Chapter 20
Happy Friday , she typed. How is everyone?
In car, Linny recovered, Zack good, headed to fun thing, talk later LY
What fun thing? A Friday in June, she supposed there were lots of “fun” possibilities.
Hold on Driving
She took a deep breath, engulfed, for that moment, by the life passages she was missing.
Like getting used to their new house. The sales transaction had been complicated, and after the closing finally went through, she’d only gotten to spend one night there—the night before book tour began.
Henry, sated with new possessions, had toasted Tessa’s six-week tour with too much too expensive champagne.
Tessa had been too nervous to have more than a sip, fearful of even the hint of a hangover, and sleepless with the unfamiliar atmosphere and the anticipation of the unknown.
The next morning, almost at sunrise, she’d kissed a blearily congratulatory Henry goodbye, and wheeled her suitcase toward the new front door, the Uber idling at the end of her new driveway at the curb of their new street.
She’d walked by their possessions, still mostly in taped brown cardboard boxes, labeled room by room and distributed throughout their new home.
Henry and the kids would put things away, she knew, and that would leave her as the newcomer when she finally returned, opening drawers and cabinets to discover where someone had stashed the cooking utensils, stacked the pans, shelved her books.
Henry and the kids would have searched out the nearest grocery, and sampled pizza places, and discovered the best ice cream.
Her family would be happily exploring, sharing, bonding.
Her family would be entering a new life. One without her. And where the only view she had, the only participation, was virtual. A virtual mom.
She adjusted her hotel pillow, thinking about that. She’d quit her job to be with her family and follow her dreams, but turned out, her dreams were taking her away from her family.
Irony, Annabelle said. Very literary.
And now—without her—they were doing a fun thing. Zack would want an arcade, and Linny would want to see the library. She loved the summer reading programs, exactly like Tessa had.
Driving talk later LY
Tessa stared at the phone. “Love you, too,” she said out loud to no one.
“Have fun.” But that was good news, she guessed, they were not sleeping in or watching junk TV, they were already out doing the fun thing.
Henry was not texting and driving. Linny was not throwing up. All was right with the world.
She flinched when the grating buzzer of her alarm went off. It always took her a moment, in that liminal precipice between then and now, to make sure she was on track. Phoenix. Friday, Headed for Denver. She whapped off the alarm. “Hush,” she instructed it. “I’m awake.”
The green schedule folder was open on her nightstand.
She was on book-tour time, with book-tour metabolism, book-tour energy, and book-tour stress.
One missed connection, one delayed flight, and the whole house of cards would topple.
If an event got canceled, the travel people at Waverley would have to regroup and rebook and reschedule and it would be an expensive mess.
Her responsibility was to get where she was supposed to be, on time, and sell books and make friends.
Every time she felt like complaining, she reminded herself she was the luckiest person ever.
A double New York Times bestseller does not complain. Everything was wonderful.
Got that right, Annabelle said. Except for that one pesky thing.
The locket. It was still not in her suitcase, though she had attempted to manifest it to magically return. It wasn’t anywhere in the room. She showered, packed, picked up the phone to call her Uber.
Except. Her heart sank, feeling the unintended consequences of her own actions. She should call the Indianapolis hotel about the locket. See if anyone had asked for it.
At least no one on social media had claimed it. Or recognized the family. That would be a disaster, someone asking for it back, and Tessa forced to say, “oh, sorry, I don’t have it anymore. And I have no idea where it is.” Now her wish was opposite from yesterday.
Now, she hoped no one recognized it.
She checked the nightstand table for anything she herself had left behind, gave one last sweep of the bathroom and the closet. Made sure she was wearing both watches and her wedding ring, checked that both periwinkle earrings dangled from her ears.
“Goodbye, Phoenix,” she told the room, and tucked five dollars under the TV remote for the housekeepers.
Her suitcase wheels rumbled across the lobby floor, and she slipped her room key card into the checkout box. “I’m out of 1205,” she told the desk clerk, waving thanks-and-goodbye as she spun her suitcase in the opposite direction.
“Oh, ma’am? Ms. Calloway?” the clerk called after her.
She turned, frowning. “Yes?”
“Hold on a sec,” he said. “We have a package for you.”
“What?” Her brain crashed, trying to reconcile this. Had Henry been right?
“Is this the one you all couldn’t find yesterday?” As soon as she said it, she knew Henry had been wrong. There was no real package. That was only bait. The locket was gone. Yesterday’s note, still in her pocket, had been a fake, to lure her from the room.
“Yesterday? Huh?” The clerk, dapper in an almost-too-small jacket and leather string tie, had opened a cabinet in the counter behind him. He pulled out a brown paper bag, like the one the hotel restaurant used for her last night’s carryout. “Here you go.”
She stared at it.
“It’s yours, isn’t it?” the clerk said again. “It has your name on it. Calloway. And 1205. Wasn’t your red message light on?”
Had it been? Tessa tried to remember.
Parasocial relationships, Annabelle said.
If it were a gift from a fan—earrings, or a friendship bracelet, or another unpackable ceramic mug—she’d stash it in her tote bag and figure out how to deal with it at the airport. She accepted the bag from the clerk, and pulled apart the handles.
And saw the package inside.