TWO #2
Luckily the guests checking in seemed to have gotten a kick out of my parents, so no angry customers walking out.
The calculator’s fine. The booking sheet has no lion slobber on it whatsoever.
All is good. If we can book a few more family reunions, and by few I mean a few hundred, maybe we’ll be able to keep our heads above water.
“Hello, hottie.” The guy whistling at me as the screen door thumps shut behind him pulls my eyes from the paperwork my parents filled out all wrong. “Tell me, does the carpet match the drapes and either way, I’d like proof. Mmm, do you come with my campsite?”
“I sure do, with a carpet so thick your toes will think they’re walking barefoot through a field of Brillo pads,” I purr, waiting for my words to sink in.
His smile fades into bewilderment, which is good because those teeth are so bright they had me reaching for a pair of sunglasses.
“Procter family reunion?”
“Oh, umm, yeah. Giovanni,” he says with a hint of a suave accent, like he didn’t catch my Brillo pad comment or decided he has a weedwhacker in his trunk that could remedy the situation. “Friends call me JP for short.”
“Short for Giovanni?”
He winks, leaning in closer on the log countertop. “You know it.”
I don’t think he realizes Giovanni starts with a G, not a J, but we’re going to chalk it up to him getting a contact high from my hippie parents. Or who knows, maybe his name’s spelled with a J but either way, we don’t have a reservation for him.
“Sorry, JP, no Giovanni listed. I’ve got a Gary and a Georgie Boo Bear but that’s it for Gs.”
“God dammit, I knew he’d stick it to me.”
All the bravado on display when he walked in has gone out the cloudy window in a, well, purple haze, and now he’s reduced to whining and lightly kicking the check-in counter.
“Stupid cousin, first he fires me for the third time, then he accuses my super hot fiancée of being imaginary and now this. Can we change Georgie Boo Bear to Giovanni please?”
“Sooo, I can, it’s just the special nametags for your reunion have already been printed and unfortunately, Mr. Boo Bear, I won’t be able to get one reprinted in time. Wait, your own cousin fired you three times?”
He scoffs. “Yeah, and that was just this year. Last year was five times. But my stupid Dad didn’t make him hire me back. I mean, hello, the company’s freakin’ named after me.”
“Hey, at least you get to show off your super hot fiancée. Well as long as her super hotness surpasses that of your cousin’s significant other.”
“Oh it will, he’s single as the number one, spends all his time working. The only problem is I don’t exactly have a fiancée.”
Is it too soon to jump ship and side with his cousin?
Sounds like the workaholic was right, our buddy Giovanni Georgie Boo Bear, JP for short, has an imaginary fiancée.
And what in the hell do you have to do to get fired from your own family business eight times in two years?
I can’t help but feel a little bad for the guy but my word, he is something special.
“She’s not imaginary or anything. She was supposed to be here, but she broke up with me last week.”
“Aww, I’m sorry, that’s awful.”
“Tell me about it.”
He’s going to ruin it, isn’t he?
“I swear to god, chicks be crazy. It’s not cheating if I paid for it, that doesn’t even count.”
“Paid for what, exactly?”
“To boink a hookie,” he responds as if it’s the most normal thing in the world. “It’s not like she’s a real girl.”
“Oh geez.” I can’t even stop my palms from covering my face. I’m most definitely on the cousin’s side of this family rivalry. “She’s not a real girl? As in she’s a boy?”
“What? No! JP don’t swing that way, not that there’s anything wrong with that. Nothin’ but poonani for Giovanni. You know what I’m sayin’?” He puts his fist down once he realizes I will not be bumping it.
“So she’s not a real girl because she’s a robot?
This is unbelievable, you’re paying the Terminator to have sex with you after getting fired for the umpteenth time from your own company, while I’m shaping the minds of the future leaders of the world and I can barely keep my head above water.
Fine, yeah, future leaders is a stretch, most of my students will be lucky if they make it to books without pictures but still. ”
“Eww, who the hell would want to read those? So you’re like a sculpting teacher for kids?”
The teeth on this man are easily the brightest part of him. The elevator certainly doesn’t go to the top floor.
“Just a regular teacher for kids, running the family campground for the summer, until we have to sell it off to get out of debt. So shame on you for paying to boink a robot. What kind of example are you setting for the young minds I’m busy sculpting?”
“For the record, Tulip isn’t actually a robot, she’s just a regular whore.”
“I’m gonna have to ask you to leave,” I say, pointing at the door. “Your campsite is 14. Go.”
“Damn, talk about PMS. Hang on, you said you’re gonna have to sell this place? You know, I’ve got a preposition for you.”
I’m guessing he means proposition, and why do I feel a slap of epic proportions bubbling just beneath the surface? Come on, out with it, my hand is tingling already.
“I need a future wifey, you need a little moolah, I think we might be able to help each other out.”