Thirteen hours and sixty-eight million cat howls later, my navigation app instructed us to turn off the interstate. The sun had set long before we crossed into New Mexico, but I could see the glint of water in our headlights as the Rio Grande snaked back and forth beside the two-lane highway.
It was a vaguely familiar journey, one I had taken with my mother the first eight springs of my life. Driving from Albuquerque to Donn’s Hill for the Afterlife Festival was our one big vacation every year, and it was weird to be making the trip the wrong way around. Several of the gas stations felt like places we had stopped at on our way home, but I couldn’t say for sure. Was that the same rest stop where I puked after ignoring my mom’s warnings about doing puzzle books in the back seat? Or did they all just have that same green paint and white powdered soap?
My clearest memory of our time on the road was listening to her favorite Oingo Boingo cassette over and over, singing along to “Dead Man’s Party” as loudly as we could. Graham had the same album on his iPod, and we mixed it in along with the R.E.M. and Oasis playlists he needed to stay focused on the road. During my turns as copilot, I texted pictures of the scenery to Kit, who replied with helpful tips from her own recent journey west: Don’t forget to pick up those gummy twin snakes next time you stop. They’re road-trip fuel!
Striker did better than I expected, mostly napping in her carrier. Graham pulled over frequently to let her stretch her legs on the truck’s seats, drink some water from her travel dish, and nibble a small pile of crunchy treats from his hand. But that level of first-class travel still left plenty of room for complaints. Any time we sped up to pass another vehicle or went around the gentlest of curves, she let out a guttural yowl that zinged straight into my heart.
“What’s this place called?” Graham asked.
“Yurt in Luck.” I checked my phone. “Two more miles.”
He chuckled. “Oh man, we have to tell Penny about that one. She hates punny stuff like that. I think it physically pained her when Tom named their motel E-Z Sleep.”
When I pictured our accommodations, I imagined something similar to that now-demolished motel outside Donn’s Hill: one long row of connected rooms strung together in a single building. The name of the place, plus the fact that Elizabeth had recommended it to us, should have warned me that Yurt in Luck would be a little different.
Rows of twinkling lights marked the entrance to a parking lot flanked by eleven small round structures. They were arranged in a wide V, with the end units closest to the road. The large center building beside the river had the word Office etched into the front window. An enormous sandstone slab welcomed us to Yurt in Luck Riverside Resort, and a pair of rustic wooden signs pointed toward Curios on one side and Critters on the other.
I left Graham in the truck with Striker and paused outside the office for a few moments, inhaling the sweet scent of the desert. I’d forgotten how good piñon pine smelled, and I let the freshness of the night air clear out my lungs and chase away the last of the day’s stress. After a few more greedy breaths, I left the soft gurgle of the river behind and stepped into the office.
Inside, a reedy man with a wild, gray beard munched on hummus and pretzel sticks at a messy desk. His weather-beaten face suggested he was in his seventies or eighties, but he leapt to his feet with the spry energy of a younger man and rushed forward to hold the door open for me.
“Come in, come in!” He patted my shoulders as I passed, then let the door fall closed and hurried back around to the business side of his desk. “How can I help you?”
“We have a reservation under Mackenzie Clair.” I handed over my driver’s license and my credit card.
He took them and sat down, frowning at the name printed on the cards. It wasn’t the facial expression I usually expected to see when checking in somewhere, and my unease mounted as he typed something into his computer and gave a slow shake of his head. “Hmm. I’m sorry, miss, but I don’t have anything under that name. Are you sure this is where you booked your stay? We are a little… uh… niche.”
“Shoot. Maybe it’s under Mac? I’m not sure which name my friend used when she booked it.”
“Nothing under Mac…. What’s your friend’s name? We might have put it under that.”
“Elizabeth Monk?”
The man’s cheeks split like baked sand as he grinned. “Cousin Lizzie! How do know you her?”
“She’s my massage therapist.”
“Lucky you! She’s famous now, did you know that?”
“So I’ve heard.” I was glad people outside Donn’s Hill had seen the video; that meant Yuri and Penelope’s strategy was working, and our work hadn’t been wasted.
“Well, let’s get you checked in. I’ll just update your name, Miss…”
“Clair,” I repeated, holding out my hand. “Call me Mac.”
“Fred Hawkes. Pleasure to meet you.” He pecked at his keyboard with two long, slow fingers. “Traveling alone?”
“No, my boyfriend is outside with our cat.”
“Cat?”
“Yeah. That’s okay, right?”
