room gave a whoosh just then, then settled. Maybe the space sighed due to the methane pockets in the earth directly beneath it, or maybe because it silently held a side, and opinion, in the motel pool debate.

Let’s go to bed, Monty. It’s morning.

Be right up.

You go to your bed and I go to mine.

But my bed’ll be your bed, now, at least on paper, legally. So we’re both going to your beds.

Goodnight, Monty.

Goodnight, Miss Finley. I don’t know if I’ll like calling you that now.

You don’t like Miss Finley?

I like Fair, Monty smiled.

We left the methane-filled room, disappointed and cobwebby. When we reached the top of the crumbling stairs, the guy in the glasses pulled a blanket off a box and tossed it over the shredded wall, catching the blanket on a torn bit near the top, and effectively hiding the Pool That Never Was and Likely Would Never Be.

Do You Think It’ll Ever Be Normal on Our Corner?

We walked through the Faraway Passageway, dusty and sullen. The only thing Monty asked for – a goodnight kiss – he didn’t get. But I hugged him, since he wasn’t quite my employee yet, and with that he jogged through The 500 Dip Bar, then through the tree-filled passageway connecting The Wilfair’s restaurant to the Motel Fairwil diner.

Gomery and I lingered near the Moonbeam Threshold while, nearby, the lobby spun to sleepy life. I could hear yawny guests sniffing out coffee and the bellmen talking about what they did the night before, hitting the movies in Hollywood or beach times with friends in Santa Monica. It comforted me, even as I fidgeted over the finding of the secret half-pool.

When do you think the motel sale will be official? asked the young man about to lose his family home.

Soon? My mom’s supposed to come down from Lodge Under Ocean to sign stuff. I would, but, you know. I’m kind of filling in, for my parents, at The Wilfair. The official Finley family filler-inner. My life is one big cameo at this point.

I don’t see it like that.

You’re the only one, then, I said, all rue. Gomery. Are you sad about, uh? The Eerie Octopus Room? I couldn’t bring myself to say pool, since it really wasn’t.

No. You should think about it, though. If not reviving it for its original purpose, then at least have someone check the methane.

Donut worry. I will.

Here’s something bothering me: Does the World’s Basement have a secret basement? I should have knocked on some of those tiles. He made a knocking motion.

Well, The Wilfair’s secret basement has a secret basement, so the right question is what’s inside the World’s Basement’s secret basement’s secret basement?

He brightened. I so cannot out-metaphysical Wilshire and Fairfax’s resident metaphysicist. Hmm. I’m seventeen-percent sure our great-grandfathers’ falling-out had to do with the fact that their respective businesses housed these… well, something, other dimensions, or. Unusual places of importance. Which sounds far less intense than ‘other dimensions.’

And why does The Wilfair have a tilt? Is there a World’s Attic, and what would be in it, if it exists? If the big basement holds things passed over and destroyed and everything that never happened. I beckoned him inside the Moonbeam Threshold. And those weird sequins, that aren’t the Lady in Sequin’s official color. Where are they coming from? And Bo. My brother said he and Wil were playing on the roof the other day, and then he acted weird.

Sounds like we need to go on a red wine date and discuss, he smiled, summoning the phrase Monty had used with Clementine Hwang.

No red wine dates once you’re in my employ. And no standing so close inside the Moonbeam Threshold, either. I nudged a step back, though not a big step, as the Moonbeam Threshold was not on the large size. The space’s nookish nature meant that any two people who stood inside it at the same time had to be comfortable with a spatial intimacy rarely seen in our make-everything-bigger world.

Fair? Donut go looking for it. The World’s Attic, or whatever you think might be on The Wilfair’s roof.

Likewise. You with the cosmic basement stairway.

Or call me. I’ll spot you, he offered.

Likewise.

I trust you. Trust me?

I do.

I still feel awful about The Redwoodian ceiling. Gomery pushed up his glasses. The Threshold’s barely there light, a golden illumination, caught his lenses at certain angles and made them glow.

You tried what you tried for a reason. You were worried about your mom and aunt. What about me? My family badgered you about that swimming pool forever. I never made the effort to get to know you. But my dad says mistakes are part of the good-stuff spectrum.

Fatherly wisdom, said Gomery.

Fatherly wisdom about the good-stuff spectrum is definitely on the good-stuff spectrum. Gomery’s own father flickered in my thoughts. Gomery? I know your dad, and Monty’s dad, were not named Montgomery. But, like. Was there ever another Montgomery Overbove?

Just my grandfather and great-grandfather. Both dearly departed. Why?

I heard something. Valencia and Vinessa Rainey-Palomo talked about a Montgomery, but it didn’t sound like they were talking about you or Monty. Though what I hear and how I perceive it are usually, like, nine miles apart and through an alley. I stared at up at the Threshold’s lantern. I’m sure it was you. They like you. Like, a lot.

The Positive Sisters were talking about me? he brightened, then waved a just joshing hand. Honest? My three main questions have been answered, or nearly. Most importantly is whether my mom and aunt are all right. There are people who seem to care about them, so I’m relieved, somewhat. I also wondered what would happen with the motel and you.

What would happen with the motel and me, like would I buy it, or were those two separate questions? The motel? And me?

Two questions, he smiled. It was an answer so direct, and delightful, I could only stare again at the Threshold’s lantern, a metal implement that just hung there. It offered no advice on how I should fold my heart around a statement that felt far larger than a mere compliment.

Do you think it’ll ever be normal on our corner?

