Chapter 26 Hollow
Renata
My night gets off to a bad start. I’ve received a long list of complaints from hotel guests about the influencer event in the water park, and a report outlining the damages to our largest water slide.
My contractor is saying they’re going to have to shut down the water park for at least a few days in order to make sure it’s still safe.
It’s the busiest season for families at the water park, and the timing couldn’t be worse. Fuming at my younger sister, I read through the reports, trying to figure out how to minimize the damage.
My phone rings. I click the speakerphone button.
“Hi Ren!” says a chipper voice.
“Amrita?” I reply. “You know how to use a phone?”
“I’ll have you know that I once spent a magical evening with Alexander Graham Bell,” the vampire-witch says haughtily.
I raise an eyebrow. “You never fucked Alexander Graham Bell.”
“Ok, fine, you’re right,” she sighs. “But I could have, if I had wanted to! Everyone knows he got around.”
“What do you want, Rita? I’m very busy.”
“I have some ideas about the conference next week,” she says. “I know that we’ve already decided on the room assignments, but I think I actually want to do something completely different…”
I groan. “Rita, we’ve been over this! No more last-minute changes.”
“Yes, but picture this,” she says, dramatically. “Enchanted portals.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, and I really don’t want to know…”
“If we have time-altering portals, then everyone can attend all of the sessions that they want to! They don’t have to worry if they want to attend two sessions that are scheduled at the same time. They can just…”
“That sounds very complicated, and difficult to organize. Do you even know any witches who can pull that off?”
“Yes, but he lives in Iceland, and we have to pay him in magic beans.”
I rub my temples in frustration. “Ok, I’m hanging up now, Rita!”
The door opens a crack, and Lily pops her head in. I breathe a sigh of relief.
“Finally, someone here to make my life easier,” I say. “You won’t believe what Rita just called about…”
Lily closes the door behind her softly, and flips on the light switch. “Um, I…I have to talk to you.”
Immediately, I’m concerned. All other thoughts leave my mind. “Lily, what’s wrong?”
She’s fidgeting a little, and not meeting my eye.
“Why don’t you sit down?” I suggest.
But she shakes her head. “No, I just need to say it. I…I don’t know if I can work here anymore.”
My vision narrows. I can’t wrap my head around what she’s just said. “What?”
“It’s just…everything with you has happened so quickly. And…and I don’t know…” she inhales anxiously. “I don’t think I can keep working here.”
“Lily…” My mind races. Where is this coming from? “Has something happened? Did I make you feel…”
“No, it’s not that,” she raises a hand. But she still won’t look me in the eye. “You’re wonderful. But this is all just too much for me. And we can’t keep going on this way. Eventually, someone’s going to find out about us…”
There’s a painful ache in my chest, like my heart is wrapped in a tight vise.
I can’t say that I haven’t had the same fear.
Mel’s words spin around in my head, about the potential scandal if someone were to discover our relationship.
I want to tell her that it’s all right, that that won’t happen, but I know that’s not true. We both know the risks.
She continues. “And…and I think it’s just complicated, for Eli. It’s not good for him to be living here. He needs a more…a more stable environment…”
Her voice breaks. I stand and move toward her, but she steps back.
“No,” she says. “No, I can’t do this anymore, Renata.”
“Lily…” I whisper.
“I can work two more weeks,” she says, quickly. “But consider this my resignation…”
I can’t bear to see her like this. The pain in her eyes. She’s clearly thought a lot about this. It breaks my heart, to know that this is how she feels about us.
I should have seen this coming. Lily is a living human, with a family, and a life ahead of her. What do I have to offer? Some secret dinners, hidden away at the back of a restaurant? Hurried sex in my office, in the rooms of the hotel…
She deserves better than that. Better than what I can offer her. She’s right, eventually someone will find out about our secret affair, and it will all come crashing down.
And I told her. I told her that if she wanted to end it she could. That she should just tell me and we would stop, no questions asked.
I have to keep my word.
My throat is dry. The painful ache is replaced by an hollow emptiness as the walls come up again.
“You don’t need to work two more weeks,” I tell her, my voice flat. “You can leave right now.”
“W-what…?” she stutters. “But what about the conference next week?”
“That’s not for you to worry about anymore.
” I walk around my desk, to my office door.
I hold it open for her. If she remains in my office for one more moment, I don’t know what I’ll do.
“You can stay in the residential suite as long as you need to, but you should give your master key back to the receptionist when you go.”
Now she looks up at me. She’s trembling.
Every atom in my body longs to reach out to her.
But it’s not appropriate. She’s my assistant.
I should have remembered that. I should never have let myself get attached the way I did.
How could I have made such a mistake? How could I have put her at risk like this?
I should have been stronger.
“Renata…” she whispers.
“Go,” I say, louder and more firm that I meant it to be. But it does the job. Lily jumps, and scampers out of my office.
I shut the door.
My office is completely soundproof, for moments just like this. I reach down and put my hands under my desk, then I throw it across the room. It crashes into my couch, papers, phone, and laptop scattering everywhere.
I pace restlessly throughout the room, cursing myself. I should have listened to Mel when I first went into her office. I should never have allowed things to become this way with Lily. I scared her off. And my behaviour was completely inappropriate. No…beyond inappropriate…
I flick the lights back off, and stand in the dark, looking out over the moonlit lake…Silverlake…
I thought she was my Lily…
But I was wrong.
I was so, so wrong.