“Hmm.” A deep divot formed between his eyebrows. “We had you in one of our pet-free units. We can’t allow a cat in there. Allergies, you know.”
My earlier tension returned to my chest, squeezing tightly, as I imagined how expensive it would be to find a room somewhere else for tonight. “Is there another room available?”
“Not on the Critter side.” He frowned and glanced at the keys on the wall. Five hung beneath gold labels that matched the signs outside: four beneath Curios and one beneath Critters. “Well, maybe. I’ll have to check something.”
He picked up the phone and turned his back to me, murmuring into the mouthpiece at a volume too low for me to effectively eavesdrop. Meanwhile, I tried to remember if we had passed any other lodging within the last hour. Would they have a vacancy? Would they allow cats?
Just as I was pulling out my phone to see if it would be too cold to sleep in the truck tonight, Fred swiveled back around in his chair to squint at something on his computer screen.
“Well, can’t we just swap them in the system? … And what about her bags?” He glanced up at me and turned away again, but his volume wasn’t quite low enough to keep me from hearing him ask, “What did the police say?”
My eyebrows and my curiosity both shot into the stratosphere. What did the police have to do with our reservation?
When he hung up the phone, his mouth was pulled into a grim expression. “Okay, we’re all set.”
“Really?”
He leaned back in his chair, snatched the lone Critter key off the row of hooks, and hopped to his feet once more. “Let’s get you settled.”
Fred led me down the row of yurts on the right. Pools of yellow light from the bulb above each porch illuminated placards with words like White Elephant, Ladybug, and Scarab instead of numbers. Our unit was on the southernmost end, closest to the wooden round-rail fence that marked the edge of the property. It was a strange little structure; it looked as though someone had taken an enormous maroon sock and stretched it over a soup can large enough to live in, then punched in windows and a door as an afterthought. Whatever the material was made of, it was taut enough that it didn’t so much as flutter in the night breeze.
“Here you are: Tortoiseshell.” Fred slid the key into the door, jiggling the handle up and down as he turned it. “You have to give it a bit of a shake sometimes.” When the door still refused to budge, he gritted his teeth and glared at the handle for a second before giving the door a little kick. It popped open. “Ah, there we go! After you.”
The yurt felt larger inside than it looked from the outside, and the interior was pleasantly bright and clean. The walls—or wall, really, since it was a single rounded surface that stretched all the way around with no corners—were made from floor-to-ceiling cedar boards that had been polished to a high sheen. The linoleum bore a few deep scratches and scuffs, hinting at the structure’s age, but the familiar scent of Pine-Sol assured me the floor was cleaner than the average motel carpet.
The night sky was visible through a circular window at the peak of the ceiling from which the canvas roof cascaded gently down to the yurt’s sides. Most of the space was taken up by a queen-sized bed, above which hung a portrait of a tortoiseshell cat. The cat looked like she had two faces combined into one, creamy tan on one side and dusty black on the other.
“This is so weird,” I told Fred. “We have a tortie.”
“Lucky you!” he said for the second time. “Literally. All our units are named after good-luck charms, and I can’t think of a cuddlier one than a tortoiseshell cat.”
A wooden dresser, a small kitchenette, and a pine table with two chairs stood around the curved wall. I was relieved to see that none of the furniture was fabric or wicker. Everything was catproof.
“The bathroom and laundry are through here.” Fred disappeared through a door that had been cut into the yurt beside the kitchenette. When he reappeared a moment later, he was pulling a large piece of rolling luggage behind him.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Oh, just something the last guest left behind. Nothing to worry about.” He leaned the luggage against the main doorframe and turned back to me. “Now let’s see. Pots and pans are in the dresser’s bottom drawer, and spare toilet paper is in the cupboard above the washing machine. Any questions?”
I had several, but they were all about the silver suitcase, so I shook my head and smiled politely. “Nope. Thanks for doing whatever you had to do to make room for us. I think we’ll be really comfortable here.”
“Good.” He dropped the key onto the little dining table and pulled the left-behind luggage out the door, calling over his shoulder, “Don’t hesitate to call if you need anything, anything at all.”
Graham pulled the truck around to our side of the little triangular parking lot. As we ferried our luggage and Striker’s accessories into the yurt, I snuck a glance at our nimble host. Rather than taking the suitcase into the office, he put it in the farthest unit on the Curio side of the complex.
There was no time to wonder what he was doing. Striker’s sharp, high-pitched yowls set my priorities, and I found a place for her litter box between the sink and the tub. Not willing to take any chances, I locked her in the bathroom so she could acclimate to her surroundings and take care of business.
