Fourteen

But Claire was already on her feet, already feeling herself pulled towards the counter by the same magnetic force that had tugged her there the day before. Coming to her senses, she paused, looking back at Jack who was still gathering his things—as well as the book, sweatshirt, and water bottle she had left behind in her haste.

He joined her halfway to the counter, chuckling softly to himself.

“This was what you were thinking, right?“ Claire asked as a thought suddenly occurred to her. “You weren’t suggesting we should definitely not take the offer, right? Like, we should wait and see who would accept it and then give them some pointers for how to spend the day?”

He shook his head, nudging her forward to the counter. “Not at all. I didn’t want this time to be finished, and I don’t think you did either. And when life gives you the thing you’ve spent all morning wishing for, you’d have to be a fool not to accept it.”

“That’s true. So you’re saying it’s big of me to admit that I wanted this?”

“Absolutely. How else are you supposed to get it?”

They were in front of the counter now, the same agent from the day before greeting them with a smile and slightly quizzical expression. If she actually recognized the two of them from the previous day’s attempted flight, Claire would be seriously impressed. Then again, it was probably to the benefit of airline employees and to the ultimate security of everyone at the airport for airline staff to be good with faces.

“Can I help you?” the agent asked, fingers poised on her keyboard. 

Jack spoke up. “We heard the offer for two people to take the next flight tomorrow, and we wanted to accept it.”

The woman behind the counter studied both of them more carefully. “Did you…?” she began, her eyes darting back and forth from one to the other.

“We both accepted the same offer yesterday. Alone. But then we became friends and spent the day exploring Munich together, and now we want to do it all again,” offered Claire.

“Right…” The woman paused, as if she were thinking through the deeper implications of Claire’s words. “You really want to stay again? The offer doesn’t get any better, I’m afraid, the more days in a row you take it.”

“Oh. No.” Claire exchanged a glance with Jack and continued speaking. “We aren’t planning on making a life or a career out of staying in Munich one day at a time. And I’m pretty sure we do both need to get back home before Christmas comes. But today?” She shrugged. “We can do today. One more day in Munich sounds like a fun adventure, and I don’t think you could talk either one of us out of it if you tried.”

“Very well then,” the woman said as she began typing on the computer. “In that case, I believe you know how this all works. Please wait just a moment while we gather the vouchers for you and arrange the shuttle to the hotel.”

“Oh! I almost forgot,” Jack interjected. “Would it be possible for us to have our suitcases with us at the hotel? One day of living out of your carry-on is fine, but a second day is pushing it.”

“You didn’t have your bags with you last night?” The woman looked horrified. “I’m very sorry about that. That was an oversight on our part.” A thoughtful expression crossed her face. “Let me just see one thing here…” She continued to tap away on the keyboard, her fingers flying so rapidly that Claire couldn’t even begin to imagine what she was doing. Sending a newsy holiday email to her great uncle? That was possible. Writing the last ten pages of her thesis? Only time would tell.

“There,” the woman said finally, a pleased expression lifting her features. “Everything is all taken care of. If you’d just have a seat over here, I’ll have your bags here shortly.”

Claire perched on the seat next to Jack, leaning into his space to whisper to him, unable to stop the grin from spreading wider across her face. “I am so freaking excited about this,“ she hissed. “Just think of all the fun we’re going to have! We can go to the Christmas market again—”

“Duh,” Jack cut in. “I couldn’t even tell you what else I want to do today, but a second night at the Christmas market is a must. Should I text Hendrik and let him know?”

Claire bit her lip as a bitter feeling blossomed in her stomach. Was it selfish to want to keep Jack for herself on this bonus day? If so, why should she care? If the universe was in the business of granting wishes, then she didn’t need to keep any of her desires to herself. “Don’t,” she said with a shake of her head. “Nothing against him or Jana, but don’t you think it would be kind of fun to experience it, just the two of us?”

Jack nodded, looking pleased, but didn’t say anything. Was it her imagination, or had his ears turned pink at the edges?

“We should let people know,” she said, digging her phone from her pocket. “Make sure no one heads to the airport this evening to pick us up from a flight that we aren’t on. And promise them we’ll be there tomorrow.”

Jack shot her a glance. “Can you really make that promise? If the same offer comes up again tomorrow, you won’t take it?”

She grimaced. “I will probably want to take it…but maybe by tomorrow I will have gotten this city out of my system and be ready to breathe some New York air. Plus, we’re cutting it dangerously close to missing the holidays entirely. And what’s next once you miss Christmas? Will we be in Germany through New Year’s Eve? Valentine’s Day? St. Patrick’s Day? Where does it end? Where do you draw the line?”

Jack was already tapping away on his phone, no doubt sending an update to Hazel and his parents, shaking his head at her at the same time. “I’m ignoring you,” he explained, “because you’re taking a perfectly legitimate concern and making it ridiculous. It’s understandable if my parents or yours are worried about the meaning of a member of the family missing Christmas.”

