Chapter Three
Sam
There are times in your life when you know the choices you make will change your trajectory forever. Pick a college. Choose a career. Swipe right.
But what these choices can’t predict, what you’ll never foresee, are all the little moments that occur because of them.
Learning you’re allergic to hamsters because your roommate insists on keeping one.
Almost getting frostbite sleeping out for concert tickets because you’re twenty-one and an idiot.
Or finding yourself three thousand miles from home, trying to get more than one bar of signal, because at thirteen you read a certain book and never looked back.
“Hold on,” I say as Amy’s voice drops in and out. It’s just past ten a.m. in New York and she’s already tried to call me twice. “I can’t hear you.”
I give up on the closed storefront I’ve been trying to peer into and jog across the road to a pub, stopping beneath a sign that reads Guinness is good for you.
“What did you say?” I ask as her voice crackles in my ear.
“I said, do you remember in my job interview when I told you it was my dream to become an editor?”
“I do.”
“Well, I take it back,” she says abruptly. “I don’t want to be an editor. I want to work in production with the cool kids.”
I swat a fly from my face and lean back against the wall. I dressed for mixed weather as the guidebook said, but the sun is beating down today, and I’m already sweating from the heat of it.
“Has the sheen finally worn off? What’s it been—two days without me?”
“I’m not built to work with authors.”
“You asked to work on Paul’s book.”
“I reached too high, Sam. I don’t know what to tell you. I am Icarus and Paul is the sun and my wings are my ambition, melting into nothing. It’s a real bonus trait of mine that I can admit when I’m wrong. So here I am, admitting that I’m not ready to step up. I would like a demotion, please.”
“Just email the—”
“I did!” she exclaims, and I crack a smile.
Amy’s good at her job. She’s just very theatrical about it.
“I emailed him with my friendliest of tones, and when he didn’t reply I emailed his agent, and his agent replied and said he’d get on it, but he did not, Sam.
He did not get on it. That man is now a month late sending in the draft, and I’m this close to losing it. ”
“Be nice,” I warn her. “We have to stay on their good side.”
“Do we? Or can we send them both into the jungle?”
“Email again and cc me,” I tell her. “That’s all we can do. If they complain down the line when we have to change the publication schedule, then we’ll have the receipts.”
“I’m not paid enough for this. I want to work on estate stuff like you.”
“Oh yeah, I’m having a whale of a time.”
My cover story for the rest of the office is Casey’s idea.
Apparently I’m here to rustle up some bonus material we can use in future editions.
He didn’t exactly give me a choice in the matter, but it still makes me uneasy to lie to my team.
Especially when Laura looked suspicious as hell when she heard the news.
“At least you get to travel,” Amy continues now, just short of grumbling.
“It’s not exactly Paris.” I glance around for some sign of life, wondering what I’m supposed to do.
I booked what looked like the only inn around the village, but I’m starting to think I got scammed.
The street I’m on is completely deserted.
I only know I’m in the right place because of the sign I passed saying Carrigwest, but otherwise it’s as if I’ve stumbled onto an abandoned movie set.
Casey warned me I’d be isolated out here, but, beyond a few houses and one tiny convenience store with a faded Closed for Lunch sign, this truly is the middle of nowhere.
“What if I show up at his house?”
“Huh?” I turn around, distracted, as I hear the faint sound of an engine.
“What if I just show up at Paul’s house like, Hey, where’s that book we paid you six figures for?” She sounds worryingly serious. “I’d be polite about it.”
“I’m sure,” I say as a beat-up Ford comes rumbling around the corner. “But also, no. Don’t do that.”
“But—”
“Look, I’ve got to go. Signal’s pretty bad out here. We’ll probably get cut off.”
“Don’t you da—”
I hang up as the car wheezes to a stop beside me and a man steps out. He looks to be in his late fifties, thin and balding with an easy smile on his face.
“You’re the lad taking the room, then?” His accent is so thick it takes me a moment to parse through it.
“That’s me. Sam Avery.”
“Ronan Delaney.” His hands go to his hips as he looks me up and down. “There’s no smoking, now. Or drugs.”
“No problem.”
“Or pets.”
“It’s just me.”
“Or cheese.”
“I…excuse me?”
“We had an incident a few years ago.”
Right. “No cheese. Got it.”
“Great! Well, let’s get you settled.” He takes my case and gestures at the building beside us.
“You’re above the pub here. Don’t worry,” he adds, catching my expression.
“It’s not a rowdy crowd. But you should pop in later.
