Chapter Text
The last stop on the bus is Chestnut Hills, a tiny nowhere-town barely on any maps. There’s another line, the next one continuing east, but it will not run until morning. The correct series of events, in this occasion, is to leave the station and find the nearest motel. Book a room for one, ask the desk manager about breakfast. Sleep in the single bed, and in the morning follow the desk manager’s instructions to locate and procure breakfast. Eat it, then return to the bus station, and leave Chestnut Hills behind.
The Red Bird Motel is within walking distance from the bus station. Emmanuel keeps his hands on his duffel bag, slung over his left shoulder, as he walks. The weight is negligible but he has so very few belongings. He wants to keep them safe.
Emmanuel pushes the door to the motel lobby open. A man is standing at the desk, checking in, with a pile of suitcases around him. A young girl stands beside him, nose in a book, and a little boy is running around the space. He comes to a stop at Emmanuel’s feet and stares up at him. Emmanuel returns the child’s gaze.
“Hi,” the boy says. The light around his head is a pale blue. It pulses faintly.
“Hello,” Emmanuel says.
“Trevor, come on,” the father at the desk says, and the boy scampers away, periwinkle light smearing behind him. Emmanuel crosses to the desk.
“One room, please,” he says. The woman behind the desk, face half-hidden by a desktop computer, doesn’t even glance up at him.
“Alright,” she says. “Single or double?”
“Single,” Emmanuel says. There is a round glass jar on the desk. It is filled with colorful, round candies. He looks at the woman, who finally glances up at him. Her eyes are blue. Her lights are gathered on top of her head like a hat, and are a leafy green.
“Name?”
“Emmanuel Allen,” he says. She purses her lips and looks back at the computer, fingernails clicking against the keyboard. She does not ask what brings him to Chestnut Hills, and he is glad.
“Sixty dollars,” the woman says. Emmanuel reaches into the right front pocket of his slacks and retrieves his wallet. He carefully counts out twenties, and slides three over to her. She takes them, taps a few more keys on her keyboard. “Alrighty,” she says. She opens a drawer and extracts a key. She passes it to him over the counter. “Room 204. Checkout is at ten.”
“Thank you,” Emmanuel says, curling his hand around the key. “Um, is there breakfast?”
“Nope,” the woman says. “There’s a diner across the street--Jan’s. Can’t miss it. Open 24/7.”
“Thank you,” Emmanuel says again. The woman crosses her arms, eyes him up and down. The leafy lights rustle, then brighten.
“To be honest, if you want a good breakfast, go to the Super Good Bakery,” the woman says. Emmanuel has yet to find food he particularly likes, but he files this information away, anyway. “It’s downtown, not a long walk from here. It’s on the corner by the post office. That bakery’s never steered me wrong.”
“What’s it called?” Emmanuel asks. The woman smirks.
“It’s called the Super Good Bakery,” she says. “Apt name.”
“Oh, okay,” Emmanuel says. “I appreciate that you told me about it.”
“Yeah, no problem,” the woman says, waving him off, and Emmanuel takes that as a dismissal. Room 204 is up a flight of stairs. The paint on the door is peeling, but inside the room smells clean. There is a TV across from the bed and a small table with a chair beside the window. The bathroom is small but clear of mildew. Emmanuel puts his duffel on the table and his backpack on the chair. He looks at his watch. Twelve thirty-four.
He strips off his shoes, his slacks, his zip-up. He unbuttons the dress shirt he was wearing and folds it neatly. He puts on his pajama pants and takes his toiletries bag to the bathroom.
Because it is night and he figures he should, he relieves himself. He also brushes his teeth and washes his face, and as he leaves the bathroom and crosses back to the bed, he turns the lights out. He cannot turn on the TV because if he does he will stay up all night watching it.
Emmanuel gets under the covers and lays on his back. The ceiling has a thin spiderweb of cracks along it. He closes his eyes.
Daphne said that you slept by closing your eyes until you fell into a trance-like state. When you woke up, hours would have passed in a blink. She said eyelids got heavy and the brain went slow and foggy. Emmanuel lays on his back, eyes closed, for six hours. He feels every minute of it.
