Chapter 22 #2
Knox awoke to the knock on the hotel door and the sound of his phone ringing at the same time. He hurriedly put on the white hotel robe, grabbed his wallet, and padded across the floor.
“DoorDash delivery,” the young man said. “You paid with a card when you ordered. Have a nice evening.”
Knox handed him a generous tip. “You, too, and thank you.”
He set the bags on the small bistro table for two and picked up his phone to find a voice message telling him that the delivery person was in the elevator.
Lottie pulled the sheet up under her arms when she sat up. “Where did you get that robe?”
Knox opened a closet door and took the extra one over to her. She threw her legs over the side of the bed, stood up, and he helped her put it on. “Have you used up all your energy? Do I need to feed you supper, or can you do it yourself?”
She giggled as she knotted the tie. “I’ve just barely got enough to get the sandwich from the table to my mouth. How about you? Do I need to feed you?”
“I think I can manage,” Knox said with a fake sigh. “If you’ll get a couple of bottles of water or sweet tea from that little fridge, I will get our food out and ready to eat.”
“If I faint dead away on the way across the room, you will give me mouth-to-mouth, right?”
“With pleasure.” He chuckled.
He could not even begin to imagine an argument so intense that he and Lottie couldn’t work it out, and he didn’t want to think about a time when she wouldn’t be in his life. He loved every minute he had spent with her, including the days when they were just pretending.
She carried two bottles over to the small table and then took her place across from Knox. “I hope this tastes as good as it smells.”
Knox bit into his sandwich and nodded. “Twice as good.”
“I’m not looking forward to summer,” she blurted out.
“That’s an abrupt change of subject, but neither am I,” Knox said.
“I didn’t mean to say that out loud.”
“It’s what’s on both our minds, but we’ll have to make the best of what time we have together and look forward to September.”
Those words stuck in Knox’s mind that night as he went to sleep. How did he make every minute count when so much dread was tucked away in his heart?
The next morning, Lottie took a dozen pictures of the wall decorations about the character, Dave Robicheaux, who appeared in James Lee Burke’s novels.
Then she took even more at the Bayou Teche that ran through a lovely little park.
She and Knox sat at a picnic table and fed the birds, and she even snapped a photo of a rare solid-black squirrel.
“This is a wonderful vacation,” she said as she scrolled back through all the photographs on her phone. “I’m already dreading going back to the construction site. How about you?”
He picked up her hand and kissed the knuckles. “You aren’t wired for that much adventure. You’d get bored after two days, but any weekend that you want to get away, I’ll call Lester. We can fly anywhere you want.”
“Are you saying you’d be bored with me after two days?” she snapped.
“Hey, don’t twist my words.” Knox could hear the edge to his words in his own voice.
She dumped the rest of the corn they had bought to feed the animals on the ground. “I’m ready to go back to the hotel for a nap.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said through clenched teeth.
How in the hell had things gone from hot romance to a cold shoulder in a split second?
he wondered as he followed her back to the rental car.
Was it because he mentioned the word bored?
By the time he came to the end of the short path, she was already in the vehicle, had fastened her seat belt, and had her head turned to look out the passenger window.
“I did not say you are boring,” Knox said as he started the engine.
She didn’t even answer him but continued to stare out the side window all the way to the hotel, where she jumped out of the car the minute that he had parked, beat him inside, and didn’t even wait at the elevator for him. When he reached their room, the bathroom door was closed and locked.
Who would have ever thought our first big argument would be over a single word?
He got a bottle of water from the minibar and took it out to the balcony.
What was so wrong with bored anyway? And it came about so fast. Was this the first stage of failure for them, or just flat out THE END—all in caps and bold print?
He heard the bathroom door open, but he sat still. In his eyes, he had done nothing wrong, so he didn’t owe her an apology. If she wanted to explain her actions, she could very well start at any time, and he would listen.
The door out into the hallway opened and closed, and he still didn’t jump up and run after her. Half an hour later, he got a text from her: I’m going home. An Uber is taking me to the airport in Lafayette, and I’m flying to Dallas. Uncle Jack is picking me up. Don’t worry.
He sent one back: Can we talk tomorrow?
He waited an hour, but nothing came back. Finally, he called Tripp.
“What’s going on? Aren’t you in Louisiana with Lottie? Why are you calling me?” Tripp said without even a simple hello.
“I did something wrong, and I can’t figure it out,” Knox replied and told him the whole story of what went on in the park.
“I would guess that she’s sensitive to that word, but why she wouldn’t even talk to you about it seems out of character for her.
My advice is for you to go home tonight.
I’m not leaving until tomorrow, and Lester is still here.
I can have him fly down there and have you home before dark.
You need to get this straightened out for your own peace of mind.
If it’s over, then pack up your trailer and come back to Spanish Fort.
You’ve finished your part of the framing job, right? ”
“Yes, I have,” Knox answered. “I’ll get my things together. Text me the time when you talk to Lester. He’ll have to file flight plans and all that.”
At seven o’clock that evening, the small plane landed at the airport, and Lester met Knox at the rental car. “Things didn’t go so well, I guess?”
“No, and I have no idea what I did wrong,” Knox told him. “I thought things were going in that forever amen direction and then boom! She was mad at me and left to fly back on a commercial flight.”
“Well, son,” Lester laid his hand on Knox’s shoulder, “when we are dealing with the womenfolks, it’s not easy to figure out where or why we stepped in a big old mess, but you crawl up here in the copilot seat, and we’ll see what we can figure out.
I might have some advice to give you, and I might not.
I’m still doin’ my best to figure out my wife, and I been married to her forty years. ”
“I’ll take any help you’ve got to give me,” Knox said.