16. Jess
Jess
This is uncomfortable. We've eaten the pizza and shunted the trash in the corner of the tent.
It's spacious enough, one central area and no separating walls.
So, each of our sleeping bags is spaced out along the ground.
Hunt had also grabbed camping pillows at the store.
They're the thinnest things I've ever used. My head may as well be on the ground.
I'll be so sore in the morning. Cole and Luca will be goddamn mummies at their age. They're in great shape, but damn.
"This is great inspo for our hotel," Hunt says. I roll my eyes. That man can find diamonds in a sack of shit.
"Yeah? You gonna do the drapery in shitty green nylon?" I ask.
He huffs. "No, smartass. Listen." He shuts up, and I have no choice but to listen.
It's so quiet out here. I grew up in Detroit.
It's concrete and buildings and cars. So many cars.
But here it's wind and crickets. The soft hum of the bees on the other side of the meadow.
Grass and flowers brush against each other.
The gentle lapping of waves in the distance.
It's so foreign to me that I'm afraid I won't be able to sleep.
Finally, Hunt says, "I think, with this hotel, we need to do something softer. Something with less flash and more clean comfort." He always goes with his gut on stuff.
"Something more boutique?" Luca asks. As the lead architect, his designs must match Hunt's interior vision and vice versa.
"I was thinking the same thing." Cole's gruff voice cuts through the tent.
We all lay, staring at the top of the tent, thinking about it.
This project is coming more naturally than any before it.
There's always some tension in a project, but now this one is falling together better than any in a long time.
For a moment, I imagine a life where we finish this hotel in Cole's hometown.
Instead of moving on to the next project, we allow the other hotels to continue running with our seasoned staff and personally take over this one.
We work and build this area up to be what Cole thinks it should be, and at night, we return to this beautiful farmhouse, and our beekeeping omega.
It plants a seed of warmth deep in my belly.
It's the kind of life I never thought I'd have.
Maybe this hope is a hurtful thing. Sunny certainly doesn't seem to want us.
But I can't bring myself to douse the flame that's building in my core every time I think of her.
I begin to drift away to the sounds of three grown men snoring.
As sleep begins to settle over me I feel Hunt shift beside me. The back of his hand brushes over mine and I freeze. His breathing evens out again but his skin is still touching mind and its all I can focus on as I drift to sleep myself.
When I wake up the next morning, it's to shouts of alarm.