Hi, guys! So I'm back with a new short story that I'm going to be working on over the summer. I wanted to do something less stressful while editing Vanilla and before I tackle my next novel, and the idea for this popped into my head. So, here we go.

I know this story is incredibly cliche, and I'll probably get a lot of criticism for that. But you know what? I don't care. This is a short story; it's nothing serious. It's a fun summer project purely for my entertainment (and yours). I hope you enjoy it!

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            “Look at this!”

            The barking demand was succeeded by two things: the first, the glossy magazine that fell with a resounding slap right into my lap; the second, my younger sister’s beaming expression, quivering at the seams with the effort of holding back the full extent of her glee.

            I should’ve known what was coming. I didn’t even really need to let my eyes trail downward, skimming over the features of the bold cover image, to know what Rosemarie was so excited about. But I found myself doing it anyway.

            “Leon McCarthy!” she squealed.

            That much had been evident, of course, the moment my eyes fell upon the swooping blonde hair and baby features of the boy in the photo, charm oozing from the very pixels of his printed smile. We didn’t need to be on first-name terms for me to know exactly who he was; anybody who’d set one foot inside Rosemarie’s bedroom in the past year would find themselves able to discern that this was the same boy who appeared on all thirteen of her posters, not to mention her impressive assortment of Leon-related merchandise. Wristbands, hoodies, printed post-its: you name it, Rosemarie owned it.

            In fact, my twelve-year-old sister was a super fan to the extent that I was certain I could now recognise any given song from his debut album within the first few beats of the intro, reel off personal details like his height and favourite food like some sort of mantra, all while humming the acoustic accompaniment to his most popular song, Hand On My Heart.

            She was in deep. And, consequently, so was I.

            “What is it this time?” Though I did my best to keep the bored tone from seeping into my voice, I found its essence trickling in anyway. I couldn’t help it. Since the foundations of my sister’s obsession had been laid into place, my brain had developed a tendency to switch off at the first mention of the L-word.

            Nevertheless, my lack of enthusiasm wasn’t about to deter Rosemarie. “Read it!” she insisted, pushing the magazine closer to me. Her fiery red ponytail, secured with her favourite sparkly hair band, bobbed fervently with the movement of her head. “Read what it says!”

            I could think of a number of situations in which I’d have been considerably more tolerant towards my sister’s incessant hyperactivity; it just so happened that here, right now, was not one of them. Stationed at the check-in desk on an afternoon that was set to mark the beginning of a spectacularly busy tourist season, baking in the sheer humidity of the confinement, I couldn’t find it in myself to muster up a display of false enthusiasm.

            Mum had paid attention when I reminded her to get somebody in to fix the broken air conditioning in the reception area of our family-owned hotel – The Beach House, the only hotel in Walden-on-Sea with a clifftop ocean view! – and the repairmen were due tomorrow morning. But saying this was forgetting the small matter that we lived in England, and putting even the tiniest slither of faith in that any freak heat waves would hold off until tomorrow was, really, just foolish. The weatherman had predicted highs of thirty-two, the air con kept up its stubborn refusal to function, and I was being roasted alive.

            Still, never one to enjoy disappointing my sister, I forced myself to look back at the magazine, picking it up and letting my eyes run across the headline beneath Leon’s sugary expression.

            “He’s filming his new music video,” I read aloud. Then, I looked back up at Rosemarie, feigning a weak smile. It was something of a difficult feat, however, when I’d spent the last two hours stuck in the same sweltering spot, checking in clusters of guests abuzz with anticipation for their upcoming summer break. Why exactly they still trekked to Walden, a town with shockingly little going for it, remained a mystery, but the fact remained that they did, and also required a place to crash for the duration of their stay. Enter The Beach House. “That’s great, Rose.”

            “No, no,” she insisted, jabbing a finger at a smaller wad of text further down the page, “read it. Look where he’s filming it!”

            Running a hand through my blonde hair, dragging its stray strands away from my sweaty forehead, I complied. My mind fumbled messily through the text, lingering on words of importance swimming between exaggerated tween slang, before I drew to the end of paragraph in time to wince at my sister’s ear-splitting squeal.

            “Isn’t it so cool?!” she screeched. “He’s filming in Aylesbury! That’s, like, fifteen minutes away! Leon McCarthy is fifteen minutes away from Walden!”

            “Wow,” I told her, delicately pushing the magazine to one side to make room for the computer keyboard I was already tugging back to me, “that’s… exciting, huh?”

