The Inn at Lake Devine (21 page)

Kris zoomed up to the main building as if it were his regular shuttle loop. A taxi driver stood smoking by his cab, and a blond woman in a fur stole was arriving, but there were no uniformed greeters. “I’ll let you out, and I’ll park down by those buildings that look like barracks.”

I said I’d check us in.

He said, “Wait for me. I know a few tricks.”

I carried my straw bag into the largest lobby I’d ever seen, wallpapered in red and offering more sofas and chairs than ten dentists’ waiting rooms could hold. The vast hall telescoped into lobby additions, decorated in the wallpaper cousins of the original flocked red.

At every corridor intersection, a cluster of mock street signs pointed to destinations: the outdoor pool, the indoor pool, the upper lobby, the lower lobby, the ice rink, the clubhouse, the bar, the coffee shop, the main dining room, the children’s dining room,
“Boutique Alley,” and the synagogue. I retraced my footsteps, not wanting Kris to register alone. He was already at the front desk when I returned, standing in front of a grandmotherly woman in a tailored gray suit, one of three idle reservation clerks. He waited for me, then announced, “Mr. and Mrs. Berry.”

I said, “I put it under Marx.”

He nudged me, meaning, Follow my lead.

The woman looked through her records, and back at us over her half-glasses. “Barry?” she asked.

“Berry.”

Another search. Kris turned to me and said, “Hon? You made them under Berry didn’t you?”

I cleared my throat and said, “Could I have made the reservations under Marx?”

The woman said, “Which is it?”

Kris announced, trying hard to look abashed, “Well, the thing is—she
was
a Marx at the time she made the reservation.”

I could see delight dawning across the woman’s features. “You two just got married! She made the reservation under her maiden name!”

Kris beamed.

I murmured, “What was I thinking?”

“Wedding nerves,” said the woman. She studied the room assignment, then tore it up, shaking her head. “This won’t do.”

I knew what wouldn’t do—separate beds. She turned around to see what cubbyholes still held keys, and emitted an “aachh” of pleasure when she saw what must have been her first choice. “This is more like it,” she said.

I said, leaning across the counter toward our benefactress, “We’re on a budget.”

“What did we quote you?”

“Forty-two per person, American Plan.”

She smiled and stuck her pencil through the curls above her ear. “Do you know who I am?”

I said, “Are you the manage—”

“I’m Estelle
Feldman
, the owner’s mother. And I’m telling you that when honeymooners come here, they get the honeymoon suite. I don’t care what their budget is or what they reserve over the telephone.”

I said, “Really, it isn’t necessary. I wouldn’t feel right.”

“You are too generous,” my pseudohusband told Mrs. Feldman. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Not another word! You take your lovely bride upstairs and see what you think, and you tell your friends that the Halseeyon is not just for old fogies.” With that she slapped the bell. “No bride and groom stay in a twin room if the honeymoon suite is empty, and that’s that.”

A bellman scuttled over; a dollar bill changed palms smoothly as Kris said, “Don’t bother. I’ve got it.”

“You can’t do anything for these two!” Mrs. Feldman proclaimed. She handed us a pink legal-size syllabus with the heading “Daily Activities,” and pointed a knobby right finger over her left shoulder. “Left past the newsstand, elevator’s on your right, top floor. Dinner’s at seven, even for honeymooners.”

“Really, thanks so much,” said Kris. “You’re a doll.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Feldman,” I added.

If it weren’t for the fact that we were there at the invitation, once removed, of a Feldman, I would have congratulated Kris on his prank. “Are you crazy?” I whispered when we’d walked a safe distance from the desk. “Now we’re going to have to keep up an act.”

The elevator doors opened and a short man in a black tuxedo hurried off. “See you later, kids,” he said, without stopping.

We stepped aboard. Kris said, “It’s called an upgrade. Hotels do it all the time, even ours. Besides, it’s a matter of pride. I’d be afraid to tell my mother I paid the rack rate.”

I said, “Like you’re going to tell your mother you shared a honeymoon suite with me.”

He tried to squeeze my shoulders in a one-armed hug, but I told him he’d crush the corsage that my maid of honor had pinned on my going-away outfit.
Hon
.

“C’mon,” he said.

I said, “Do you upgrade every Tom, Dick, and Harry who sashays up to your desk with a honeymoon story?”

