Mitchell Fiction: Message Received

“Here’s some mail and some messages that arrived for you, Mr. Vreyman,” the woman at the hotel counter said, handing over a pile that had to be at least two inches thick.

Mitchell tried not to groan at the sight of it. As he swiped the key card off the counter, he turned away and started reading the top page, a fax from JR.

“Oh, and a package!” the counter woman said, freezing Mitchell mid-stride.

Before he could react, Charlie lunged for it. “I’ll take that,” he said, snatching it away before Mitchell could see it. “Expecting anything?” The tour manager said.

Mitchell tried to read the label on it. “Just let me look for a second.”

“Sorry. If you’re not expecting it…”

Mitchell growled. So fucking what if this was JR’s new safety rule? It was entirely possible that Amy or Ma had sent this and forgotten to tell him to expect it. And if Kerri had sent it to surprise him, she’d have sent it directly to Charlie. His hotel sign-in name made her giggle. He kind of liked it: E. Vreyman.

Best of all, none of the band’s fans had figured it out.

Charlie wound up in the elevator with him, but Mitchell began sorting through the shit that had been waiting for him. All band business: from JR, their manager, from the record label, from the publicists. It was probably going to mean the rest of the day spent with Daniel, who was probably already in his room, making his own sense of the same exact shit.

He’d been in his room for three minutes when Charlie knocked at the door and handed the box to him. Didn’t even come in the room, just stuck his arm in and said, “My mistake. This was expected.”

Mitchell grunted at him, knowing the guy would freak if he heard anything more, and closed the door. The box wasn’t big; it sat right on his palm. It hung over the sides but didn’t make it to the tips of his fingers. It was a perfect cube.

Mitchell smiled at it. Only Kerri would find this sort of box.

He shoved the papers aside and sat on the edge of the bed to open the box and see what she’d sent.

It made no sense. She’d sent him a bottle opener.

He lifted it out of the packing peanuts and stared at it. It sat on his palm the same way the box had, only it was smaller. Seemed to weigh more now that it’d been freed from its package.

A bottle opener.

He didn’t get it. He rarely drank beer that still had the tops on when it was handed to him — and that assumed it was even still in the bottle. He hadn’t gotten used to the way people fell over themselves to open a stupid bottle of beer for him. Like he was incapable now that the band was big.

It made as much sense as the bottle opener.

Except, suddenly, the bottle opener made perfect sense.

Mitchell grinned. He couldn’t help it.

He stretched out on the bed, pulled a pillow out from under the ugly comforter, and got lost in the plans of what exactly they were going to do to each other when she showed up in a day or two.

When the knock sounded on the door, he laughed. He hadn’t realized he’d been expecting it. Or the gorgeous redhead who was on the other side, holding a stack of extra towels and a bottle of schnapps.

***
Lots more Sunday Scribblings for you, and lots of messages inside those scribblings. Go knock yourself out.