            “But Coraline! Do you even understand what this means?”

            My attention had already been diverted towards the screen; only a minimal fraction remained on my sister. It wasn’t that I hated my position as the front desk woman for the afternoon, filling in while my parents took care of admin upstairs in the office, listening to Rosemarie talk my ear off about all things Leon. But the fact stood that it was a summer job, and the least I could do to help my parents over the most stressful time of the year. While tourists brought cash, they also brought problems – and these could stretch anything from not having enough fresh towels laid out for them upon every return, to broken loo roll holders, to complaints of the ocean view not being sufficiently ocean-oriented. Summer might’ve been a holiday for most, but this definitely didn’t apply to hotel owners.

            Now, with Rosemarie, I answered distractedly. “What?”

            “It means,” she explained, hopping up on the front desk, “that all I have to do is convince Mum or Dad to drive me up there one afternoon, and I might even get to meet Leon!”

            I didn’t want to crush her hopes. Really, I didn’t. But sometimes, especially in situations like these, there was a distinct lack of alternatives. “Look, Rose,” I began gently, swivelling my chair to face her, “I know how important this is to you, but you have to remember that summer’s just starting. Mum and Dad are going to be swept off their feet with work for the next few weeks. You know how crazy things get around here at this time of year. It’s not fair to be bothering them.”

            Her already drooping expression sent a pang of guilt niggling at my chest; my next half-hearted suggestion constituted my attempt at salvaging what was left of her good mood. After all, she was the one giving up a day on the beach to sit here with me, in this baking sauna, just to keep me company. “But I’ll tell you what,” I added, “if I get some time, and Leon’s still in town, we might be able to take a trip up to Aylesbury. No promises, but I’ll try. How’s that?”

            She yelped in excitement, the squeal escaping from the face-wide grin that materialised across her expression instantly. “Thank you!” she gushed. “Thank you, thank you, thank you! You’re the best sister ever, Coraline!”

            I let her envelope me in a bone-crushing hug, though my body temperature was already sky-high, my skin uncomfortably sticky with a layer of perspiration. Blowing air from my cheeks, I dragged a hand across my forehead, making a mental note to dig around in the store cupboard sometime later in search of a fan.

            My gaze had found its way back to the computer screen when a dormant thought popped into my head. “Oh, hey, Rose: could you do me a favour?”

            She looked up, ever attentive, the freckles splayed across her cheeks more noticeable than ever against her pale skin.

            “Room twenty-five were asking for a fresh batch of towels earlier, but I never got round to sending them up. Could you grab a pile from the laundry room and deliver them for me?”

            “Sure!”

            She vanished in a flash, disappearing swiftly through the door that tailed off into the main corridor, her eagerness to assist coupled with a desperation to escape the unpleasantly stagnant air of reception. I let myself breathe a sigh of relief once she’d gone, relishing the moment of silence that descended upon my surroundings. I loved my sister to bits, especially since she was probably the kindest and most caring twelve-year-old in existence, but really, there was only so much Leon McCarthy I could take before requiring a breather, for sanity’s sake.

            The thought had barely had a chance to scuttle across my mind before the tinkling of the overhead bell pulled me back into reality; it was shortly followed by the pounding of urgent footsteps on the wood panelling. I looked up in time to catch sight of the figure already halfway across the room, closing in on me with peculiar speed. He was tall: that much I could gather straight off, especially noticing the slightly clumsy way his steps fell into place. Flaunting a blatant disregard for the temperature, the boy had a beanie pulled down over his head, only a few stray wisps of blonde escaping from beneath the fabric, and dark sunglasses that completely obscured his facial features.

            He was panting  when he reached the desk, hands stretching out to grip the wooden edge, steadying himself.

            “Um,” I began, subconsciously reaching up to adjust the name badge pinned on my shirt, “can I help you?”

            “I need a room,” he breathed. Beginnings and endings of each word blending into one another, his speech was an incomprehensible stream that proved difficult to follow.

            I straightened a little in my seat, already assuming my air of professional poise that I’d refined over many summers of practice. “Have you made a reservation? I’ll just need to take your booking number and your last name so that I can—”

            “I don’t have a reservation. I just need a room. Right now. It’s, uh…” He glanced over his shoulder, looking back at the closed door in a manner that oozed paranoia. “It’s really urgent.”

