Wanderlost (12 page)

“Oh, um . . . good genes, I guess.” I laugh awkwardly. What would someone like Elizabeth say now?
Aubree
would prefer to jump up on the table and shout, “Please,
please
flirt
away! I'm only seventeen!
Totally
younger than you!”

But of course I can't, and really, he's just handed me the perfect excuse to keep this crush from going anywhere.

“Um . . . ,” I try again. Ergh.

Sam rescues me by saying, “And now I've completely embarrassed you, which was also not what I meant to do. How about we just go right back to talking about tour guide stuff and we can forget that I was ever your Captain Amazing. Or was it Oh Captain, My Captain? I can't remember.”

I grin. “Pretty sure we settled on Watson, but nice try.”

Sam grins back. “I still maintain Oh Captain, My Captain works way better, but
c'est la vie
.” I smile, then drop my eyes, grateful, but also a little disappointed about no more flirting. Even if it
is
a bad idea.

He clears his throat. “Okay, as I was saying. What was I saying? Oh yeah, right. Bringing the fun. Okay, so there's one last thing that's probably the most important.”

I'm still afraid to talk because anything I say right this second is going to come out all squeaky. Instead I just nod and raise my eyebrows, urging him to continue.

“Most important of all,
you
have to have fun.”

“Me?” Yup. Voice is squeaky. I swallow the frog in my throat. “But it's not my tour. Okay, yes, it's my tour, but it's not
for
me.”

“Yeah, but if you're having fun, it's contagious. Everyone will be right there with you and it won't even matter if you're just stopping to fill up the bus with gas.”

Ha! He said he's been on a bunch of these tours, so he should know the guests do a fine job filling up the bus with gas all by themselves. Especially Hank.

“You're saying I need to have fun to be fun?” I ask.

Granted, I've been equally excited to see things as some of my guests, and I know I've squealed over the same sights they have, but I'm pretty sure the rest of the time I've been completely focused on getting through each moment and trying to figure out how to stay one step ahead at all times. And whenever we've been on long driving stretches, I've mostly kept to myself, working on my beading or staring out the window. Wow, it's entirely possible I might really suck at being a tour guide.

Sam nods. “Yup. Lemme ask you this. What would you be doing tomorrow in Salzburg if you were here all by yourself? Without any itinerary to follow.”

Anywhere else I wouldn't have a clue how to answer him, but here I don't even pause. I do not pass Go, I do not collect two hundred dollars, and I do not spare a thought for how someone like Elizabeth would answer.

“
Sound of Music
sightseeing.” I bounce a little in my seat.

I expect Sam to roll his eyes, but instead he nods his head so hard I'm afraid it might come off his neck. “Yes! See? I can tell just by the way your posture changed that you're excited about being where the movie filmed. Okay, so obviously we have to use this.”

We?
“Er, use it how?” I ask. Tomorrow we're scheduled to
tour Mozart's residence. Mountaintop spinning is not on the list.

“We need to do the
Sound of Music
movie tour.”

“They have that?”

Sam looks at me like I have a second head. “Would you pay to be on that tour?”

“Any amount,” I answer.

“Exactly,” he says. “You and a million other fans. Which means that of course they have one. More than one. But we don't need theirs because we can make our own.”

Sam's energy from before is back and he looks like a squirmy puppy as he pulls an iPad out of his bag and sets it on the table between us. “We can make this epic!” he says.

I gape at him a second, but his enthusiasm is contagious, and we
are
talking about one of my favorite movies of all time, so clearly there's nothing else to say but “Let's do it!”

Again, I know it would be way smarter to keep Sam at arm's length. But on the other hand, this is legitimate tour guide business we're working on. So it's officially all official.

“Deep
breaths. Don't
be nervous,” Sam tells me, squeezing my shoulder gently as he boards the bus behind me.

I don't even know why I'm jittery (aside from the fact that Sam finds an awful lot of little ways to touch me). It's not like I haven't been a tour guide for the last six days. Except I realized yesterday that what I thought was me handling the tour and all its obstacles uncharacteristically well was really only me acting in survival mode, ensuring everyone stayed together and made it to the next city intact. And Dolores's sling in my peripheral vision reminds me
intact
is a relative term.

So, really, today is my first official day actually engaging as a tour
leader
. Which, duh, makes it pretty obvious why I'm jittery, I guess. Sam was very convincing over breakfast this morning and it took him zero seconds to persuade everyone else to abandon our existing plans and embrace our new and exciting schedule for the day. Mary and Emma nearly swooned when Sam mentioned
The Sound of Music
, so I know I have at
least two fangirls along for the ride.

