outside
the bus station, I start asking around for the most expensive hotel in town. I
want Jacuzzis, I want fresh towels bigger than sheets, and I want room service
with a smile.
A taxi driver
directs me to what they call The Aurora Lodge and Resort Center, a many-starred
affair dropping down along the slopes with private patios so the guests can ski
right out from their rooms. The marble floor of the lobby is so polished you
get the feeling you could ice skate right across it. People sit around in arm
chairs in sweaters and waterproof pants reading paperbacks and watching skiers
fly down the mountainside. I tip the bellboy and tip a few of his friends, then
slip and slide over to the front desk and tell them I want luxury. They have me
checked in before I can pull out my Frequent Guest card, and the bellboy leads
me down some never-ending hallways to my own little piece of paradise. The
fireplace shoots flames at the push of a button, the bed could sleep everybody
you might meet, and the bathroom, I’m relieved to discover, comes equipped with
a bidet.
So I unpack my
worldly goods, slip the thirty-eight into the icebox of the minibar for
safekeeping, and call up Consuela in housekeeping to see what she can do about
an Italian suit that was never meant for Greyhound. Consuela’s on the scene in
forty seconds flat. Comes bursting through the door like the fire department.
“Where ees
dees soot?” she says, scanning the room like a maniac.
“I’m sorry,
Consuela, I don’t speak Spanish,” I say. She takes me by the lapels and shakes
her head at the sheer tragedy of it all.
“Off with
eet,” she says, and looks off towards the ceiling to give me a moment to work.
Hadn’t realized it was all that bad myself, but Consuela may have a point. A
perceptive woman, this little Consuela, and not unattractive with her black
hair up in a bun so tight it makes her look half-Oriental. She gets you
thinking maybe all this time you’ve been one of those masochists and never even
knew it. You wonder if maybe there’s a place to purchase a starter whip
somewhere in this town. Not to mention the white uniform, which of course is
fetish with a capital F as in fiesta.
Anyway, I get
the jacket off and then she sees the shirt, and believe me there is hell to
pay. She holds out her hand while hammering that little foot of hers on the
rug. I hand over the shirt without a protest and move on down to the main
event.
“I feel I
should say a little something here, Consuela,” I tell her. “But unfortunately
there is no word for it in Spanish. I know this because the people from the
dictionary down there came up to investigate. Turns out you lose too much in
translation, though maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad thing.”
Consuela may
or may not take this in, considering how she’s launched an assault on my
suitcase and I’m starting to feel like the Alamo in person. Humbling
experience, stripping unattended. By the time I get down to my pants zipper,
she’s got laundry piled up clear to her chin and I’m taking a little trip down
memory lane trying to pinpoint how exactly I came to be wearing no underwear.
“Holy Christ!”
I say by way of distraction, doing a little face I call the Poltergeist at the
sliding glass doors to the slopes. “It’s the Mighty Sequatchie Snow Beast.”
She goes for
it, and by the time she can turn back around I’m standing there in full
resplendence, unless you count the hat, which is technically just part of the
resplendence. Consuela scoots right across that hardwood like a hyperactive
lizard and has those pants up on the pile before I can make any introductions.
“Is that it?”
she says.
“You’ve got to
be kidding,” I say.
“No more
leetle socks under the bed maybe?”
“Sweetheart,
you’re holding my entire wardrobe in your hands there. How soon can we expect a
reunion?”
She shifts the
laundry up on her chest a little like she’s weighing it then subtracting the
clothes to
the bus station, I start asking around for the most expensive hotel in town. I
want Jacuzzis, I want fresh towels bigger than sheets, and I want room service
with a smile.
A taxi driver
directs me to what they call The Aurora Lodge and Resort Center, a many-starred
affair dropping down along the slopes with private patios so the guests can ski
right out from their rooms. The marble floor of the lobby is so polished you
get the feeling you could ice skate right across it. People sit around in arm
chairs in sweaters and waterproof pants reading paperbacks and watching skiers
fly down the mountainside. I tip the bellboy and tip a few of his friends, then
slip and slide over to the front desk and tell them I want luxury. They have me
checked in before I can pull out my Frequent Guest card, and the bellboy leads
me down some never-ending hallways to my own little piece of paradise. The
fireplace shoots flames at the push of a button, the bed could sleep everybody
you might meet, and the bathroom, I’m relieved to discover, comes equipped with
a bidet.
So I unpack my
worldly goods, slip the thirty-eight into the icebox of the minibar for
safekeeping, and call up Consuela in housekeeping to see what she can do about
an Italian suit that was never meant for Greyhound. Consuela’s on the scene in
forty seconds flat. Comes bursting through the door like the fire department.
“Where ees
dees soot?” she says, scanning the room like a maniac.
“I’m sorry,
Consuela, I don’t speak Spanish,” I say. She takes me by the lapels and shakes
her head at the sheer tragedy of it all.
“Off with
eet,” she says, and looks off towards the ceiling to give me a moment to work.
Hadn’t realized it was all that bad myself, but Consuela may have a point. A
perceptive woman, this little Consuela, and not unattractive with her black
hair up in a bun so tight it makes her look half-Oriental. She gets you
thinking maybe all this time you’ve been one of those masochists and never even
knew it. You wonder if maybe there’s a place to purchase a starter whip
somewhere in this town. Not to mention the white uniform, which of course is
fetish with a capital F as in fiesta.
Anyway, I get
the jacket off and then she sees the shirt, and believe me there is hell to
pay. She holds out her hand while hammering that little foot of hers on the
rug. I hand over the shirt without a protest and move on down to the main
event.
“I feel I
should say a little something here, Consuela,” I tell her. “But unfortunately
there is no word for it in Spanish. I know this because the people from the
dictionary down there came up to investigate. Turns out you lose too much in
translation, though maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad thing.”
Consuela may
or may not take this in, considering how she’s launched an assault on my
suitcase and I’m starting to feel like the Alamo in person. Humbling
experience, stripping unattended. By the time I get down to my pants zipper,
she’s got laundry piled up clear to her chin and I’m taking a little trip down
memory lane trying to pinpoint how exactly I came to be wearing no underwear.
“Holy Christ!”
I say by way of distraction, doing a little face I call the Poltergeist at the
sliding glass doors to the slopes. “It’s the Mighty Sequatchie Snow Beast.”
She goes for
it, and by the time she can turn back around I’m standing there in full
resplendence, unless you count the hat, which is technically just part of the
resplendence. Consuela scoots right across that hardwood like a hyperactive
lizard and has those pants up on the pile before I can make any introductions.
“Is that it?”
she says.
“You’ve got to
be kidding,” I say.
“No more
leetle socks under the bed maybe?”
“Sweetheart,
you’re holding my entire wardrobe in your hands there. How soon can we expect a
reunion?”
She shifts the
laundry up on her chest a little like she’s weighing it then subtracting the
clothes to
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