Chapter 19: David's Glare
The lobby light fixture had been flickering for three days.
I'd put it off—other priorities, more urgent repairs, the endless list that seemed to grow faster than I could shrink it. But today Johnny had mentioned it twice, and Stevie had developed an eye twitch that seemed specifically triggered by the inconsistent illumination.
So here I was, balanced on a step ladder, unscrewing a fixture that predated the motel's last renovation by at least two decades.
The door slammed open behind me.
David Rose swept into the lobby like a storm system that had been brewing for weeks. His Brebner's apron was still visible under his coat—the humiliating uniform he hadn't bothered to remove before escaping work. His expression combined exhaustion, outrage, and the particular flavor of aristocratic suffering that seemed to be his default state.
He stopped mid-stride when he saw me.
Our eyes met across the lobby. I remembered the grocery store—his glare across the aisles, the silent accusation of having witnessed his lowest moment. That glare had softened over the intervening weeks, but it hadn't disappeared.
Now it returned in full force.
"So you're everywhere now?" His voice dripped with defensive hostility, the kind that came from someone who'd been preparing this confrontation in their head for days. "Watching me fail at bagging groceries, working at our hotel, probably dating Stevie—"
"I'm not dating Stevie."
The flat interruption caught him off-guard. His prepared attack crumbled mid-sentence, leaving him with words that no longer fit the conversation.
"You're not?"
"No."
"But you're always—" He gestured vaguely at the motel, at me, at the general state of everything. "You're always here."
"I work here." I returned my attention to the light fixture, unscrewing the final bolt. "Your father offered me a position. I accepted."
"My father hired you?"
"Part-time maintenance and hospitality training. Ask him if you don't believe me."
David processed this, his expression shifting through several variations of suspicion before settling on confused hostility—a slightly warmer version of his previous position.
"Why would you want to work here?"
"Because the motel needs help. Because I needed work. Because—" I paused, choosing words carefully. "Because I'm trying to build something useful instead of just drifting."
The honesty caught him off-guard again. David Rose, for all his defensive armor, seemed unprepared for people who simply told him what they were doing and why.
"That's... surprisingly honest."
"Is it?"
"Most people have ulterior motives. Schemes. Agendas." He crossed his arms, but the gesture was more protective than aggressive now. "Everyone in this town seems to want something."
"Everyone everywhere wants something. The question is whether what they want hurts anyone else."
He studied me for a long moment, searching for the manipulation, the angle, the hidden agenda that would make this make sense. I let him look.
"You saw me at Brebner's," he said finally. "At my worst."
"I saw you at work. There's no worst about that."
"I was humiliated."
"You were doing a job you didn't want in a situation you didn't choose. That's not humiliation. That's survival."
Something flickered in his expression—not quite gratitude, not quite acceptance, but the first crack in the wall he'd built between himself and everyone who'd seen him fall.
"I don't trust you," he said.
"That's fair."
"I probably won't trust you for a long time."
"Also fair."
He seemed thrown by my acceptance of his distrust. "You're not going to argue? Try to convince me you're worth trusting?"
"Trust isn't argued. It's earned." I removed the old fixture, setting it carefully on the step ladder's tray. "Come back in six months. If I'm still here, doing what I said I'd do, maybe we can have that conversation."
David stared at me like I'd sprouted a second head. Then, without another word, he turned and walked toward the rooms, the defensive hostility still present but the venom significantly reduced.
Stevie appeared from the office doorway she'd obviously been hiding behind.
"He's like that with everyone. Don't take it personally."
"I'm not."
"Good." She watched David's retreating form. "He's scared. They all are. They lost everything and ended up here, and everyone they meet is a potential threat or a reminder of how far they've fallen."
"Including me?"
"Especially you. You saw him at his worst and you didn't look away." She shrugged. "That's unforgivable in his world. People are supposed to pretend they didn't see the emperor's new clothes."
I thought about the grocery store, about the choice not to intervene, about the weight of watching someone suffer through something they needed to suffer.
"He'll be okay," I said. "Eventually."
"You sound certain."
"I've seen people rebuild after worse."
She gave me that look—the one that said she was filing this statement away for future analysis. "You say things like that. Things that suggest you know more than you should."
"Maybe I just pay attention."
"Maybe." She didn't sound convinced. "Finish the light fixture. I'm getting another headache from the flickering."
She returned to the office, leaving me alone with the wiring and the questions I couldn't answer.
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