He cleared his throat and nodded toward the door. “You should probably go inside before you catch your own death.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” I replied, and quickly turned away from him and went inside.
Dana was sitting at the front desk, reading another book. An N. K. Jemisin fantasy this time. They looked up when they heard the bell above the door chime, and jumped off their stool. “You’re soaking wet!” they cried, grabbing a towel from underneath the desk, and coming around the side to hand it to me.
“Thank you so much.” I took the towel from them, and dried my hair before it dripped all across the hardwood floor. Then I wrapped it around myself and gave a shiver. “Damn weather tonight.”
“You’re telling me,” they replied, returning to their post. “The weather apps didn’t even give us a warning—”
“Oh, look, there’s our famous author,” came a voice from the living area. A chill curled down my spine. And there, sitting so properly in one of the IKEA chairs in the living area, was Heather Griffin.
Everyone had that one person who made their high school career unbearable, and Heather was mine. We had been friends for a brief moment, until she came to the conclusion that I was crazy after the murder case. She never believed that I talked with ghosts—she thought I was looking for attention. She was also one of the main reasons why the rest of Mairmont thought so, too.
“Who were you talking to outside, Florence?” Heather went on with an innocent look. She was accompanied by a group of women who looked like a book club, laughing behind their copies of Ann Nichols’s Midnight Matinee.
“I was just—you know—talking. To myself,” I mumbled. Idiot. I was an idiot to get so comfortable in Mairmont. I should’ve known better.
Out of the corner of my eye, Ben moved slowly into the lobby, his hands no longer in his pockets but on his hips. He stared in at the book club with pursed lips.
Dana, bless them, leaned forward on their stool and said loudly, “How’s your stay, Florence? Do you need anything? Towels, shampoo? Peace and quiet?” they added pointedly, darting their eyes at Heather.
She smoothed on a smile and poured herself a glass of lemon-infused water from the dispenser on the far side of the desk. “Well, I know when I’ve overstayed my welcome. It was nice to see you, Florence. Maybe we should catch up sometime,” she added, scrunching her nose with a grin, and clipped her way back into the living area, where book club resumed.
I sighed and leaned against the desk. “Damn. For two seconds I’d forgotten about her.”
“Lucky.” Dana laughed. “I could send you up with a bottle of wine? We’ve got a new red in from the Biltmore that is gloriously bitter.”
“Don’t tempt me! I still have Dad’s obituary to write. And I somehow have to find wildflowers.”
“There’s some growing in the back garden if you need them.”
“A thousand of them?”
They winced. “Yikes, sadly not.”
“See, that’s my problem. And wildflowers are so vague—never mind I don’t have a thousand dollars to spend on a florist to find me some.”
In the lounge, the book club tittered some more. I would be lying if I said I didn’t want to hear what they were saying about Midnight Matinee. Ben was leaning against the doorway, hands crossed over his chest, listening in on them. His face didn’t tell me anything, except that he was either bored with their analysis of my writing or he wasn’t paying attention to them at all.
“Hmm.” Dana drummed their fingers on the oak desk, thinking. “You could try the Ridge, maybe? It’s become part of the state park now. You might find some there, if the season’s not too early.”