Take Me Home | ✔

Chapter Three

dedicated to kpgcatlover for being a lovely commenter :-)

and to Patrick Scott Ritter: if you're reading this, stop right now. Thank you. 

[ three ] - "i'm trying to find a guy"

              ↠  friday - precisely a week before graduation    

            "Excuse me?" I tried impatiently. I blink at the teenage girl in front of me; she looked no more than two years older than I was. And currently, she was filing her nails while clutching the phone between her cheek and shoulder, chewing pink bubble gum and rolling her heavily eyelined eyes. 

         I tapped my foot against the ground as I stood in front of the reception desk. The girl behind the desk didn't even notice I was there. She just kept on babbling away while popping her gum loudly. 

          "I know!" she started to squeal into the phone. "He totally ditched me last night! And he never called me back! I gave him everything, and what did he give me? Nothing. Exactly." 

               I find my hand gravitating over the metal bell on the granite counter, trying again. "Excuse me? I'm trying to look for--" 

         "Hold on sweetie," she said without even looking at me,  before turning back to her conversation. "I'll call you back, Donna." Hanging up, she placed the phone back into the receiver, continuing to file her perfectly manicured nails. I wondered what a high-maintenance girl like her would ever want to work in a three-star hotel at the age of twenty. 

          "Can I help you?" she bats her heavy eyelashes at me, almost bored. 

          "Yeah, I'm trying to find a guy," I start. 

          "Aren't we all?" she scoffed in my face, still chewing her gum, the inside of her mouth covered in pink wads. She was chewing so hard, I could almost feel her spit jumping out at me. I recoiled in disgust. 

         "That isn't what I meant. What I meant was I'm trying to find a guy who's in this hotel," I nodded, but she gave me a blank stare. Thinking quickly, I added fast, "He's my brother, and he's here before going off to university in Cali. And I need his room number." 

          The girl chewed her gum noisily, getting on my nerves with each passing second. With another blank look, she shrugged her thin shoulders. "Okay," she responded. "What's his name?" 

           I freeze instantly. I never did get his name from last night. My eyes widen as I wring my hands nervously. 

             "Uh. . . uh. . . " my eyes flicker quickly all over the lobby, as if looking all around the empty room would give me the guy's name. How could I have been so stupid to think I would find a guy without getting his damn name? 

           The girl blinked at me, chewing her gum slowly in a skeptical way. "Is he even your brother?" she drawled, like she was reading my thoughts at this second. 

            I sighed heavily. "No." 

             "I thought so," she nodded. My hopes of ever getting back to California were squashed to a flatten paste. But as I was about to turn away, she said, "Well, don't you have a floor number or something?" 

        I blink as the realization comes to me. He was on the same floor as me, or we would never have had to ride the elevator together. "Yes!" I almost scream. "Floor nine."