It was not at all clear to Ben how you could even leave Shooters with so much on your hands. Charisse’s order, alone, had to be delivered by two waiters. He was at least collected enough to know he needed some time to assess his options. So he tipped her head onto his shoulder and, with the free arm, began nibbling on french fries and taking small bites from the reuben he’d ordered. He looked at her coffee. If she would wake up for a second or two, he could perhaps get a few sips in her, and this might keep her awake long enough to consume some of what was overflowing the table.
But no. She was gone. He even checked her pulse to make sure it was not life-threatening. Seventy-two.
When midnight arrived he decided to act. He asked for the food to be boxed and for a red-haired waitress with a dollop too much mascara to carry the collection to the water taxi, while he carried Charisse, as though he was carrying her over a threshold. It would have been easier for him to carry her over his shoulder, like a sack of potatoes, but he figured this would too closely resemble a body snatching, or an overdose, and inspire a fuss.
He didn’t want a fuss. He just wanted a hotel room somewhere to end a day that was entirely misguided and nearly lethal.
To make matters a bit worse, one of the two motors on the water taxi began to smoke on the cruise back and had to be shut-off, thus slowing things down to a moonlit saunter. Even Fort Lauderdale was beginning to go to sleep. The mild salt air began to intrude on his senses, the stars got brighter through feathery windows in the clouds. Nothing at all like New England.
His back was beginning to tighten when he got her to the car. He fished the keys out of her alligator-skin purse, stretched her out in the back seat, and then found his way out of town somehow, heading back to the west, toward the Everglades, but then veered north toward Coral Springs.
After driving twenty minutes he noticed a sign for a Marriott and decided to exit and land there. It would be a bit pricey but it would have to do.
By the time he checked in, parked the car, smuggled her still-unconscious body into the room, and kicked his shoes off, it was 2:30 in the morning and he was exhausted. He quickly drifted off. When he awoke to the sound of a microwave oven, he couldn’t tell whether he’d been out for three hours or six. He didn’t even know there was a microwave in the room and whether it was Julia Child, Aunt Bea, Martha Stewart, Dom DeLuise or the Terminator operating the appliance, it mattered nothing to him.
“Oh dear mother of God!” he heard. “These egg rolls are to die for!”
He rolled over to face the wall.
“Where the coffee go?” was the last thing he heard before passing back into sleep.
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