The noise escalated and Sierra hoped someone would complain. Mrs. Singleton didn’t stay the night in the hostel—she had her own small house in town. The young man who was left in charge for the night was pretty social; he might not mind the noise. Or the girls. When Sierra had checked in there were no single rooms and Mrs. Singleton said that chances were good no one would need a bed in a double and if anyone did, it would most certainly only be let to a woman.
She opened her book, midway, hungry for a little of Mr. Darcy’s evolution from aloof snob into a real hero. She put her smartphone on one of her music downloads, her earbuds in her ears and settled in to ignore the noise of girls having fun. She didn’t last long. Less than an hour passed when she went downstairs and told John, the young man in charge, he’d have to do something about the noise.
“I’ve talked to them a couple of times,” he said. “College girls. I don’t want to ask them to leave if I can avoid it.”
A little bit later one of the girls stumbled into the room. She looked about eighteen. And she was drunk.
“Roomie!” she greeted with a slur.
“Crap,” Sierra said. “You’re drunk!”
“Jes a little,” she said, then hiccuped. She held out a fifth of whiskey. “Wanna little?”
Before Sierra could even answer, the girl fell on the bed. Facedown. Dropping the fifth so it spilled onto the rug.
“That’s that, then,” Sierra said, looking back at her book.
But the girl stank. The room smelled of whiskey. And she was, of course, snoring like a freight train. The odds were good she’d end up sick.
Sierra packed up her things. She went downstairs and right out the door without saying a word to John. She’d work it all out later, ask for a refund. Right now she was feeling like this whole idea, all this bloody do-it-alone crap, was the biggest mistake of her life. She was on the verge of tears, but Sierra never cried. She punished herself by holding it fiercely and stoically inside. She could call Cal and Maggie, but she didn’t want to. What would they think? That Sierra the emotional cripple was going to hang on to them forever and they’d never be free? That three days in Timberlake and she was falling apart? So much for independence! She’d always be the baby to Cal even though she was thirty and had done some hard living.
She sat on a bench outside the dark barbershop and called her old sponsor and former roommate, Beth. The phone went straight to voice mail. She said, “Just me. Everything is fine.” Then she disconnected.
Well, so much for that.
Her phone rang immediately. Beth.
“It’s late,” Beth said. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m just a little screwed up. My head is on wrong. I’m staying in a hostel and got a drunk roommate—she can’t be twenty-one. Not that that ever stopped me. But I can’t be in that smell. I’m sitting on a bench on the main street of this little, dinky town and the only action is down the street at the only bar and grill and I can’t think. I can’t move. I don’t want this to be a mistake. Maybe I’m not ready. Jesus, it doesn’t take much to send me off the rails, I guess.”
“When did you last go to a meeting?” Beth asked.
“It’s been a while,” she said. “I’m not really settled in yet...”
“I guess you’re not if you’re staying in a hostel. Weren’t you going to be with your brother?”
“I never intended to stay with him,” Sierra said. “He’s just married six months or so and they’re pregnant. I’d be in the way. I want to see him a lot, not live with him. I have to figure this out.”
“Here’s what I want you to do. If there’s a meeting tonight—go to it. Then I want you to go to a motel. Worry about money later. Hit the first meeting of the day tomorrow. It might even be a two-meeting day. No more hostel business—you don’t want to be living with a bunch of college kids on a vacation bender...”
“The lady said they were strict...”
“Uh-huh,” Beth said. “Another thing that never stopped you. Talk to someone at a meeting about a sponsor. You shouldn’t fly solo in a new town. You should have someone you can call if only to go for coffee in the next few hours. Are you hungry? Tired?”
“Nothing like that. Just depressed. Why, I have no idea! My brother and sister-in-law pulled me right in, this place is beautiful, some drunk girl stumbled into my bedroom and stank up the place. That’s a good reason to be irritated not depressed!”
“We don’t need a reason,” Beth reminded her. “Find a safe, warm place tonight and call me in the morning. Find a meeting.”
“I will,” Sierra said.
“I’ll wait while you look,” Beth said.
Sierra gave a heavy sigh. She checked her phone app—a meeting locater. She did a little clicking. “Looks like I missed the last one...ten o’clock in Leadville, a thirty-minute drive. Midnight meeting in Denver—a long drive. But there’s a seven o’clock in the morning. I hate being the new kid.”
Beth laughed. “Come on, there’s a long list of things to hate.”
“I want to be strong,” Sierra said.
Beth laughed again. “Good luck with that. That one never works.”
We don’t pray for control, Sierra recited silently. We are powerless.
“Think you can make that early one in the morning?”
“Yeah. Sure.”
“Can you find a place to stay?”
“Yeah, there are places around. And there’s always my brother. One night wouldn’t kill him.”
“Or you?”
“Or me,” she said. “Okay, I think I have a handle on it now...”
Beth asked her to recite exactly what she was going to do. The little grocery was still open. She’d get some snacks, maybe a premade sandwich if they had some. Chips and a soda, maybe a cupcake or something. She’d find a warm, safe place to stay for the night, hit an early meeting, but by morning she’d feel a lot better and have a good plan.
It was amazing to her how fast that feeling of hopelessness could come over her. It was usually like this, a stack of relatively small issues—being the third person at a table, the odd one; her brother kissing his new wife and the envy she had that he had somehow managed to rebuild his life. She suddenly thought, I will never have that. Then the noise of partying in the hostel; the drunk girl. Any one or even two of those things wouldn’t have screwed up her head. Sierra was, if anything, resilient. She knew how to hunker down, breathe deeply, offer up a prayer or two, get through it. She worried that maybe she was given to some mental illness. Not the same as Jed’s—she didn’t have imaginary friends. But she believed she leaned toward depression.
She’d voiced that in a meeting once and at least five people said, Duh.
Impossible as it was for her to comprehend, she was still grieving the loss of her crutch, her best friend, her savior. Of course that crutch broke under her weight, that friend betrayed her, the savior cast her into hell.
She pulled her sleeping bag out of the trunk and put it in the pumpkin’s small backseat. Then she went to the grocery; they were just closing up so she turned on her fake smile and begged a favor, a few snacks if she could be quick.
“Got the munchies?” the clerk asked snidely.
A huff of laughter escaped her. “I’m not high!” she said, incredulous. “I’m staying at the hostel and there’s nothing to eat!”