Then why do I feel like Fraulein Maria being summoned to Mother Superior's office?

I glance at Sam, who's settled himself next to Dolores and is busy peeling a banana for her. When he catches me staring, he flashes a thumbs-up.

My eyes land on Mr. Fenton and he flashes me double thumbs-up. At least I know he's rooting for the real, authentic me, which is nice.

I clear my throat. “Um, so . . . everyone? If I could have your attention?”

Hank sounds a catcall from the back and directs all eyes to me.

I take a deep breath.

“Okay, well, so thanks for being flexible today. I know Sam mentioned at breakfast that we've come up with an alternative plan and I just hope you love it.”

I smile the biggest smile I have in me and reach beside Bento to the bus's radio. Of course I'd noticed the TV mounted above Bento's seat, but I never even thought to use the DVD player until Sam mentioned it at our coffee date. Well, not date, but, um, work outing. Pushing play, I return to the front seat to grab the small bags Sam and I assembled in the lobby last night. I have to give the guy total credit. He was instrumental in scrounging together a bizarre arrangement of items from various shops all over Salzburg.

I dispense party favors the length of the bus.

“Here you are, Hank, Maisy.” Hank takes his hand off his wife's knee long enough to reach for two bags, and I work my way to the front just as the screen is zooming in on a spinning Julie Andrews and the words “The hills are alive” flash at the bottom.

Mary asks, “Is this close-captioned? If so, I'll turn down my hearing aid.”

I smile, a genuine one this time. “Nope. It isn't. It's the sing-along version, so the lyrics will show on-screen anytime there's a song. I found it in the hotel gift shop. I thought we could have the movie playing in the background today, and if anyone wanted to sing along as we watch, all the better! So, if you'll open your bags, you'll find props. The little flower is to wave when Captain von Trapp sings ‘Edelweiss.' And the popper is to set off when the captain and Maria kiss for the first time. Also, according to the DVD case, we're all supposed to hiss whenever the Baroness is on-screen and boo whenever the Nazis appear.”

“What about Rolfe? He's not a Nazi to start, but then he becomes one. Do we wait to boo until he rats out the captain?” Emma asks, clearly very invested in the whole thing.

Sam pipes up from behind her. “I say we boo him the whole time. He's an asswaffle.”

I nearly fall over with Sam's choice of words, but no one else blinks.

“Agreed!” Mr. Fenton is nodding.

Oh. My. God. I think they actually like this idea. I was
worried Mr. Fenton might have planned his own lecture for today and been put out, but no. He seems totally into this. Now I'm smiling even harder.

On screen, Maria hears the church bells and realizes she's late for the prayer service. As she races down the mountain, our bus climbs it, following directions Sam wrote out for Bento last night while I pretended to be too busy “researching” to scribble them myself.

“We're going to start in Mehlweg, near where Maria does that hilltop twirl. It's about a half hour away,” I tell my riders, but they're all glued to the movie's start. Wait until they see what other DVDs Sam ordered for them online last night. We had to have them delivered ahead to Prague, but they should help pass the time on the second part of our trip.

Sam moves into the empty row behind me, slinging an arm over the back of my seat and leaning in to talk to me. “So far, so good, huh?” he asks.

I grin in reply. “Yup,” I say, twisting a little so he can see my expression.

Our faces are so close I can smell the peppermint gum he's chewing. He looks over his shoulder at Dolores and calls out, “You good, Gram?”

She must nod because he comes around and slides into the seat next to me, slouching low and propping his feet on the half wall that separates my row from the steps.

“Hey, sorry for crashing out on you like that last night,” he says.

“Right. One second you were stuffing goodie bags and chatting away, and the very next you were facedown on the arm of the couch.”

Sam laughs. “I know! Jet lag catches up with me like that. I feel bad you had to witness it.”

It was totally sweet the way he'd drooled on the armrest of the sofa, but I'm not about to admit that to him. Sam looks torn between laughing at himself and being embarrassed.

In the end he settles for laughing at himself, which I knew he would because I've never met anyone so comfortable in his own skin. Not even Elizabeth.

“Did I say anything mortifying when you woke me up?” he asks.

“Oh, you mean like ‘Mom, I swear, I brushed my teeth already!'? Would you consider that mortifying?”

Sam drops his face into his palms and pretends to be upset, and I laugh at him. He grins back, but then he gets a tiny line between his eyebrows as his grin fades and he studies me. His head tilts and I start to get self-conscious. Do I have something in my teeth?

“I have something very alarming to tell you and I don't want you to freak out,” Sam says, still examining my face closely and with concern. Um, how am I supposed to not freak out when someone says that to me while looking at me the way he is? I swallow. Do I have some kind of skin thing I didn't notice this morning in the mirror? Is there something hanging out of my nose? What the hell?