Kris said, “Okay, we got more than I was angling for. I thought maybe a larger room with a nicer view. Or a complimentary bottle of wine at dinner.” He thumbed the button repeatedly, then asked, “Are you mad about the lie or about me assuming too much?”

I said, “What happens when we meet Linette? Do we let her in on your little joke?”

He pretended to be absorbed in the numbers flashing above the door. When
PENTH
lit up, a chime sounded, and we stepped onto a hallway with brown faux-marble wallpaper and plum carpeting. At the end of the hall was Room 1000, which had silver bells stenciled above the number and an ugly brass knocker. We stepped into a pitch-black room. The light of a pink-bulbed chandelier revealed white satin walls and a floor carpeted in a polar-bear shag. It was no suite, just a standard double with a theme—plastic roses, plastic champagne glasses, and a round, ruffled bed as big as a sand trap.

Kris said, “Never get excited about an upgrade before you see it.”

I said, “There’s no room to walk around.”

We tossed our bags onto the bed. Kris checked his watch. “Dinner’s in forty-five minutes, right? I’ll take my shower, or you could go first. Or I could take a walk while you got dressed.”

I said, “We’re like an arranged marriage from the old country. Never been alone until the wedding night.”

Kris took off his down vest and went to the closet. “Bedwise?” I heard from inside. “Just because we got the giant marriage model doesn’t mean I’m going to roll over to your side. Unless you want me to.”

I said we didn’t have to decide anything now. We’d eat, maybe dance—I read from the pink schedule—“ ‘to the music of the Sonny Cirrell Orchestra with Songstress Toni Falcone.’ ”

Kris walked back to the bed and offered me one of two wooden hangers he’d wrestled from their detachable hooks.

“Thanks,” I said.

“Do you like to dance?”

I said I did.

“You think it’s just ballroom dancing?”

I said we had our choice—ballroom dancing in the Red Sea Room or disco dancing in the Blue Lagoon. I looked up from the schedule. “Or maybe we’d want to turn in early.”

“No pressure,” he said.

I unzipped my suitcase and took out my short black dress, then tossed my black special-occasion bra, bikini underpants, and panty hose onto the shiny white bedspread. Kris looked away.

I said, “Are we bashful?”

“Hotel policy,” he said. “You avert your eyes and back up to the door to await your tip.”

“Who says?”

“My mother—when certain female guests, whose husbands don’t come up until the weekend, unpack their unmentionables in front of the bellboy.”

“You’re kidding,” I said. “Such a thing actually happens at the Lutheran Lodge?”

He said, “I’m not kidding.”

“To you?”

“Even to me.”

I asked why he said that—“Even to me”?

He shrugged. “I’m a distant second. But that’s okay.”

“You think you’re a distant second in what way?”

“I meant growing up. Nelson was the handsome one and the object of all the guest crushes. But it’s okay. I shouldn’t be talking like this—as if Nelson hasn’t been through hell.”

I said, “Not to be argumentative or anything, but Nelson had the lifeguard advantage.”

“While I did laundry and watched Gretel for fifty cents an hour.”

I walked a pile of my underwear to the dresser and put it in the top drawer. I said, “Nelson is a great guy, and I’m sure his students are all in love with him—but he’s the obvious choice. Like Paul McCartney. But the truth is, women eventually realize that George and John, who were right under our noses the whole time, are more sublime.”

“Is that true?”

I turned around. “I was a ninth-grade girl once. I thought Nelson was the greatest. Robin and I both did.”

“Are you leading up to something like ‘But then I grew up and met you, and suddenly I realized Nelson was just a pretty boy with a Red Cross patch sewed on his trunks’?”

I said, “Exactly.”

He smiled.

I asked, “How come I don’t remember you from that summer?”

He hesitated, then puffed out his cheeks.

A fragment of an image flashed—a fat boy with a round, sweaty face. He must have seen his clue register, because he said, “That was me—Spanky.”

I asked if he remembered me from back then.

“I’ve tried to.” He shrugged. “Apparently I’ve blocked out my fat phase.”

“You remember Robin, though?”

“The Fifes came every summer.”

I sat down, so we were side by side on the edge of the bed. Thinking of him, once chubby and possibly tormented, the imagined second fiddle to a blandly handsome brother, I said instead, “Poor Robin.”

“God,” he said. “What a winter.”

“How are the Fifes?”

“Lousy, I’m sure.”