What with the hidden cosmic stairway and The Wilfair’s mystery tilt? And those aren’t even the weirdest things.

I can’t wait to hear your candidate for our corner’s weirdest thing.

The weirdest thing is you’ll be the new legal owner of the Motel Fairwil club sandwich recipe and yet you still won’t know what’s in it, he grinned.

A voice floated outside the threshold. Hey, Mark! Where’s Miss Finley? I need her. It was a front-desk employee, likely wanting to summon me to handle a guest problem. Whatever the problem was, it was probably of the early-morning grouchy variety and I was in no state to face it, given the fact I was still in Monty’s clothes, covered in cobwebs, and stomach-swirly.

The stomach swirl told me I had an inoperable case of the hardcore besots. It was a condition brought on by hiding from the world, in a ridiculous wishing threshold, with my longtime neighbor and former foe and future employee and newly instated this person this person this person.

I’m playing hooky, I mouthed.

Hickey? he mouthed.

Exactly. I affected mock seriousness, again feeling as nervous as I had in The Redwoodian’s hallway when Gomery had asked if he could put his hand on the wall behind me. Better go.

Stay awhile. He gently pulled at a cobweb near my cheek. Times like this won’t happen when I work for you, will they?

They won’t. My bellows heart wheezed as if it were aiding an acre-sized blaze.

We slipped back into the Faraway Passageway, though Gomery paused to pat the threshold wall. Just thanking your magic arch for a wish granted.

You don’t believe in that stuff. I pondered what he meant by wish granted. That the hotel and motel were no longer fighting? That we were now friends who this-person’d each other in shadowy basements?

I do believe in thank-yous. And nobody ever acknowledges the wishing well. They only return to ask new favors, which must bum wishing wells out.

Yeah. Guess the relationship between wishers and wishing wells is a one-way street, I pondered. All take, no give.

What’s the wish of the wishing well? To be thanked.

I didn’t love Gomery Overbove right then. But I knew I’d soon be in deep-end, jump-in-the-tar-pits, hang-by-my-fingertips-from-a-diving-board, sticky-ketchup love with him. I’d write his name in mints on the surface of the pool. I’d be so far to one side of the good spectrum it would damn near tilt, hard, like The Wilfair’s roof.

I only hoped all of this would happen after he stopped working for me.

C’mon, timing. Help a lady out.

Is Everything Very Close Together?

Walk you home? Gomery paused by the hotel’s defunct phone booth and tilted his chin in the direction of the elevators.

"Home home? Upstairs? Nope."

The elevators, then?

Hmm. Let me plot. If we crossed the lobby, which brimmed with bed-headed grouchies towing suitcases, we’d be seen by Wilfair staff. Their webby, pool-haired boss, scurrying along with her cobweb-laden neighbor, would attract only slightly less attention than a person standing in full sunlight wearing a suit made of mirrors. At least the staffers would pretend they hadn’t seen us until they rushed to the employee break room, ready to gossip.

He rubbed his face. I need to find a different job. If this isn’t all insane, yet, it definitely has detailed directions to insane’s house.

Then I made what was at least the dozenth poor choice of my week: I touched the tip of my finger to my soon-to-be employee’s nose.

Cute? Definitely. Complicating our fast-approaching boss-employee relationship? Absolutely.

Would I do it again if I had the chance? Unequivocally.

We hurried through The 500 Dip Bar, where the restaurant hostess was seating a sleepy party. Josie’s eyes widened at the sight of two scurry-by cobweb ghosts, each exuding a low mood after a high-spirited night.

Gomery entered the trees between the hotel restaurant and motel diner and I followed, again snagging on the same tree I snagged on a week ago, when the cousins and I had gone through the secret passage the opposite way. Last time, a small branch had ended up in my hair, but this time I noted something else: Something was stopping me at that tree, or at least slowing my pace.

Fair? called a voice from the diner side.

Here. I patted my leafless head, which could have benefited from the addition of a branch. My pooly hair pointed in every direction of the compass, and was in the process of inventing a few new directions, too. Any adornment, even foliage, would be an asset.

Getting snagged again at that same tree occupied my thoughts as we wended our way around the diner’s booths, but something else rather significant stood up, raised its hand, and immediately muscled into that thought’s place.

Sitting on a stool was none other than J67, the woman who had fixed The Redwoodian’s ceiling after Gomery had pulled part of the Stay Awhile cabins through.

She was not wearing a puffy jacket, nor were any other members of her volunteer unit with her. She also didn’t have a plate in front of her or a menu, so she wasn’t in the diner to eat.

Gomery, I called, then remembered I didn’t actually want the Overbove cousins finding the staircase to the World’s Basement, which I suspected was hidden somewhere in the motel’s diner, given its spatial anomalies.

Yes?

Uh. Nothing. We walked into the office, where a piece of paper taped to the motel’s glass door caught our eye. The motelier opened the door, jangling the sleigh bells tied to the handle, and read. Dear Mystery VCR-Leaving Person from World’s Basement. VCR busted. Got another? I want to watch my introductory videotape. Love, Montgomery Y. Overbove.

Hmm. I glanced back at the diner.

Gomery mulled. This might disturb our guests, but seeing as we don’t have any, or the ones we do get are only here to access some secret part of my childhood home that is a complete mystery to me, I’m all right with this note staying up. He shut the door. Fair, your face.

What? I touched my warm cheeks.

Are you hot?

Just. Today, all of life’s atoms are like— I clawed my hands.

Atoms are attacking you?