            “I’m afraid we don’t have any rooms available at the minute,” I said, my tone clipped and polished like I’d practiced: the same for every guest. “It’s the first week of summer, and therefore our busiest time of the year. All of our rooms booked up weeks in advance. I’m afraid you’ll have to try—”

            “You don’t understand.”

            I stopped, surprised. “Sorry?”

            “Look, I’m sorry, but you really don’t understand,” he repeated, a detectable sense of urgency leaking into his exasperated tone. He looked about to run a hand through his hair, before remembering it was hidden beneath his hat, his arm dropping back to his side. “I’m desperate here. I know it’s a really long shot, but could you just check your computer or something? There’s got to be something you can do for me here.”

            “I really don’t think—”

            “Please?”

            Now, I paused, feeling myself under an inexplicable scrutiny, even though the eyes of the boy remained hidden behind dark lenses. “Okay. I’ll check.”

            Hands moving swiftly over the keyboard, I tapped into the usual database: the central hub for all our reservations and current vacancies. My little finger hit the enter key, and I waited for the bold message to materialise across the screen, to confirm my well-informed suspicions that there were, in fact, no rooms available. When it didn’t, I found myself frowning, leaning closer to the screen in an attempt to pinpoint the details of the change.

            “Anything?” he pressed, leaning into the desk.

            The no had been balanced on my tongue, ready to precede my professional apology: the one that reeled off as easily as flicking a switch. Yet now I swallowed over it, peering at the computer. “Actually, it seems we’ve had a cancellation,” I told him. “It says here that the Lighthouse Suite is now available. Still, you should probably be aware that that particular suite is our newest and most spacious, and so naturally you’ll find its nightly rates are significantly—”

            “I’ll take it.”

            “Sorry?”

            “I said I’ll take it.” He was already fumbling in his pockets, extracting a black leather wallet and rifling through its many compartments. Seconds later, a credit card had been thrust across the desk, skimming the polished surface before skidding to a halt in front of me. “Just take it. Charge whatever you need to. Now where do I sign?”

            I felt as if I should say something, to extend what had been a remarkably short conversation for somebody who’d just booked the most expensive suite in the entire hotel, let alone at a moment’s notice. But I couldn’t find the words in my mouth, instead silently removing the check-in book from behind the counter, sliding it over to him with the pen I always kept handy behind my ear.

            I watched his scrawl take messy form on the paper, the pen obeying each of his hand’s juddering movements, the letters of his signature stretching right outside the allocated box. A few drops of stray ink splattered across the page as he dropped the pen, looking up at me with a restlessly expectant expression.

            “So, uh… your key, I guess.”

            I winced internally at the hesitance that plagued my tone as I turned my back on the stranger, reaching up for the key labelled Lighthouse Suite. The key ring attached was light: a fake silver finish, moulded to the shape of an anchor. Running a finger over its surface, I was struck by an odd sense of reluctance: a doubt as to whether I should even hand it over at all.

            But when I turned to face the boy, he was biting his lip, shifting his weight on the balls of his feet in a stance of pure restlessness. And in that moment, I found myself compelled to hand it over.

            “Here,” I told him, as the cool metal exchanged hands, “enjoy your stay. If you bear with me one second, I’ll just show you to your—”

            “No need!” he interrupted briskly, feet already starting to carry him in the opposite direction. “I’m sure I can find it myself! Lighthouse Suite, right?”

            It was only when he reached the door, one hand already on the handle, that he paused, eventually turning back to shoot me a smile I could tell was genuine, even beneath his sunglasses. “Oh, and thanks. I really appreciate this.”

            By the time he’d disappeared, the sound of the lift doors sliding smoothly open creeping in from the corridor, I couldn’t help myself. Succumbing to temptation, I cracked open the check-in book to the page he’d scribbled on, leaning in closer to inspect the letters of his hurried scrawl.

            Lenny Maguire, it read.

            As I closed the book, I found myself testing the name out in my head, drawing out the syllables for much longer than necessary. Funny, I thought, as I slotted the book back into its position on the shelf, he didn’t look much like a Lenny.

            And even when Rosemarie made a bounding reappearance into reception, having completed the errand for room twenty-five, humming the tune of a Leon McCarthy song I was ashamed to say I recognised, I couldn’t seem to put the Lighthouse Suite’s newest guest out of my mind.

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So, there we go. Not sure how updates are going to be since this isn't really a serious project; my main priority this summer is editing Vanilla. Nevertheless, I hope you enjoyed it, and be sure to drop me a comment to let me know what you think! :)