“Are the boys back on their feet?”

“Not quite.”

“Anything ever develop between Gretel and Chip?”

“Gretel thinks so.”

I said, “Does she know I spilled the beans?”

“Absolutely not.”

“She did flash me that warning look when she escorted Chip up to his room.”

“And then you and I were alone.”

“For at least ten minutes,” I said.

Kris dropped onto his back and put a pillow over his face. “That moment? When my mother burst in? I wanted to kill her.”

I liked that anti-Ingrid sentiment, so I countered with something charitable: “You can’t blame her for walking into her own kitchen. It wasn’t like she barged into your bedroom.”

“Yes it was! You had your arms around me, and I was so happy, even with the funeral ahead of us. Then it was over in a split second, and you were gone for good.”

I lowered myself down beside him, propping myself up on one elbow. “
For good?
Aren’t you being a little melodramatic?”

He lifted the pillow as if tipping a hat, flashing the smile that had conquered Mrs. Feldman.

I said, “No hurry or anything, but I’m a little tired of hearing about this kiss.”

W
e were led to a round table, where the Seidlers, Reenie and Harry of Staten Island, and the Mizitskys, Marilyn and Al of Queens, were already seated and energetically buttering rolls. So happy to make our acquaintance—Natalie and … 
Chris
, is it?

“With a
k
,” he said, pumping the men’s hands across the relish tray.

“Who are you with?” asked Marilyn.

“Miss Marx,” said Kris.

“What group, I meant.”

“No group. Just escaping for a couple of days.”

“What about you?” I asked.

“Eleven ninety-nine,” said Al.

Before I could ask, his wife offered, “Health-care workers.”

“You’re doctors?” asked Kris.

“Doctors!” Al scoffed.

“We represent the health-care
workers
,” said Harry, his mouth full of curled carrot. “Almost everyone here this week is Eleven ninety-nine.”

“You two kids,” said Reenie, whose red dress shimmered with fish-scale sequins. “Are you married?”

“We’re friends,” I said.

Kris leaned sideways until our shoulders bumped.

“Okay, good friends,” I amended.

“Your first time here?” asked Marilyn.

I said it was, and we’d chosen the Halseeyon for a reason: the Feldmans’ daughter, Linette—

“What do you do?” Harry asked Kris.

“Wait,” said his wife. “What reason? Who’s Linette?”

“The daughter,” said Marilyn. “The one in the office we spoke to about the facecloths.”

“What do you do?” repeated the husbands.

Kris smiled. “I’m in the family business.”

“What kind of business?” asked Harry.

“Hotel.”

“No kidding? What hotel?”

“The Inn at Lake Devine in Vermont.”

“How big?” asked Al.

“Forty-two guest rooms and four cabins.”

“Small.”

“Can you make a living from a place that size?” asked Harry. “If you don’t mind my asking.”

“We get by,” said Kris.

“Do you get big names up there?” asked Reenie.

I could see Kris mentally scanning the mailing list. “She means entertainers,” I said.

“We’re not set up for that,” said Kris. “We’re on a beautiful lake, so we have swimming, boating—”

“How’s the food?” asked Marilyn.

“Hearty.”

“Kosher?”

Kris said, “No.”

“Vermont,” Reenie reminded her.

A waiter, dressed in black pants and a short black jacket, appeared with six small tomato juices and mimeographed menus. I noticed the first item was “Melon Cup” or “Choice of Your Favorite Juice.” I asked what the melon was this time of year.

“The little balls,” he said.

“I’ll have that,” said Kris.

The waiter darted into the kitchen and returned immediately with six Melon Cups.

“What’s good, Victor?” Harry asked.

“Everything.”

“What’s too good to pass up?”

“The roast beef. The capon. The turkey. The flanken.”

“I’ll have the roast beef and the turkey,” said Harry.

“Same,” said his friend.

“For the ladies?”

“Is the flanken fatty?” asked Reenie.

“Get it,” said her husband. “You can taste it. Get the chicken, too.”

“I’ll have the chicken,” she told the waiter. “No flanken.”

“Me too,” said Marilyn. “Just the capon.”

“I’ll have the roast beef, rare,” Kris said.

“Well done for me,” said Harry.

“Same,” said Al.

I asked what the flounder was stuffed with. Victor rattled off, “They take crackers, melted margarine, garlic powder, bell pepper, parsley—”