Edie waves the woman over so there can be no mistake. “I’ll check you in!”
Alessandra’s bracelets clinkety-clank. It’s the passive-aggressive sound of her discontent. Thankfully, the phone rings and Alessandra answers it. Edie splinters her attention long enough to realize that it’s the hostess from Cru calling back. Alessandra can handle the Katzens’ dinner reservation.
“Okay?” the peacock-haired woman says. She approaches with her children now firmly in hand. Both have white-blond hair and are wearing little round spectacles with thick lenses that make their eyes look like pale blue fish swimming behind glass; they’re so odd-looking, they’re cute. “My name is Kimber Marsh and this is Wanda and Louie. We’d like to book a room.”
“I can certainly help you with that,” Edie says. Their first walk-in! Lizbet will be thrilled; she confided to Edie that she’s concerned about their low occupancy. “What kind of room would best suit your needs?”
“I’d say we need a room with two queens. I can’t very well get them their own room, they’re too young.”
“For how many nights?”
“I’d like to stay for the entire summer.”
The entire summer? Edie thinks. She starts vibrating with excitement. This is what Lizbet has been hoping for: people hearing about the hotel and walking in off the street to book rooms.
“The rate on our deluxe guest room with two queen beds is three twenty-five,” Edie says. “With tax and fees, that room is four hundred dollars.”
“That’s fine,” Kimber says. “Please book us until…” She pulls up the calendar on her phone. “The kids have to be back in school then…add a few days to get ready…let’s say August twenty-fifth.”
Edie checks her availability, glances at Alessandra, who is just hanging up with Cru, and says, “Tell you what, I’m going to give you a free upgrade to one of our family suites.” The hotel has twelve suites and only one of them has been booked, so Edie feels fine about upgrading Kimber Marsh. The suites are divine and, in Edie’s opinion, should not be left languishing. Suite 114, which is the one Edie is giving the Marsh family, has a big living area with a full wall of brand-new hardcover books, all for the guests’ reading pleasure, and there’s a window seat overlooking Easton Street. This particular suite has a master bedroom and a whimsical room for kids with four wide bunk beds connected by tunnels and rope bridges; there are hidden reading nooks, and there’s even a swing. It’s very extra. Wanda and Louie will love it.
“You’re upgrading us?” Kimber says. She raises her sunglasses to the top of her head so she can read Edie’s name tag. “Edie Robbins, you’re an angel fallen to earth.”
Edie studies Kimber’s face. She has bleary-looking blue eyes with brownish-purple rings beneath them; she reminds Edie of a beleaguered mom in a laundry-detergent commercial. Edie fills with joy at being able to offer this nice blue-and-green-haired woman an upgrade. “It’s my enormous and whole-hearted pleasure,” she says. She’s overcome with a sense of professional pride and fulfillment. This is what hospitality is about—offering the guests something extra, something that makes them feel special, singled out and tended to. “I’ll just need to run a credit card.”
“Well, that’s the thing,” Kimber says. She glances at the children, who are as still as sentinels beside her. “Kids, go play chess, please. But only one game.”
“I don’t want to play chess,” Wanda says. “I want to read.” She holds up a book that Edie recognizes—a vintage Nancy Drew mystery with the canary-yellow back cover. The Secret of Shadow Ranch. Edie read the same edition when she was Wanda’s age.
“Please, Wanda?” Louie says. “I’ll let you win.”
Edie laughs and Kimber rolls her eyes. “He’s obsessed. He brought a travel chess set with him, of course, but he accidentally left it at the Connecticut welcome center and it was a river of tears all the way up I-95. I hope you like children, because we’ll never get him out of here. He’ll sit at that chessboard all summer.”
Edie laughs again, though a little less enthusiastically. Louie is able to drag Wanda over to the chessboard while Edie waits to hear what “thing” Kimber is talking about.
When the children are out of earshot, Kimber says, “I was hoping I could pay cash.”
“Cash?” Edie says. The woman is booking a room for four hundred dollars a night for eighty-one nights and she wants to pay cash?
Kimber drops her voice to a whisper. “I’m in the midst of a divorce, so both of my cards have been frozen because they draw on joint accounts, yada-yada. I have cash, but I won’t be able to give you a card, I’m afraid.”
Edie blinks. Who in the year 2022 is crazy enough to think she could check into a luxury hotel without a credit card?
“The charge won’t go through,” Edie says. “We just put a minimum hold on it, fifty dollars per night.”
Kimber Marsh says, “What I’m telling you is that it’s not going to work, the card will be declined.” She clears her throat. “We tried this already at the Faraway.”
“Ah,” Edie says. The Faraway is a fairly new boutique hotel in the center of town. If the Faraway didn’t let Kimber Marsh check in without a credit card, then Edie obviously shouldn’t either. But…she knows it’s the hotel’s mission to distinguish itself from the other luxury hotels on the island. Why shouldn’t they accept cash? Cash is money. But then Edie recalls the unspoken-but-understood reality of the hotel business: Guests lie. Their relationship with you—meaning the hotel staff—is temporary, so they feel they can say whatever they want. How many case studies did Edie read at Cornell about handling sticky situations with guests? Dozens—and yet none exactly like this. Her ex-boyfriend Graydon would probably say that Kimber Marsh was trying to pull a con, using her children as a smoke screen. She says she has cash, but what if she doesn’t? And even if she does, is she just going to hand over a stack of bills?
Edie needs to speak to Lizbet.
“I’ll just be one second,” Edie says. She pops into the back office and calls Lizbet’s cell, but it goes straight to voice mail. Ugh. She remembers that Lizbet is giving a tour of the property to the couple from Syracuse checking into room 303 and shouldn’t be interrupted. Every guest is a potential influencer.
Alessandra comes back into the office. “You’re letting those guests wither.”
Wither, really? Edie thinks. She’s been gone less than sixty seconds. “I need to speak to Lizbet.”
“Why don’t you let me take over their checkin since you’re not comfortable doing it.”
“I’m comfortable,” Edie says. She brushes past Alessandra, goes back out to the desk where Kimber Marsh waits. Edie hears Louie say, “Checkmate.” He starts setting the board up again while Wanda sinks back into the armchair and opens her book. “I really need to speak to my GM before I okay this,” Edie says.
Kimber Marsh leans in. “My soon-to-be-ex-husband left me for my nanny.” She emits a short, bitter laugh. “It’s such a cliché, but the reality is, I lost my spouse and my help. Craig and Jenny are spending the summer together in the Hamptons—Jenny just found out she’s pregnant—so I wanted to take my kids away rather than let them stew in the cauldron that is New York City. But not having a functioning credit card is an issue, I realize this.” She pauses. “What if I give you the first week in cash with an extra five hundred dollars thrown on top for incidentals?” She sighs. “Can you work with me? Please?”
Left her for the nanny? Edie thinks. Who’s pregnant? Of course Edie can work with her. This poor woman needs her help. Kimber Marsh wants her kids to have a fun summer, and Edie is going to make that happen (and maybe win the thousand-dollar bonus for her superlative service!).
She hears Alessandra’s bracelets but she doesn’t look over. She slides two key cards across the desk. “I’ll discuss your payment options with my GM, but for now, let’s get you settled in your suite.”
Alessandra clears her throat.