Two Thousand Miles (18 page)

Fortunately, time had slipped easily away. When I wasn’t staring out the window, I pretended to be sleeping and nobody bothered me.

When we arrived in New Orleans, I still pretended to be asleep until I overheard Shelby say something about finding a place to stay. “We don’t have reservations?” flew out of my mouth. I’d never traveled anywhere on a whim.

“We always find something when we get here,” Bit said. “We could probably stay at the Days Inn just out of town,” she said to the group.

“It wasn’t too bad, I don’t guess,” Cody said. 

“Where’s the best place to stay here—the best part of the city?” I asked.

“The French Quarter,” Shelby and Bit said in unison.

“So, we’ll stay in the French Quarter then,” I said.
“My treat.”

“Really?”
Bit asked.

“Really.”

“Can we stay at The Ritz?” she asked, hopeful.

“Do we look like we belong at The Ritz?” Cody asked.

“Who gives a shit?” Shelby said. “A sold room is a sold room. As long as you pay and don’t tear up everything, you can stay.”

“Exactly,” I agreed.

The Ritz Carlton lobby was beautiful, filled with fine furnishing and elegant fixtures. Bit looked around, closely studying the contents. “Everything is so nice, almost like it wasn’t meant to be touched,” I heard her mumble to Logan.

I noticed a few guests in the lobby do a double take after seeing the six of us walk by in our cut offs, tanks, and flip flops, but the woman at the reservation desk didn’t flinch.

Her name tag read, Elaine Aucoin. Her dark bangs were swept neatly to one side; her makeup looked professionally applied, giving her skin an airbrushed quality. Her glossy red lips parted widely when she smiled at us, revealing ultra white teeth.

“Welcome to Ritz Carlton New Orleans. How may I assist you,” she asked.

“I would like to check availability, please,” I said. “Four rooms on the same floor if possible.”

“Size preference?”

“King.”

“Double okay?”

“I’d prefer single.” I’d always hated rooms with double beds in them, even if no one was using the other bed.

“Just for tonight?” she asked.

“Tonight and tomorrow.”

“May I see your ID please?”

“I handed her my driver’s license, along with my black AMEX, you know the credit card with no limit. I was on my father’s account, but still, the card had my name on it.”

Elaine Aucoin didn’t flinch at that either. After examining my driver’s license, she said, “I have club level suites available. Would you like to book those?”

“Yes, please.” I was playing it cool, but knew Bitty would probably pee her pants as soon as she laid eyes on the nine
-hundred square foot suite that would be hers and Logan’s for the next two nights.

“Use this card for incidentals on all the rooms?” Elaine asked.

“Yes, please.”

“Keith will show you to your rooms,” she said, nodding to the concierge standing on the other side of the desk.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” she smiled.
“Oh, and happy birthday, Ms. Parker.”

“Thanks,” I nodded. Then I cringed.

“It’s your fucking birthday!” Shelby whisper yelled.

“Yep.”

“We have to do something.”

“We are doing something.”

“No, I mean you need cake and presents and party hats with glitter on them.”

“I don’t need those things.”

“Yes you do,” she argued. “Every girl needs those things on her birthday.”

“No, I really don’t,” I said firmly.

“You know she’s going to do it anyway, don’t you?” Bit said.

“I know,” I sighed.

We filed off the elevator, following Keith to the first suite, which Bit and Logan took. The rest of us waited outside as Keith showed them around.

I could still hear Bit squealing down the hall at the suite Shelby and Cody took.

“Mini bar! Shit yeah,” I heard Shelby and laughed. So did Mason. It was nice to hear and for a moment, things felt normal between us again, but things weren’t normal. Things were nonexistent.

When we reached the next suite, Keith opened the door and I motioned for Mason to go inside.

“You take it,” he said.

“Okay.” I wasn’t going to argue with him.

“Thanks for this,” he said as I walked inside. I gave him a tight smile and shut the door.

I went straight for the bathtub. It had been a long time since I’d been able to take a bath for the hell of it. Just for the sole purpose of soaking in rose petal scented hot water brimming with bubbles.
 

I turned on the water and stripped down as I looked through the selection of bath products on the counter. I chose what smelled the best and dumped it into the tub. I got in, sank down in the scalding water until it was up to my neck, and closed my eyes.

My bath bliss didn’t last as long as I would have liked, because Shelby was ready to “tear up the town” as she’d put it. I’d forgotten to lock the door so she let herself into my room to tell me I had fifteen minutes to get myself together and meet everyone in the hallway.

I put the white lacy tank top and cut off shorts back on. I’d only worn them a couple hours. I shook my hair out, put it back up in a sloppy bun, and rushed out of my room, following the sounds of their voices to the elevators.
 

“Oh my god, Kat!
Our room is so beautiful,” Bit cooed. “And so big! It’s like a house.”

“I’m glad you like it,” I smiled.

“The free alcohol is pretty neat, too,” Shelby winked, and then pulled a tiny bottle of Jack Daniels out of her front shorts pocket as we loaded onto the elevator.

I laughed. Cody shook his head. “You know she’s
gonna take the towels and robes and stuff, too.”

“It’s fine,” I said.

“We can keep the robes?” Bit asked, wide eyed.

“You can keep the robes,” I nodded.

“You can keep your robe, but Kat’ll have to pay for it,” Mason said, propping himself against the back corner of the elevator.

“It’s not a big deal. People take them all the time,” I said. I looked at Bit. “Keep the robe.”

