Мэри Эндрюс - The Newcomer

“Those photos of yours did the trick,” Ava said. “I’m thinking, when it slows down in the fall, or maybe sooner, right after the spring breakers leave, I’ll get you to style and photograph all the rooms. You could sprinkle some seashells around and freshen things up. I bet I could raise prices by at least ten percent, and nobody would even notice.”

“Merwin would notice,” Letty said. “But Ava, about fall…”

Ava waved away her objections. “I realize, you said you weren’t sure if you’d hang around ’til then, but I’m just gonna pretend I didn’t hear that. You know, with Isabelle going off to college in August, I’ll need all the extra help I can get around here.”

Letty nodded in Maya’s direction. “Can we talk about this later, please?”

“Oh. Right. Anyway, we’ve got a guest checking into the efficiency this evening. She’s coming down from New York, and wasn’t exactly sure of her arrival time, so I told her if it’s after six she can just call my phone and I’ll meet her here and check her in.”

“How long is she staying for?” Letty asked, pulling up the Murmuring Surf’s booking page on the computer monitor. She clicked over to the page she’d designed for her old unit.

“She paid in advance for four days,” Ava said.

Letty frowned. “I thought we had a one-week minimum stay during the season.”

“Well, yeah, but since we just added the efficiency, I thought it would be okay to take a shorter stay. Just this once.”

Letty shrugged. “You’re the boss, but seems to me we’d be better off waiting for the weekend and booking a guest who’ll be here at least a week.”

“Now you sound like Joe,” Ava said. “It’s just four days. After this, yes, I’ll absolutely apply the one-week minimum stay.”

Ruth Feldman was not happy. “Ava, would you please look at this?” She held up a piece of faded and frayed plastic webbing. “Billie sat down on one of the lounge chairs by the pool just now and the thing collapsed. She could have been killed!”

Ruth and Billie were both dressed in their modest one-piece bathing suits and matching terry cover-ups. Ruth’s swim goggles were pushed on top of her still-damp steel-gray hair.

“Oh Lord,” Ava said. “I’m sorry, Billie. Are you okay?”

Billie Feldman turned around and displayed a mildly scraped ankle. “It could have been much worse,” she said. “I managed to catch myself or I might have broken a hip or something.”

“Okay,” Ava said. “Thanks for letting me know.” She looked over at Letty. “Could you please go over to the pool and drag the broken lounger over to the dumpster? I don’t want anyone else getting hurt.”

“We already took care of that,” Ruth said. “But Ava, the webbing on all those chairs is in the same condition. You need to do something before someone gets seriously injured.”

“I will,” Ava promised.

Maya peeked around the corner of the reception desk and gave a shy wave to the two older women.

“Hello there, young lady,” Billie said, leaning down. “What are you working on today?”

“I write my name,” Maya said. She held up the workbook sheet where she’d laboriously traced the letters of her name, and then wrote the letters freehand, wobbly, but legible.

“Look at that, Ruthie,” Billie said, pointing to the worksheet. “Isn’t that good? And she’s what? Five years old?”

Maya held up her hand with her thumb tucked behind her palm. “I’m four. How old are you?”

Ruth snorted. “She’s seventy-two. Eleven months younger than me.”

“My birthday is in September. And I will be five and I will go to big-girl school. When is your birthday?”

“Actually, Ruth’s birthday is next week,” Billie volunteered. “But we’re both all done with big-girl school, thank God.”

“Will you have birthday cake?”

“No,” Ruth said quickly. “Grown-ups don’t have birthday cake.”

“I’m sorry,” Maya said politely. “You can come to my birthday party and have some of my cake.”

“Awww,” Billie said. “That’s the sweetest thing I ever heard of.” She nudged her wife. “Isn’t that sweet? Maya invited us to her birthday party.”

Ruth managed a smile. “That is sweet. Thank you, Maya.” She turned to Billie. “Okay, time to hit the pool again.”

“I like to go swimming,” Maya said.

Billie nudged Ruth, who gave her a questioning look.

“Letty,” Billie said. “Would it be all right if Maya went swimming in the pool with us for a while? We’d be very careful. You know, I used to be a Red Cross lifesaving instructor.”

Letty could hardly believe the offer on the table. “Really? That’s awfully kind, but I wouldn’t want her to interrupt your lap swimming.”

“We did our laps earlier,” Billie said. “It’ll be fun to have an excuse to just splash around. Won’t it, Ruthie?”

“I suppose,” Ruth said.

“Obviously, Maya would love to take you up on your offer,” Letty said. “If you’re serious, I’ll just run her back to our place and get her bathing suit and towel. And I’ll meet you at the pool. Okay?”

“Yes! Swimmy, swimmy, swimmy,” Maya said, hopping up and down with excitement. She grabbed her aunt’s hand. “Letty, hurry. I want to go swimming.”

“That sounds fine,” Ruth said stiffly. “We’ll see you at the pool.”

“Will wonders ever cease,” Ava said, as soon as the older women left the office. “Ruth came this close to cracking a smile at Maya just now.”

“I’m glad you were a witness, because I wasn’t sure if it was a smile or just gas.”

“See, they’re really not that awful, once you get to know them,” Ava said. “Now you better get Maya over there before Ruth changes her mind. When you get back, let’s talk about ordering some replacement lounge chairs.”

“Bad news,” Letty told her boss when she returned to the office. “Ruth was right. Every single one of those loungers is on its last legs. All the webbing is rotted out. And if one of the oldsters does fall through one and get injured, I’m afraid we’ll have a lawsuit on our hands.”

Ava smiled at Letty’s use of the word “our” but didn’t make mention of it. She pointed to the computer screen, where she’d been pricing lounge chairs from a commercial furniture company.

“Those don’t look much better than what you’ve got now,” Letty said. “What about something a little sturdier? Like cast aluminum, or better yet, teak?”

“Like this?” Ava scrolled down to a photo of a grouping of teak outdoor furniture. “See the price of them?”

“Wow. Twelve hundred dollars?”

“And that’s wholesale. And it doesn’t include cushions,” Ava said.

Letty was reading the product description. “Plus, the delivery time is at least six weeks. We’ll have a mutiny on our hands if we don’t have lounge chairs for the pool. Couldn’t we just buy something locally?”

“There’s that factory-outlet patio place up on US 19 in Clearwater,” Ava said. “I’ve never been in there.…”

“I see their television commercials all the time,” Letty said. “Maybe we should check it out.”

“Agreed. And I’m putting you in charge of this little project,” Ava said. “You could run up there now. If you see something that will work, go ahead and buy it.”

“Really? You trust me to make a big decision like that? We need what? At least a dozen chairs?”

“Make it sixteen,” Ava said. “I’m tired of listening to guests bickering over who gets the ‘good’ chairs. Price out some drinks tables to go between the loungers while you’re there. You can take pictures of what you’ve chosen and text me. Okay?”