At six thirty in the morning, Emmanuel sits up. He turns on the TV and watches for twenty minutes before he showers. He can still hear the news from the bathroom, even with water running. The Chestnut Hills local news talks about an upcoming festival at the church. Emmanuel went to a church festival with Daphne. She wanted him to run a booth, but he told her he wanted to experience the festival normally. So they’d walked, hand-in-hand, and looked at all the creations being sold by their neighbors, friends, Bible study members and book club associates. They had shared cotton candy on the Ferris wheel, the festival spread out below them.
Emmanuel rubs shampoo through his hair aggressively.
The water is set to hot because Daphne would screech when the water was cold. Emmanuel doesn’t really mind either way. He rinses his hair and lathers up the small circle of motel soap. When he’s done in the shower, he checks his jaw and finds that he doesn’t need to shave. He usually doesn’t, but he always checks anyway. That’s how mornings go--wake up, shower, shave (if needed), brush your teeth, comb your hair, get dressed.
Emmanuel brushes his teeth. He combs his hair. He puts on a different pair of slacks, and a different button-up shirt. This one is pale yellow. He pulls on the same pullover and makes sure all of his things are gathered before he laces up his shoes, puts on his backpack, shoulders his duffel, and goes downstairs.
Emmanuel should eat. He didn’t eat last night--he has to eat on a schedule, or else he’ll forget. He doesn’t particularly like eating, so with that in mind he decides to go to the bakery. He can get something light there, perhaps a muffin or a croissant.
The morning is beautiful, bright and sunny, and Emmanuel arrives at the Super Good Bakery all too soon. He wishes the walk were longer, to enjoy the day. Perhaps when he is done with his breakfast he will walk about the town before returning to the bus station. After all, it’s not like he has anywhere to be.
Bells chime as Emmanuel pushes open the bakery door. Inside is warm, painted a soft yellow color. The front room is small, but there are two tables between the door and the counter, each with four chairs around them. Each chair is a different color than the last, creating a colorful rainbow. There are two people in line before the counter, and Emmanuel stands behind them, scanning the chalkboard menu. In colorful lettering, it declares an abundance of coffees and teas. Overwhelmed, Emmanuel changes his attention to the glass display case beside the cash register.
The top row of the display case is covered in cupcakes, each with carefully crafted swirls of icing and decorated with shimmery sprinkles. The bottom two rows of the case are stacked with pies, golden-brown and so fresh the glass is slightly fogged up. The middle row is crammed with cookies, muffins, and brownies. Emmanuel does not care for food, but even he admits that the array is dazzling.
He moves forward in line. Now that he’s closer to the case, he decides on a poppyseed muffin. Usually lemon is one of the flavors he doesn’t mind so much.
The woman in front of him in line steps aside to wait for her drink. Emmanuel takes a step forward, mouth opening to relay his order, but when he sees the man behind the cash register he falters.
The man standing there is beautiful. His eyes are apple green, his light hair is short, pointed toward the ceiling, and his cheeks are covered with freckles. His pink mouth is open, and the light around his head is golden, straining out in every direction like a lion’s mane. Emmanuel has never seen a person’s light so bright, so gorgeous before.
Emmanuel’s own light, or at least what he can see of it in the mirror, is different from a normal person’s. It’s white-blue, and contained, a tight knot hovering inside his face. It doesn’t leak out the way other humans’ do. It does shift into different shapes, curling and twisting, but that’s just another mark of Emmanuel’s strangeness. He doesn’t particularly like it. But this man--oh, Emmanuel likes his light very much.
The beautiful man blinks. “Um,” he croaks.
“One poppyseed muffin, please,” Emmanuel says. “And a cup of water.”
“You--” the man says. The golden halo around his head flickers. “Right. I’ll get that right for you.” The man turns away from the register to face the back counter. Emmanuel watches the broad lines of his shoulders and his stomach flips. The man takes a long time gathering up the water and the muffin, and his face is faintly red when he turns around.
“Here,” he says, passing the bag with the muffin over. Emmanuel reaches for it. Their fingers touch.
The man snatches his hand back and focuses on the register before him.
“Two dollars,” he says. His voice is deep. Emmanuel wants to roll in it.
He opens his wallet. He doesn’t have any singles, so he passes over his debit card. The man--he is wearing an apron, over an open flannel shirt and a superhero T-shirt, perhaps he is the baker--takes the card. He looks at it.