Meet the locals. New York, is it? I had a brother working in construction there back in the day.
Might have outstayed the old visa but he’s a good lad.
He’s in Brisbane now with the wife. Have you ever been to Brisbane? ”
“No. I—”
“Never been myself. A bit too far, but he likes it well enough. They have sharks in the water there, apparently. You ever seen a shark?”
I shake my head as Ronan leads me around the side of the building where right beside the dumpsters is a flimsy-looking door that I hope we’re going to walk past, but no.
“It’s nothing special,” he warns as he opens it. “But we haven’t had any complaints.”
That I find hard to believe. It’s not that I was expecting the Ritz, but…
Huh.
Behind another door at the top of a narrow staircase is a small room that is as bare as bare can be.
A single bed made up with a thin floral sheet, a dresser with a mirror, and…
that’s it. Besides the curtains hanging limply on either side of the window.
And, I guess, the faded picture of John F.
Kennedy next to one of the Popes with a random dog.
The walls are white. The furniture is pine.
It smells overwhelmingly of chemical air freshener.
“Here,” Ronan says, passing me a small scrap of paper. “For the Wi-Fi. Do you want a chair?”
I hesitate. There’s no desk or anything that needs a chair, so…“That’s okay.”
“Are you sure? I can bring one up from downstairs.”
“Positive. Thank you.”
He spends another minute showing me around. How to open the window (with effort). How to lock the door (also with effort). I’m told that parking outside is free and that the shower in the minuscule en suite is new and instant, and then he hands me the keys, shakes my hand, and off he goes.
It doesn’t take long to unpack. I dump my clothes in the dresser, set my laptop on top, and shove my suitcase under the bed.
The bed that I then check for bugs, Googling for the telltale signs.
I find nothing: The room is bad, but clean.
And, with nowhere else to stay in this town, I take some pictures because no one back home will believe me, and call my sister because I promised her I would.
She picks up after only a few seconds and switches to a video call, where I get a close-up shot of her nostrils.
“Hi. Hold on.”
“Who’s that?” one of my nephews screeches.
“Santa Claus,” Lizzie says. “He wants to discuss the bad word you said yesterday.”
“Billy told me to—”
The door clicks shut behind her, cutting off his outrage.
“Hey,” she says to me. “Guess who figured out the child locks on the kitchen cabinets?”
“Oh no.”
“Oh yes. So that’s been fun.”
She finally brings the phone to her face, and I blink at the sight that greets me. “What are you wearing?”
“It’s a face mask. My skin needs moisture.”
“Then drink some water.”
“Never. Are you there? Are you alive?”
“I’m here and alive. My knee hurts, though.”
“Because you’re old. And cheap. I thought work trips were supposed to shell out for business class.”
“I work in the arts,” I say, rotating to show her the room. “This is about as fancy as they can manage.”
“As if you care,” she says with a snort. “They’d put you in a tent and you’d still fall to your knees thanking them. You’re editing Frank Sheridan’s book.”
“That’s not what I sound like.”
“That’s exactly what you sound like. Don’t act as if this isn’t the greatest thing that will ever happen to you.”
“I feel like you could have phrased that differently.” I sit on the bed, wincing as the springs dig into me. “How are you?”
“I bought yoga pants online, and they accidentally delivered two pairs. It’s literally made my week. What’s Ireland like? Green?”
“Not really,” I say, glancing outside. “Kind of brown. They’re going through a heat wave.”
“I’m still jealous. Invite me over.”
“I’m working.”
“With the mysterious author,” she taunts.
“She’s not mysterious.”
“She’s very mysterious. I looked her up and couldn’t find anything. It’s like she disappeared off the face of the planet. Have you met her yet?”
“No.”
“Are you going to?”
The questions come at me rapidly, but I’m used to it. Lizzie loves raising her boys full-time, but I know she gets desperate for adult conversation.
“Are you going to meet her now?” she continues as I hear the faint yells of a tantrum in the background.
“Maybe,” I say, checking the time. Past three p.m. “She hasn’t responded to my email, but Casey said he sent over the introductions.”
“She hasn’t responded because she’s mysterious.” Something crashes at her end, and I fight a yawn as she yells at one of my nephews. “Just remember, you need to eventually befriend her so I can befriend her, and then I can know a famous person. So be cool, okay? Don’t be you.”
I let the phone fall to the side as I lie back on the bed with a thump. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I think you know,” she says as I rub my eyes. And then, “Is that a picture of the Pope with a dog?”