Graham was grinning at the photo above the bed when I closed the bathroom door. “This has to be a good sign, right?”
“I think so.” I gave him a quick kiss. “This is already a great trip.”
We took our time settling into our temporary home, tucking a week’s worth of cat food into the dresser drawers and unpacking our clothes. After such a long car ride, it felt good to stretch out on the large bed for a few minutes before releasing Striker from the bathroom.
She inspected every inch of the building’s interior with quivering whiskers and a wet nose. The furniture must have met her approval because she settled down on top of the pine table in a compact bundle and stared at the desert that stretched out beyond the fence.
“Let’s leave her here while we grab dinner,” Graham suggested. “We passed a taco place a few miles back that looked open.”
We left Striker to guard the yurt and drove back up the road to the restaurant Graham had seen. The all-night eatery took up the right half of a gas station, with counter service inside the convenience store. Graham ordered our food, and I wandered the shop, selecting sour candies, mini donuts, and potato chips to keep handy in the yurt. My purchases made, I joined Graham in a faded yellow booth to wait for our dinner.
He leaned against the hard plastic mold of the bench and leafed through the Arts section of the Albuquerque Journal. His posture was lazy, with one leg crossed over the other and the newspaper suspended between his elevated hands. I couldn’t see his face, but I knew his expression would be one of easy contentment, as though we were sitting in the kitchen of Primrose House instead of a Chevron.
I had always assumed Graham’s relaxed attitude had been because of his surroundings. Prior to this trip, I’d only seen him on his home turf. But he had carried that calm demeanor through every rest stop on the long drive here, and I realized that, in addition to his talent for sculpture, Graham had a knack for being comfortable anywhere he went. He could settle into any chair, pick up an abandoned copy of the local paper, and lose himself in the moment.
I envied that. No matter where I was or what I was doing, my mind wanted to focus on being somewhere else and doing something different. There always seemed to be some errand that needed running or question that needed answering. Like right now. How could I relax when tomorrow we would be visiting my childhood home?
“You okay?” Graham asked.
“Yeah, why?”
“You’re shaking the whole booth.”
I pressed down on my bouncing leg, forcing my foot to stop tapping. “Sorry. Now that we’re here, I’m excited to start seeing everything again.”
“Here.” He handed me a section of the paper. “This might help distract you while we wait.”
Attempting to mimic his Mr. Cleaver-like posture, I flicked open the paper and skimmed the current events. None of it interested me—I doubted I would care about local government business even if we were back in Donn’s Hill. As a tourist, I felt especially disconnected from New Mexico’s news.
Then a headline caught my eye with a word I had never seen before today but with which I was now intimately acquainted: YURT RESORT DEATH RULED ACCIDENTAL.
A woman found dead in the Socorro County desert died from hypothermia, officials said Friday. Camila Aster, 24, of Gainesville, Ga., was found in her pajamas just a few hundred yards from her motel outside Escondida after an unusually cold overnight low of 26 degrees Fahrenheit.
Aster was reported missing on Oct. 28 after failing to check out of her room on time. Resort staff found the door to her unit ajar and no signs of a struggle. She was in the Socorro area on vacation to visit the Very Large Array and was traveling alone, according to police.
“This was a shock to all of us,” said Lucille Hawkes, owner and operator of the Yurt in Luck Resort. “Our guests are like family.”
A chill ran up my spine, and I checked the date at the top of the page. The paper was only a day old. Within the last week, this woman had been staying at our exact same motel. What were the odds hers was the Tortoiseshell room?
One in ten, my brain chirped helpfully. But I knew in my gut that the luggage Fred Hawkes carried out of our unit hadn’t been left behind by anyone who’d gone home alive. Our room had last been occupied by the now-deceased Camila Aster.
I kept reading, rabidly curious to know more about the woman whose suitcase had so recently been wheeled out of our bathroom.
Authorities warn that hypothermia can set in at temperatures as high as 50 degrees, especially if alcohol or other substances are involved. Aster is the 22nd person to die of exposure this year…
My vision fuzzed, and my mind stopped processing the words in front of me. Suddenly, I was no longer sitting in a cheap taco shop. I was crying on the swing set in my mother’s backyard, clutching the chains at my sides and struggling to process her death. I hadn’t seen her die. I hadn’t even been allowed to see her body. All I had was a single word, a nonsensical bunch of syllables I hadn’t understood and hadn’t wanted to.
Exposure.
The word unleashed a tidal wave of emotions that would have knocked me over if I wasn’t already sitting down. As the cashier dropped a paper bag full of burritos onto our table, I burst into tears.