Sam takes a deep breath and says, “One of your dimples has disappeared.”

Oh. Oh,
phew
. “I only have the one.”

“Yes, well, I see that now. I would have sworn it was two when I stalked your passport picture, but I guess there must have been a smudge on it or something.”

Thank God my sister and I look enough alike. If he were holding that picture up to my face right now, he'd see way more differences, but if the dimples are all he noticed, I should be good.

“This is tragic, you know,” he says.

I try to fight a smile. “Tragic? How so?”

“Well, it means I'm going to have to reorder the hand towels I was having monogrammed for our guest bathroom. Dimples and Watson just won't work anymore.”

I grin. He's really cute. And really impossible not to flirt with. Harmlessly, of course. “Maybe we could just X out the
s
or stitch something over it.”

“Ooh, yes, good call. We could have them embroider a flower in its place.”

“Nah, we can do better. What about a skull and crossbones?” I ask.

“
Très
romantic, Dimple. See what I did there? I dropped the
s
.”

I open my mouth to reply, but he raises his head and holds up his hand to silence me.

“Do you hear what I hear?”

I tilt my head and listen hard, but all I can make out is the movie playing to a rapt audience.

“I don't hear anything.”

“Exactly. No one behind us is wondering in verse how we're going to solve a problem like Maria. Which begs the question: How's your singing voice?”

“Um, well, I tried out for chorus in seventh grade.”

“Okay, that sounds promising,” he says, grinning.

“I didn't make it past round one.”

“And I, for one, would like to hear why.” Sam's fingers stroke his chin and his eyebrows raise as he issues the challenge. Is he serious? I think he might be serious. The song has ended and Maria is now being assigned the governess job by Mother Superior. Sam gives me a pointed look and drums his fingers on the half wall.

Oh, no. No, no, no.

“Sam. I really don't think I can lead a sing-along. I'm already at the far edges of my comfort zone here.”

When he smiles at me, I flush. “Lizzie, pushing your comfort zone is what traveling is all about. Now, what do you think about getting this sing-along off the ground?”

“Sam, I can't.”

“The
t
is silent. Try it again.”

“What? I—”

“Say it.”

“I can—”

His finger shoots out and covers my lips before I can get the last letter out. “That's what I thought.”

He jumps up and points at me. “Ladies and gentlemen, who would like our fearless tour guide to conduct our sing-along this morning? Because Abustus Caesar is entirely too quiet.”

There's a smattering of applause from my passengers. I shoot Sam death rays with my eyes, but I ease myself out of my seat and turn to them, gulping at the eager faces looking back at me. Well, if I completely suck at this, at least I'll never have to see these people again in my life after our tour ends.

The statistical likelihood that any of the seniors knows how to post videos to YouTube is somewhere between low and not a chance. Which still doesn't keep me from cringing at the prospect of singing for them.

I steal a quick glance at Sam and he smiles up at me, looking completely serene. I'll bet if the tables were turned, he'd be on verse three of a song by now. So would Elizabeth. It's so unfair. Why does everything come so easily to certain people? And why is it that no amount of close studying of those people on my part seems to be unlocking any magical answers to that one? What if it never does?

Above me on the screen, Julie Andrews pushes out of the abbey gates, swinging her guitar. Well, if ever there was a more appropriate song about faking it till you make it, I can't think of one.

Here goes nothing.

“Okay, just remember you all asked for this,” I murmur. Hank answers with another catcall. I angle my back so I can't see Sam at all and take a deep breath. Above me, the song has
started already and Maria is wondering what this day will be like. You and me both, sister. I fix my eyes on the road out the back window, open my mouth, and join in.

“And here I'm facing adventure / Then why am I so scared?”

Oh Maria, I have all the feels for you right now.

I manage to get the next few lines out, willing myself to project the words. It's not like there are documented cases of people dying from extreme embarrassment, right? I force myself to make eye contact with my passengers and find them all smiling back at me. Sam, Emma, and Mary join in for the next verse, and then Mr. Fenton. By the time I get to the middle of the song everyone but Dolores is singing along. I steal a glance at Sam and almost stop midverse to gasp because of the way he's looking at me. He blinks fast when he catches my eye, and before I can interpret the look further, easygoing, confident Sam is back and he winks and belts out the next line with gusto.

I am in the Alps. I am in the Alps, on a bus with a Spaniard, a cute boy, and six senior citizens. And I am singing. Loudly and (mostly) without shame.

I collect my breath for the last line.

“I have confidence the world can be all mine / They'll have to agree, I have confidence in me!”