He lifted her arm and showed her his intentions. She nodded her approval. With the pen he signed his name, pressing enough to ink, but not enough to hurt her. Then he drew a heart.
“For our first time.”
“Of hopefully hundreds,” Fallen added. Each blink was a test of endurance, trying to keep him in her field of vision. “What was chasing you? Before?”
His voice was slurred, but he answered. “Lad. He had a gun. He didn’t see me, but I saw him. All that mattered was finding you.”
And with that, she felt the rush of leaving him. She woke up with his words echoing through her mind. She fully expected to see Lad in 514 with her. When she realized she was alone, she was relieved. And then tremendously sad.
She gathered her dress and crawled off the bed, her heart still slowing down from sex with Thomas.
She stopped and covered her mouth as it broke into a wide smile.
Him.
She’d had him.
Fallen moved the antique table out of the way of the door, remembering to straighten the comforter before she left.
Her walk home was freezing. It was getting much colder, and she wasn’t dressed for it. She wasn’t dressed for anything, except the perfect thing she’d just experienced. She let herself into her house and ran to her room. In her head she knew Thomas wouldn’t be there, but her heart was a spiritual thing, hoping anyway.
She opened her door, holding her breath. The room was exactly as she’d left it. Her heart crashed, like the stupid, wishful thing it was. Fallen tossed her jacket on her desk chair. She walked in and sat. The things that had been missing in the dream were present now. She ran her hand over her bed. Calling their experience a dream seemed to diminish it somehow. It was as real as this moment. Thomas’ comment about being battle-weary weighed on her mind. Did he mean that literally? As she glanced in her dresser’s mirror, something caught her attention; she stood slowly and walked toward her reflection, holding out her arm. It was backwards, his name in the mirror, so she looked down.
And there it was. Thomas’ name and a heart. On her arm in real ink. Tears clouded her eyes.
He was real. He was real.
He was real.
Chapter 12
Inked
When Fallen woke up Friday morning, she looked at her arm for the longest time, ignoring her alarm. This was something that couldn’t be explained away. She’d watched him do it in the dream, and now it was here. And it was on her right arm. She could never write neatly with her left hand.
It had been Thomas. That gave her peace. As crazy as it all felt, the man she was head over heels for was a person. That mattered.
When she finally got ready for work, she let herself think about the scarier part of the dream’s revelation—that Thomas had been running from Lad. Could he be even more a danger to her than she’d realized? Was he stalking her in the dreams as well?
Luckily, her work uniform covered the doodle from Thomas, because she was not planning on scrubbing it off anytime soon. And knowing Mr. Orbit, if he saw it, he would make her remove it.
On her walk to work—moving a little more quickly than usual—she had a thought. She wanted to make his signature permanent. Because her newest fear was losing it. It validated her feelings and reminded her of his adoration. She toyed with the idea while she walked, finally finding a purpose for the tattoo parlor she passed by every day.
When she slid into her place at the meeting, she was happy to see that Desta was back. The woman didn’t look sick…well, aside from her ever-present cough. Melanny seemed far more relaxed this morning, and Fallen figured out why when she announced that the crew could stop doing their extra lobby chores because Mr. Orbit had gone. Fallen was grateful to be standing against a wall so she didn’t actually swoon from the relief.
Even the housekeepers from 8 and 9 couldn’t get her spirits down with their snide comments about Fallen not being protected by her sugar daddy any more. Fallen waited for Desta after she got her cart. The older woman made her way back to the door, assuring other employees she was fine.
They pushed their carts together toward the elevator and were left by themselves as everyone else got in the elevator first.
“Are you feeling better?” Fallen asked quietly after the birdcage had rattled away.
“Better my ass. That man made me take the leave.” Desta shook her head and pouted.
“Mr. Orbit?” Fallen was surprised. He’d seemed to talk to Desta nicely. Maybe she’d gotten the wrong impression.
“Yes. Mr. I-am-so-important Orbit.”
Fallen held open the elevator door as Desta loaded in her cart.
“Can you stop by later and talk about room 514 with me?” Fallen watched the woman’s face carefully.
Desta’s left eye twitched before she answered. “Yeah. I’ll stop by.” She pushed her cart out into the hallway.
With that, Fallen reset the elevator to take her one floor up to level five. Today she would find out what was going on in that hotel room. She hoped that would help everything make sense. As she pushed her cart down the hall to start at room 501, she noticed activity in front of 514. The maintenance guys were involved, talking back and forth loudly with the room door open.
She entered the first room and began cleaning, now wondering all over again what the hell was going on.
···
The workers bustled back and forth in room 514 for a good two hours. Fallen toyed with the idea of popping into see what they were doing, but she had a feeling that’s what Mr. Orbit wanted her to do, so she stayed away and remained wildly curious instead.
Desta came down, smelling of smoke, when Fallen was beginning in room 507. The maintenance men had just packed up to leave, one of them stopping to apologize about the mess they’d left in 514. She’d told him it was no problem, but now she worried that somehow they’d taken the magic connection out of the room.
Desta unpropped the door and let it close behind them. Fallen was startled, but smiled when she saw that Desta had grabbed a sheet from where she’d set it on the desk.
