Russ Franklin - Cosmic Hotel

“Seriously? This is Elizabeth Sanghavi’s formula for marriage?”

Elizabeth had her suitors, and she’d married two of them — Van Raye first, then an attorney, William (Will) Henry Elrod IV from Savannah, Georgia. Constantly being on the road wasn’t suited for marriage.

I said, “Do you want to find someone and arrange this business deal?”

“Stop it! I hate arranged marriages, but Americans want to pretend like marriage isn’t business. An individual’s success depends on the family; the spouse comes first and foremost.”

“Jesus,” I said, “will you listen to yourself?”

“A large family is a sign of success.”

I thought about all the cousins running around in Florida on hot days, all of us dirty, pulling things out of the refrigerator to eat, tried to picture Elizabeth overseeing such chaos.

I pushed my hair back. “Goddamn it,” I said and then very calmly, “This hotel is going to be a pile of concrete in a couple of months. Why should we even care?”

She slammed her fist on the table. “That’s what I’m talking about! Stop it! You are in control. . make yourself feel better! Misfortune breeds misfortune, families become cursed! That is not us! ” She got up and went to her bedroom.

Her door shut harder, and I went out onto the private balcony off of my room and looked at the airport, felt the cold wind sting. I thought I heard something on Elizabeth’s balcony but the wall blocked me from seeing if she was there. A mile away there were the pearly floodlights crowning the terminals where people were traveling, constantly traveling.

I dreamed a doorbell was ringing. I woke but didn’t move because I didn’t want to loosen the bed covers. I looked around searching for a sign to indicate what hotel I was in, what city. The ice in the courtesy bucket collapsed, and then there was clearly a knock on the outer door.

I got out of bed and met Elizabeth going to the door, tying her robe’s sash. “Nothing good could be happening at this hour,” she said.

I looked through the peephole and saw two figures, the image of their bodies concave like parentheses around a golden luggage cart full of boxes.

When I opened, a Gypsy Sky Cargo delivery person said, “I apologize for the hour, but this was a hot priority per your request. You are Sandeep Sanghavi?”

One of those bearded bellhops shifted his balance to try to see into the suite. He had two luggage carts stacked with our boxes.

“They found them. Good,” Elizabeth said.

I quickly signed the DIAD pad and found the important box on top of all the others, a box with an orange sticker: “FRAGILE: Live Fish.”

“Again, Gypsy Sky apologizes for the inconvenience of the hour,” the delivery woman said, “but I mean with this priority. . ”

“They came from Dallas?” I asked her, carefully taking the box to the kitchen and using the tip of a steak knife to slice through the tape.

She said, “Came to us in Fort Worth, and I’m afraid due to a processing glitch they were never offloaded in Fort Collins. Someone threw a hot-location search on them. Look at this priority.” She pointed to the electronic pad.

“I don’t understand what that is,” I said, glancing as I removed the Styrofoam cooler’s top and saw the clear plastic bag. I immediately lifted it and before my eyes was my purple betta fish swimming, his image slightly distorted by the plastic, but alive and well.

“Just what it looks like,” she said. “That’s a priority five, and I’ve never seen anything above a three, and I’ve been doing this for seventeen years.”

I lifted the bag in front of my face and watched the fish.

“Priority three is something like you would see for essential industrial or even medical, you know,” the woman said. “Didn’t know there was a five.” While the bellhop unloaded boxes, she looked me up and down as if to determine who I was, and then into the apartment to see Elizabeth.

“Gypsy Sky Cargo apologizes for any inconvenience this might have caused,” she said.

“Who did the search?” I asked her.

Elizabeth came and looked at the fish and took it from my hand and carried it to my room.

“Who did the hot locate?” The woman made a sigh but consulted her pad. “There’s no ID.”

“Thank you,” I said.

I showed her the door, which had been propped open by the bellhop’s rubber stopper.

My phone dinged with a message.

Is everything in order? Don’t get carried away with thanking me.;)

I typed quickly as I went to get a tip for the bellhop.

You stole our things.

No I didn’t.:(I never get to help people. I can help you.

When I handed a tip to the bellhop to get him out of the apartment, I noticed his eyes above the wild growth of brown beard focused past me to the door. I turned. There was a woman in her pajamas standing inside our suite. She held an ice bucket.

I whispered, “Who are you?”

The bellhop had to skim the wall to get around her, but she stood her ground. He grabbed his rubber stopper but held the door open. “Anything else, Mr. Sanghavi?”

I put up my finger to stop him. “Who are you?” I asked the woman again.

“Sandra. I was looking for the ice and vending room.”

“Why are you in here?” Was this person somehow responsible for all this?

She stepped into the light of the living room, her white fuzzed bedroom slippers snapping. She hugged a bucket of ice. “Look at the size of your suite.”

Hearing the voice, Elizabeth came out of my room drying her hands on a towel. “Excuse me. May I help you?”

The woman glanced at her and then down at a can of soda stuck in her bucket of ice. “I was thirsty. I’ve always loved pop. Is the gift shop open?”

“It’s the middle of the night,” Elizabeth said.

“I’m looking for the. . ” she contemplated, “. . the thing. You know.”

Elizabeth flipped the towel over her shoulder and put her hands on her hips. “And what kind of sleeping pills did you take tonight?”

The woman thought about this and said, “I’m not drunk.”

“Aren’t you?” Elizabeth asked.

The woman said lowly, “I’m completely okay.”

Elizabeth said, “Then may we help you back to your room?”

We found most sleepwalkers because someone called the front desk to complain that a stranger was knocking on their door. Sleepwalkers in hotels often locked themselves out of their own rooms, and several times had shown up in their underwear at front desks asking for admittance to their room. Quite common.

The bellhop kept the door open with his foot.

“I just came here to find. . ” But she didn’t finish.

“I know, the thing ,” Elizabeth said. “Do you understand? You are sleepwalking?”

“No I’m not.”

“Let’s get you back, okay?” Elizabeth said.

“Yes. I forgot why I’m here?” She turned toward the door. “I’m disturbing a private property.”

Elizabeth showed her the way out.

The woman mumbled, “This is really strange. Nothing like this has ever happened to me. I’m Sandra Whitehouse, you know.”

We followed the bellhop to the elevators.

Elizabeth said, “Do you remember where your room is?”

“Certainly. It was nice to meet both of you. I’ll see you in the morning. Are you going to Frank’s lecture?”

“We most certainly will not be,” Elizabeth said.

The woman looked confused but walked away without glancing back, hugging her ice bucket until she got to a door. Elizabeth and I both held our breaths until she found her keycard, swiped successfully, and disappeared inside her room.