“Emmanuel?” he says.
“Yes,” Emmanuel says. “It means God is with us. It’s from the Bible.”
“Right,” the baker says, swiping Emmanuel’s debit card. He glances at Emmanuel from the corner of his eyes as he goes. Emmanuel tries not to stare at him. “D’you want a receipt?”
“What?” Oh, right. “Yes, please.”
The baker clicks his tongue and prints the receipt. He hands it with the card over to Emmanuel, who takes them carefully. “Thank you,” he says.
“Have a nice day,” the baker says.
“You too,” Emmanuel says, then he takes his muffin and his water and he leaves the bakery. He doesn’t get very far, though, just about five steps away, before he stops. He--that baker--
Emmanuel is no stranger to attraction. He has experienced it enough times, even, to know what kind of people he isn’t attracted to. But that baker--Emmanuel is overcome. He remembers the list-- locate and procure breakfast. Eat it, then return to the bus station, and leave Chestnut Hills behind. But perhaps he should stay, at least for a little while. At least to see the baker again, maybe to learn his name--
“Wait!”
Emmanuel turns. He nearly collides with the baker, who had run out of the Super Good Bakery. The man steadies himself. He stares at the half-eaten muffin in Emmanuel’s hand in shock.
“You actually--you’re eating it?”
“Um, yes?” Emmanuel says. “It’s good,” he lies. Well, maybe not a lie. It’s not bad.
“Oh, okay, that’s good,” the baker says, running his fingers through his hair.
“Did you need something?” Emmanuel asks politely.
“Um--is--I’ve never seen you, ‘round here,” the baker says. “Small town like this, all faces are familiar ones. You new? Staying long?” He gestures at Emmanuel’s duffel bag.
“I only arrived last night,” Emmanuel says. “I’ve been intending--”
“‘Cause if you’re new, and if you’re gonna stay, we’re hiring,” the baker says. Emmanuel blinks in surprise.
“I can’t bake.”
“We need a cashier,” the baker says. “Just, you know, if you wanna stick around.”
“Okay,” Emmanuel says. “I will consider it.”
“Cool,” the baker says, running his fingers through his hair. “Uh, I’m Dean, by the way.”
“Dean,” Emmanuel repeats. He likes the way it feels in his mouth. Dean swallows. He sticks out his hand.
Emmanuel takes it. Dean’s hand is calloused, strong. Emmanuel wonders what it would be like to hold it, but then the handshake ends.
“It’s nice to meet you,” Emmanuel says. Dean smiles. He looks kind of sad, or perhaps flustered. Emmanuel isn’t good at interpreting emotions. This entire encounter is quite confusing. Why would Dean extend a job offer to someone he’s barely met?
“You too, Emmanuel,” Dean says. He says the name carefully, like he’s never heard it before. “I’ll, um, see you around?”
“Yes,” Emmanuel says, and Dean grins, teeth white and the lights around his head flaring brightly, before he returns to the bakery, the door swinging shut behind him.
Emmanuel stares at the door until it stops.
Then a couple walk into the bakery and the door moves again, so Emmanuel turns around. He takes another bite of his muffin and walks toward the motel.
A job with a handsome baker, or restless wandering, bus to bus to bus, with motel rooms in between, no destination in mind and no purpose besides away from Colorado? Emmanuel knows which one sounds better.
He folds the muffin wrapper into a triangle and puts it in the paper bag the muffin came in. After he drinks the water, he puts the bag inside the plastic cup, then throws the combination away at a trash can on a street corner.
The Red Bird Motel lobby looks the same as it did last night. The woman behind the desk is the same one who signed him in last night and checked him out this morning. The green lights behind her head flutter somewhat sluggishly, but she smiles when she sees him.
“Actually,” Emmanuel says, mentally writing a new list. “I need another room.”
“For tonight?” the woman asks, reaching for her keyboard.
“No,” Emmanuel says. “No, I’m staying indefinitely.”
“Alrighty,” the woman says. She slides him a key. “Room 204. Welcome to Chestnut Hills, Emmanuel Allen.”
Emmanuel takes the same key as before, thanks her, and turns to find his room.