“Why don’t we start with you telling me what you want to know about 514?” Desta snapped open the linen with a practiced wrist before lifting the sheet high and watching the corners land perfectly.
Fallen pointed. “Show off.”
Desta laughed and then coughed.
“Well, first, it’s been empty the whole time I’ve worked here. No one stays there, even when we’re crowded. Orbit told me it’s a memorial to his parents. And just now the maintenance guys were in there doing something, and I have no idea what.” Fallen tucked in her side of the bed.
Desta stood and put her hands on her hips. “Well, that’s interesting. Very interesting.”
Fallen waited.
Desta sat in the desk chair and leveled a hard stare at Fallen. “Not too long ago there was a girl who cleaned this floor for three years. But since then we’ve had lots of turnover. I’m not sure if you’re a quickie or a long termer. I think the jury’s still out. But 514 always plays a part in that.”
“Did the other housekeepers experience things in that room?” Now Fallen felt a little scared. Why were they in and out so much? Was Thomas the man they all saw in their dreams? Jealousy raged through her.
Desta took a while to answer, like there was a battle inside of her. After a resigned sigh, instead of answering the question, she asked one.
“Do you love him?”
“What? Who?” Fallen played dumb.
“The man you meet when you dream.” Desta was quiet; just her raspy breathing animated the room.
“You know about the dreams?” Fallen grasped the mattress so she would stay upright.
“Intimately.” Desta lifted a brow.
“Really?”
“You have to keep this between us. I’m never supposed to talk about it, but there’s a spark in you, lady. I feel like you can handle the truth of it all. Well, the truth of what I know.” Desta reached over and s
tarted to wipe at dust on the TV stand with her hand.
“I’m ready. I don’t think you can shock me.” Fallen touched the spot on her arm that had been inked by Thomas.
“I started working here at 45. I’m 70 now, so that was 25 years ago. Has it been that long? I guess it has. Time moves quick; you gotta pay attention to it.”
Fallen tucked her legs up underneath her.
“At first, like you, I cleaned the fifth floor, including room 514, which was always empty. One day I fell asleep on the job, and I had a dream of my Burt. After that, once a week I got to be with this amazing guy—the man who was made for me. And it wasn’t enough, but we made it work. I started smoking because I wanted to have the smell around to remind me of him. He loved his cigarettes. That would sound crazy to anyone else, but not to you, does it?” Desta paused.
Fallen shook her head. It didn’t sound crazy at all.
“Thought not. It wasn’t too long into our relationship—maybe six months?—that Mr. Orbit’s dad sat me down one day. He was the owner back then. See, the family has owned this hotel, and quite a few others, for a real long time.” Desta seemed to look for approval to continue.
Fallen waited, afraid to breathe.
“Well, I was surprised to find out he knew I took naps in 514. When he asked me about it that day, I confessed. But instead of being angry, he encouraged me to continue. Which was odd. I took him at his word, though, and kept up my routine. I loved Burt too much to stop anyway. I wanted to see him, and I couldn’t make it work anywhere else.”
Fallen was completely absorbed by what Desta had to say—almost like one of the dreams. She wished the current Mr. Orbit was a little more like his father and had just encouraged her to continue her naps without the charity balls or bed making.
“How much time did you get?” Fallen asked.
Desta’s sad smile gave her a sinking feeling.
“Fourteen years. For 14 years I had my Burt once a week. And then one day I went, and he wasn’t there. I was desperate. We were never able to tell each other much about our real lives. So in the end, he was just gone. I don’t know if he died or something changed or…” She shook her head. “For another year or so I dreamed and tried to find him, returning to all the places we’d been together. We had a little house over there, all decorated. In our time we lived a whole ‘nother life.”
Desta looked misty for a moment. “When the things he’d imagined started to fade, I didn’t have the heart to keep going. It was too painful.”
“I’m sure.” Fallen recalled the moments she’d been in the dream without Thomas. She couldn’t imagine the abrupt end of a 14-year relationship.
“Since then, there have been lots of girls working this floor, and some have napped in the room, though not all of them. And they each stayed on for varying amounts of time. Some last a week, some last a few months, and occasionally someone lasts longer. I have a ton of theories, but nothing solid. The girls are always secretive. Several have just stopped coming to work, so I don’t really know what happened. Did they figure out something I couldn’t and learn how to stay there full time? I don’t know if I’ll ever know.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.” Fallen meant the sentiment from the deepest part of her.
“Things changed when Lad took over.” Desta shook her head. “Instead of just respecting the room and letting it live, he wants to claim it. He wants the true love for himself, so he’s been interfering, as near as I can tell. And it’s affecting him.”
“How do you mean?” Fallen felt like her head might explode with questions.
“Well, he’s tried napping in there himself, but it doesn’t seem to work. Instead he’s become obsessed with the women who work on this floor, especially the ones who dream.” Desta leaned forward. “He was married to one of them, but then she divorced him.” Desta waited to see Fallen’s reaction.
“He seems a little obsessed about me.” Fallen twisted her fingers together.
Desta nodded. “Is the man you dream of your true love?” she asked.
