Page 64 of Soft Flannel Hank
“I’m looking for Esther. Magda said she was here.”
“Well, I don’t know how Magda would know something like that.”
“Alice. Please,” Hank begged, his voice catching.
“Hank, my darling, I’m not at liberty to discuss current guests.”
Hank raked his hands through his hair in frustration, feeling the scream rising in his chest. He was about to go outside and let it go when Alice said lightly, “Of course, I’m not bound to confidentiality aboutguestsof current guests.”
Hank turned slowly.
“So Icantell you that Marjory Mhara is visiting someone in room ten.”
“Jory?” Hank asked, but Alice’s attention was already focused back on her magazine.Jory?He didn’t care about Jory.
Unless…
* * *
Jory and Estherspent the morning talking. Esther talked about Georgia. About witchcraft. About her gifts. Jory told stories, her accent slowly fading as the subjects drifted farther away from her origin.
“Maybe you can teach me to weave,” Esther said as she watched Jory roll yarn into a ball.
“It’s easy to learn. It takes years to master. But you’re stuck in this room for the foreseeable future, so why not?”
Esther groaned and flopped back on the bed. “Ugh,” she groaned. “I don’t want to go back to living off of granola bars and bananas and sleeping in my car.”
Jory laughed. “You’re hiding out, not camping. I have to go open the shop in a few minutes, but I texted Magda. She’s going to bring some food over later.”
Esther got up off the bed. She walked to the wide window and lifted the curtain an inch to the side so she could peek out at the parking lot and gasped.
“Shit. Oh, shit, shit, shit, shit.”
“What?” Jory asked, leaping off the bed.
Esther peeked out again. Hank’s truck was parked at the far end of the lot.
“It’s Hank.” She slid down to the floor under the window.
“Hank? Here?”
“Yes,” Esther hissed. “But maybe he doesn’t know we’re here. He’s not out there, is he?”
Jory peered through the side of the window. “No, I don’t see him out there. Maybe he’s—oh fuck. Nope. He’s coming this way.”
Esther moaned. “How does he look?”
“Angry.”
“Angry?”
“Like he wants to smash something,” Jory replied.
Esther felt her temper flare to life. “He has no right to be angry with me.”
As soon as she said it, heavy pounding echoed through the door and throughout the room.
Jory’s eyes went wide. “It seems he begs to differ.”