Cody pressed the L button on the elevator, and the doors closed. On the way down, I caught Mason looking at me. Once I’d made eye contact with him, I couldn’t make myself look away. His hat was pulled down, but I could still see the hypnotic blue of his eyes, set off by the sun on his skin. He wore a sleeveless shirt that showed the definition in his arms, his thumbs hinged on the openings of the pockets in his shorts.

My heart beat so hard that I felt it in my ears and was starting to feel dizzy because of it. Then, the elevator came to a stop and I was forced to break my concentration on Mason.

As we walked through the lobby
, I told myself that I would never make it through the weekend with Mason so close. It was too hard to be around him and not be with him. I instinctively wanted to grab his hand and hold it. On the elevator, I’d felt like snuggling against him, kissing his rose-colored mouth while running my hands along the naked skin of his arms.

Mason may have said he couldn’t get more involved with me, but he certainly wasn’t acting
like he didn’t want to—which was completely unfair to me. And my broken heart.

We exited the Ritz on Canal Street and set out to explore the French Quarter.

“We have to go to Bourbon Street,” Shelby said.

“We have to take the carriage tour,” Bit added.

“We should probably follow Canal to Decatur and hit Jackson Square first. The French Market is over there, too. Then we can head to Bourbon Street, take the carriage ride and eat dinner,” Logan said.

Apparently his idea was a good one because no one said anything else, just started walking. I tried to stay as close
to Bit and Shelby as I could, but it still kept working out that Bit and Logan were side-by-side and Shelby and Cody were side-by-side, which left Mason and me dangling awkwardly behind them.

When we hit Decatur Street, Shelby stopped near a trash can to finish her miniature bottle of booze while Bit and Logan studied handmade jewelry in the window of the business next door. I gazed at the buildings around us, making a conscious effort not to look at Mason when he stepped in front of me.

“I
wanna apologize for what I said about you and Garrett. I didn’t mean it,” he said. I nodded. I wasn’t going to say it was okay or tell him not to worry about it like some people did when they received an apology. What he’d said hurt, just like he’d meant for it to. I would accept his apology, acknowledge it with a nod, but that would be it.

I started to walk away. “Kat,” Mason said. I turned to look at him. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.” That statement I wouldn’t acknowledge period. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t meant to, he’d still hurt me.
 

We strolled through the flea market area in the French Market District and went inside a few of the fixed shops. I found some great smelling bath potions and candles that were packaged in beautiful antique glass containers. I wanted to buy them, but they were too fragile and would have been too heavy for me to carry around the rest of the night. I left the shop hoping I would get to come back and buy them before we went back to Slidell.

“We have to get some!” Bit shrieked, pointing to a tiny lemonade stand across the street. “That lemonade is the best you’ll ever have,” she said to me. It was five dollars for a sixteen-ounce glass, but worth every penny.

“Wow,” I said, after taking a sip.

“See,” Bit bragged.

It was the perfect combination of freshly squeezed lemon juice, water, and sugar.

The six of us quickly sucked down our lemonade as we entered Jackson Square. It was as hot as Shelby had promised it would be, so instead of being appalled, I copied her when she stuffed her plastic cup down the front of her shirt. The melting ice inside the cup helped give my body a break from the heat.

We found an empty carriage and took our tour. It was loud and too hard to hear most of what the guide was saying, but I
wasn’t paying much attention anyway, I was too busy admiring the architecture of the surrounding buildings, and watching the artists on the streets paint and pedal their artwork.

It
was beautiful during daylight hours, but I couldn’t help but imagine how much more beautiful it would have been to circle through the city late at night—in cooler air—with everything lit up.

When the tour was over, Shelby gave her phone to the guide and asked her to take a picture of us. As we clumped together next to the carriage, Shelby threw her arm around Bit and stuck her leg out
like she was trying to hitch a ride somewhere. She opened her mouth wide and stuck her tongue out while Bit smiled like a pageant contestant, and Logan and Cody laughed because they swore the horse pulling our carriage had farted. “It smells like bacon,” Cody snickered. Mason and I stood uncomfortably next to each other, trying to pretend we weren’t standing next to each other, but still managed to look the most normal out of everyone. 

We walked the grounds of the St. Louis Cathedral, but couldn’t go inside because there was a wedding going on. As we
wandered down Royal Street, it was starting to get dark and I was hungry and felt like I’d been walking for years instead of hours.

“Is anybody else hungry?” I asked.

“Yes,” I heard almost simultaneously.

“We’re almost to Bourbon Street. We’ll find a place there,” Shelby said.

Bourbon Street was the most crowded place we’d been all day. There was a lot to see, but because of the crowd, I was mostly concentrating on staying with my group.

“Marie
Laveau’s!” Bit pointed to a sign hanging from the ceiling of the covered sidewalk. It read, Marie Laveau’s House of Voodoo.

“Voodoo!
Hell no! I’m not goin’ in there,” Logan protested.

“I think I’ll take a pass, too,” I said. Then something hit me. “Isn’t Dixie’s last name
Laveau?”

“Yeah.
Ha!” Bit laughed. “That must be why she’s so evil. The Voodoo Priestess of Louisiana is, like, her great, great grandma or somethin’.”

That struck me as funny. I’d always thought of grandma’s as being sweet and baking things. Not casting spells and putting fear into people’s hearts
, or whatever Voodoo Priestess’s did. But I’d also never had a grandma. I knew nothing about my mother’s parents at all and my father’s parents were both dead. They were killed in a car crash when he was thirteen. He told me he’d missed having them in his life all these years, but that maybe losing them was what had made him strive to be so successful.

We went in the first seafood place we stumbled across
, and were quickly seated. Shelby tried to order a beer, but our waiter didn’t fall for it. Instead, he brought her sweet tea, along with the rest of us—including me. I’d started to become fond of it.