The Monday after Thanksgiving, Trisha landed past lunchtime, after Susan and Mike left, and didn’t give me a chance to even say hi.
“Have you seen the news?” she cried, and smashed the phone in my face.
I read the headline and frowned, trying to compute the words. Brandon Price is leaving Haunters after season ten. What the flying fuck?
Trisha saw me gawk and pushed me to the east parlor.
“May we?” she asked before pushing me in.
“Of course.”
Trisha made me sit down on the couch under the window and left me there.
“Are you okay, Fran?” asked Ann.
“Yes, yes, I’m just surprised,” I got to say before Trisha came back with both tablets and set them on the coffee table.
“You guys need to hear this,” she said, browsing the whole article on her phone. “Hold tight. I’m gonna read it all.”
&l
A week. That was the longest I was able to fight myself back. My conversation with Amy about Brandon worked like battery acid in my mind, corroding any intention and determination to find a Haunter-free life.It was Sunday afternoon, and the world outside every window was carpeted in the purest white I’d ever seen. It’d been snowing at least for a while almost every day since I’d come back from Pennhurst, and the one and only snowplow in charge of keeping Greenwich Road open was working overtime.After the fire at the guesthouse, Mike had called the best sweepers in all Massachusetts to make sure the Manor chimneys wouldn’t act out too, and now I was able to have heaters with little flames in the kitchen, the east parlor, my room and the study.So Sunday afternoon, white as far as I could see from the couch under the window in the east parlor. I praised the last work of art Charlotte had made on her magnetic board and bid the Blo
Somehow, Trisha managed to get home before Monday sunset. She’d had to leave her car in Boston, take a bus to Worcester, another from there to Hardwick and then walk all the way from town to the Manor. But she made it, and I treated her to a lavish dinner, before sending her upstairs for a relaxing bath and a good night sleep in her warm, comfy bed.I was still excited about Brandon’s call, but I put it aside to hear about her crazy adventures in the snow. By Tuesday morning, when my friend found her way downstairs to let Susan have her way on the second floor, I was already calm and composed, and just dropped a casual comment about it.“Oh, he texted me last night,” she said, struggling to go from the standing-up state to really awake. “Just a line: let’s do it after New Year. You coming back from the party with him?”I frowned, thinking that was actually a good idea. If roads were open, maybe he would accept an invitat
Of course I was in the bathroom when the bell rang at Amy’s. Not any bathroom, but the one at the other end of the apartment. That’s my sixth sense for you. I scampered toward the front door, my heart racing. I stormed into the living room and hardly stopped to make sure it was him. A heartbeat later, I was jumping into his open arms.We didn’t laugh, we didn’t talk, we didn’t kiss. We just stood there, hugging each other as tightly as we could. And it was so weird. Because at that moment in his arms, my cheek against his chest, hearing his heart pound, feeling the light weight of his face against my hair, I felt that ever since I’d tiptoed out of that hotel room, I’d been lacking something vital I hadn’t noticed was missing. But not anymore. Now I was whole again.I don’t know how long we remained like that, a minute or a year. But he eventually kissed my hair and loosened his arms around me, just enough for me to
Boston was but a blurry outline in the morning, wrapped in the storm. Brandon had planned to go shopping with me, but it was plain to see we wouldn’t make it past the hotel gates in that weather. So he ruled we would stay in the suite and rest until lunch, and then we would go to the spa together. Not like I was about to refuse.I stole one of his tees, all of them white or light gray, go figure, to take the breakfast leftovers to the kitchenette. Back to the bedroom, I found him sitting in the middle of the bed, wearing his trunks without my permission, flicking through a notebook. He saw me coming and motioned for me to go back to bed, throwing the notebook into his bag from a few feet away.We spent the rest of the morning just cuddling in bed and talking, mostly about all the things he kept finding out ever since the cleansing.After lunch, we were forced to get dressed and head for the spa, where I found out couple suites were a thing. We bathed with
Back to the hotel, he commented he had a couple of Zoom calls he needed to make, so I left him occupy the living area and decided it was time to revisit the soaking tub, placed right by a big window to the street. I don’t know what got into me, but I felt like giving the place a little atmosphere to make it more relaxing. The spa staff had gifted us with not one but two baskets of products, including many scented candles, so I lit some of them around the tub and turned off the lights. I put my hair up in an improvised bun, stepped into the paradisiac steamy water, and just lay there with my eyes out the window, losing track of timeI’d just drained the tub to refill it with fresh steamy hot water when I heard Brandon say, “Son of a bitch.”I sat up in the tub and found him kicking his shoes off and taking off his shirt at the same time. A moment later, I guided him to sit between my legs and lay back against my chest.“Fuck yeah,&rd
I couldn’t believe my eyes as I stood before the full-length mirror in the bedroom. Brandon had called a stylist to take care of my hair and my makeup for the party. And now that I’d added the outfit we’d picked the day before, it was like seeing another person in the mirror. Hand to heart, I had no idea I could look so pretty. He came to stand behind me and rested his hands on my shoulders, looking up and down my reflection with his warm smile. “Look. That’s my favorite top model ever,” he whispered in my ear. Before I could argue, he produced his phone and circled my waist with his arm, sticking to my side for the classic mirror picture. He turned to me and his eyes slid down to my lips. “Fuck. I should let you at least get to the party with your makeup untouched, right?” “You better,” I replied, dying to kiss him. He raised a finger and hurried to his bag, from where he came back with a longish black velvet case. My frown made him s
Mike had cleaned the driveway all the way to Greenwich Road, so Brandon didn’t have any problem driving past the gates to park only a few steps away from the Manor.Good thing I recalled turning on my speaking app even before climbing down from the truck, because the front door opened by itself a moment later. Brandon hesitated, so I took him by the hand to make him keep walking.“Happy New Year!”“Hey, twins! Happy New Year!” I looked around. “Trisha isn’t home?”“Not yet.”“Come, come.”“In a minute.”Brandon had stopped with one of his suspicious frowns. I let go of his hand and opened the SLS app on my phone. It showed two sticks figures standing on the porch by the open door. Two adults. I showed him the screen.“Bet those are Ann Marie and Edward,” I said. “A formal welcome to the Manor.”
Saying it was a rough patch would be the understatement of the century.Trisha found me two days later in bed, where I’d crawled in after Brandon left, and where I still was when she came back home, doing nothing but crying. I would only get up to go to the bathroom, and on one of those quick trips, I spotted the corner of the fat quilt escaping the closet door. The quilt that had covered Brandon and me the first time we’d slept together, just before setting Kujo free. So I spread it open on the bed and curled up under it to keep crying.Lizzie showed up to check on me a couple of times, until I turned my phone off.Susan didn’t come anywhere near my room, no matter if it was the day to vacuum the master bedroom or change sheets or whatever.When I refused to get up, eat or even speak, Trisha decided it was time to call on the cavalry and texted Amy. She arrived the next day, Thursday. She didn’t ask any questions. She sat on my be