Fallen thought about it. She thought about how much she longed to see Thomas’ face. How crazy she felt, needing his arms around her. Was that feeling manufactured somehow in the hotel? It was impossible to know. She just spoke the truth she felt.
“If true love hurts more than this does, I don’t want any part of it.” She touched Thomas’ name again.
“That sounds about right. How can something that makes you so miserable make you so desperate to have more of it?” Desta started coughing again. After a moment, she stood. “I have to get back to my rooms. I have a ton of suspicions, but now you know all my facts.”
“Desta?” Fallen stood too.
“Yeah?”
“I feel crazy. Is it really happening? Is he in this world? Can I find him?” She crossed her hands over her heart like she could protect it.
“It’s real. And as far as the rest of that goes, you need to ask Lad’s ex-wife. Just a rumor, but I think she’s neck deep in her happily ever after.”
Desta closed the door behind her, and Fallen sat back down, trying to absorb the avalanche of information.
···
When Fallen had entered room 514 to clean at the end of her day, the only change she could identify was an added security camera. She was troubled by the new technology and mentioned it to Desta on the way out to her car.
“Don’t worry, muffin. I got you. Just clean it real nice, okay?” Desta patted her on the shoulder before getting into her car.
But it was hard not to worry because Thomas was never far from her thoughts. What if their work in the room had changed her ability to dream there? What if being watched ruined it—along with being terribly violating.
As Fallen arrived home, she found Nora walking out of the house, carrying the jeweled bag with the swag from the charity ball. It seemed she planned to start her weekend off with a bang.
“What do you have there, Nora?” Fallen pointed at the bag.
“You got these pretty gifts. I was just going to take them to show my friends.”
Fallen closed her eyes for a moment. Luckily she hadn’t shown the watch to Fenn because she’d intended to save it for his graduation. When she looked again, she saw Addiction shining back at her from Nora’s eyes. It would use every dirty trick in the book to get money for booze.
“Give me the things back, please.” Fallen knew it was a pointless battle, but she had to try anyway.
And then the excuses came. The denial. The anger. The bargaining. Finally, Fallen had had enough.
“You take the watch. And give me the house key you took from Fenn. Then you can leave.”
She watched as Addiction hemmed and hawed, weighing the instant gratification against the long-term benefits of having a key so it could steal and manipulate Nora’s children in the future.
When Fallen closed the door, she had the bag and tiara and key. Despite their fight, Nora had claimed she would bring back the watch someday soon. She was just borrowing it for a while.
Fallen tried not to feel the betrayal too deeply. The worst part would be explaining to Fenn that Nora was not getting on the wagon anytime soon.
···
For the next few days, Fallen checked her email almost daily, getting to the library just a few minutes before it closed. She was tempted to check on the hotel computers, but she saved that option for absolute emergencies. She thought constantly about all Desta had told her, but she’d asked no more questions. Although she and Desta passed each other at least every morning and afternoon as their shifts started and ended, she had asked for a few days before they discussed 514 again. Fallen had felt guilty then, realizing that Desta was delving into painful memories to counsel her.
She made it a point to clean room 514 without looking at the camera. Uneasiness slipped down her spine whenever she was in there, knowing Mr. Orbit—or someone else—could be watching her from somewhere. It was an unwelcome addition to her anxiety about whether o
r not she’d still be able to see Thomas next Thursday when she tried to dream.
On Wednesday her rooms had been easy to tidy during the mid-week lull at the hotel, so after work, she finally had time for all the errands she’d been wanting to do. First she logged in at the library and found a return email from Mr. Orbit’s ex-wife.
Fallen,
Please pardon my tardiness in replying to your email. It’s a difficult topic for me, and my husband has begged me to leave it alone. But I need to share with you what I learned. I want to help lift the burden of being separated from the one you love from your shoulders.
We will need a good meeting spot—crowded, hard to listen in on so we can talk.
~Ellen
Fallen typed back that she would be at Fenn’s football game against Poughkeepsie High School on Saturday evening, so they could meet in the stands with the home crowd. She would be there anyway, and her time off was limited, so hopefully that spot would be what Ellen needed it to be.
As Fallen left the library, she found the email had heightened her hopes for getting to Thomas. Or getting him out. However it would work. She just needed the room to still be working after whatever Orbit had done.
After the library, she stopped at a pawn shop and offered the man at the counter the charity ball tiara. He pointed out that the bag was worth something as well, being covered in real gold glitter and a few gems. As he worked out the price, she looked in the case. Sure enough, a watch that looked suspiciously like the one she’d been planning to give Fenn was up for sale.
Fallen left the place with $200 cash and a guilty heart because she planned to use some of the money just for her. But nothing could stop her from visiting her next destination. She finally entered the tattoo studio she’d walked by many times on the way home. She’d been keeping Thomas’ ink dry in the shower, so it had only faded a little, but she wanted to make sure she would never lose it.
For $50 she had the signature inked in place forever, along with the small heart. The pain was crazy on that part of her arm, but for a reason she’d have trouble explaining to others, it made her love for Thomas real by immortalizing the miracle of the pen ink, which had transferred with her over to the waking world.