Page 46 of Counting the Days

“Yeah, well, so are you.”

He smiled, the fragile skin around his eyes crinkled, and she felt the urge to bite it off. They lay like that for as long as they could keep their eyes open, not wanting to miss one second of this moment—the moment they were finally together, finally allowed to touch. The weight of Rhea’s eyelids became too heavy to fight against. She closed hers first, Danny followed, and together they gave in to sleep.

270Days

Rhea woke to the horrificsound of knuckles on wood. She was alone in bed; was the whole evening a dream? She sat up and looked around; her wet, balled-up raincoat by the door was proof that the events had actually occurred. That and the minty, smoky taste of Danny still on her tongue.

She opened the door to the kind-eyed woman from the front desk.

“Hi there! Sorry to bother you, but…just wanted to make sure you were all ready to check out.”

“Oh, um, yeah—what time is checkout?”

“Two hours ago…”

Rhea gasped, “Oh no, I’m so sorry—”

“No, no, don’t worry at all, just need to make sure we can turn your room around in time for the incoming guests.”

Everyone at Esalen was unfailingly kind. If this were a normal hotel and Rhea had slepttwo hourspast checkout, she imagined cops would have escorted her out in handcuffs.

Instead, the woman said, “Don’t rush, and you can just leave your key on the bed when you’re done packing up.”

“So, the workshop is over?”

“Yep, hope you enjoyed it!” the woman said over her shoulder as she walked away.

Rhea had missed the final session of intimacy exercises. What if they’d saved the best one for last? The one that would have finally made her a perfect human?

She looked at her cellphone. There were no new messages, not even from the guy she just made out with; was her phone suddenly unable to receive texts on this rural California coast? She fired off a test text.

Rhea:I think my phone’s being weird. Let me know if you get this

Louisca:Got it

Her phone was officially able to receive text messages.

She quickly got in the shower, slathered conditioner on her matted hair, and began combing it out. Most men did not touch her hair. She assumed they were too intimidated by the curls since they were most likely used to running their hands through the American majority: silky, straight strands. Maybe they were afraid their hands would get stuck and Rhea would have to cut them out like gum. Danny, however, was not most men; he had managed to tangle and mat her hair worse than she knew was possible…and she could not wait for him to do it again.

She zipped into a cream Rachel Comey jumpsuit and stuffed everything inside her suitcase. She silently said goodbye to her room, her ocean view, and the otters down below. She wheeled her suitcase back over the bridge, feeling a shroud of grief. Part of her wished Esalen was a cult; then they would never let her leave. It only took one weekend for her to forget about the real world and feel like the workshop was her entire life; Wild Eyes was her sidekick, Uh-Huh Same was her adversary turnedally, Gary and Lisa were her mentors, Danny was her love interest, and she would most likely never see any of them again. Well, except Danny…she was definitely going to see Danny again…right?

She walked past his room. The door was open, and a twenty-something hippie was making his bed. She had to resist asking the hippie if she could take the used towels home with her so she could huff them like glue.

She closed her eyes and heard his low voice whispering, “I’m crazy about you.” Did that mean he wanted to see her again? Did that mean he wanted her to call him as soon as she woke up? He could have left a note, but instead, he’d just abandoned her. Surely he should have at least texted by now, if only to make sure she hadn’t died in her sleep. Middle-aged people die in their sleep all the time. She felt vulnerable and longed for her safety blanket, Warm Wendy.

She shifted her car in and out of drive six times, feeling a little disappointed the workshop had not fixed that particular tic. She drove away from the property, determined not to think about Danny Beckett for the rest of the drive. She would not think about the weight of his body. The feeling of his hands on her face, buried in her hair. The way warmth emanated from him. She was not going to imagine herself sticking her cold feet between his legs on chilly mornings….

Her phone rang and she knew it was him without even looking, because he was thoughtful and sensitive. Because he knew how vulnerable she must have felt, waking up alone, uncertain of where they would go from here. She looked at the touchscreen on her dashboard: It was Tiny. She felt guilty for her astronomical dismay at seeing her dear friend’s name on her phone.

“How dare you hang up on me?” Tiny said.

Rhea filled her in on the sultry predawn details.

“Well, I can’t help but feel one hundred percent responsible. Jason told me to keep the stupid golf course thing to myself.”

Rhea assured her the night was destined to go the way it did, regardless of any eerily accurate psychic predictions.

“And how do you feel now?”