Claire gasped in fake affront. “And you don’t think they’re entitled to feel exactly the same way about me sitting out President’s Day? Where is your holiday spirit, mister?”

She tutted her disapproval, then fired off a few text messages. There was a quick message in the group chat to her parents, letting them know her plans had been delayed by one more day, along with a similar message to Bianca. She refused to acknowledge the unspoken elephant in the room that was eating up all the oxygen…if Bianca wanted to talk to her, she would figure out a way to do it that didn’t involve teasing and torturing Claire.

The final message she sent was to Emma.

“So, guess who’s once again jumping at the chance to take the next flight tomorrow and spend a fun and frisky day exploring Munich? I’ll give you a hint: it’s not just me, but I feel a lot differently about the other person than I did at this time yesterday.”

Emma sent back a solid line of exclamation points, followed by another line of question marks. “What do you mean? Can’t the airline get their shit together and get you back to the States? Or is something brewing between you and Mr. Tech Bro? Blink twice if you need to be rescued. I can be there in, like, 8 hours.”

Claire sighed as she wrote back. “I definitely could have flown back today if I wanted to. But Jack and I both thought it sounded like more fun to have an extra bonus day in Munich, on top of the bonus day we already spent here.”

“Okayyyyy…so you’re not being held against your will?”

“Not even a little bit. And in case you were wondering, though apparently you weren’t, I’m not holding him here against his will either.”

That earned her an emoji rolling its eyes skyward. “As if anyone ‘stuck’ spending a day with you could do it against their will. I’m totally jealous of Tech Bro, by the way. I wish it was me getting to hang out with you all day. Are you going to allow him to participate in Christmas Eve Eve today?”

Claire pursed her lips in thought, tapping her nails on the edge of the screen before writing back. “Good question. I suppose I could put the offer on the table. Considering that you let Connor participate from the very first week you met him, I don’t think I’d be violating a sacred contract or anything like that.”

More eye rolls. “Not why I was asking, but good to know. Just…have fun and be safe and get home eventually, okay? And let me know when you do.”

“Would I ever not tell you something like that? For all the mundane details of my day-to-day life that I readily share with you, I think you can rest confidently knowing I’ll share any transatlantic flight details with you.”

She sent one final message before tucking her phone back in her pocket: “By the way, if you and Connor want to come crash Christmas Eve Eve at the hotel, you’d be more than welcome.”

Emma’s response came quickly enough that the phone vibrated before Claire had even released her grip. She pulled it back out and smiled at the message. “I would in a heartbeat. But something tells me that this little two person party you have going on with Tech Bro definitely doesn’t need to be crashed.” As if the meaning of her message weren’t obvious enough, Emma had included a series of emojis, starting with a winking eye, then progressing to a kissing face, and ending with a face surrounded in hearts.

A uniformed man approached the bench where they were sitting then. “Mr. Holloway and Ms. Davis?” he asked. At their nod, he gestured for them to follow him. “I’ll escort you to the shuttle. Your suitcases have already been collected and will meet us there. I believe you already have all your vouchers and compensation accounted for?”

“We do.” Jack nodded, handing Claire her sweatshirt, water bottle, and book. A brief thought flashed through her mind, a question of how she had managed to travel for the past few weeks on her own without losing any of her possessions. Maybe she was just more careful when she didn’t have someone else to lean on, but now that Jack was here, she could really just relax…and apparently come dangerously close to leaving half of her carry-on luggage behind when she walked away.

The shuttle was identical to the one that had carried them to the airport that morning, all the way down to the driver, who did a double take when he saw them.

“It’s really us again,” said Claire with a smile. “We just can’t get enough of that hotel of yours.” He looked puzzled and didn’t say anything in response, but at least he returned her smile.

“It’s nice to see this bad boy again,” she said as she slapped the side of her suitcase and took a seat. “I think the first order of business, for me anyway, is a shower and a change of clothes. What do you think? Head out after that?”

Jack had taken a seat across the aisle from her again, both of them taking up the empty seat next to them with their suitcases. “That’s a good plan,” he said. “I can’t say there’s anything too specific that I’m dying to do in the daytime, either, so if you’ve got any ideas, I’m all ears.”

Claire shrugged. “I think after I shower, I’ll be searching on my phone for the must see places in Munich. Because off the top of my head, all I can think of is Oktoberfest and I am pretty sure that’s irrelevant right now. Unless there’s a Decemberfest that I don’t know about.”

Jack shook his head at her. “And you think my jokes are bad? How much more Decemberfest can you get than a full-on Christmas market, though? Maybe we could go to the English Garden and walk around a bit? Can’t go wrong with a little fresh air before a big travel day.”

“We have to stop talking about big travel days,” said Claire, “Or I’m afraid we’ll end up stuck in this weird travel purgatory where we’re always getting ready to fly across an ocean tomorrow and yet tomorrow just never comes.”

“It’s too soon to say if just because we haven’t been able to leave twice if we’ve actually found ourselves in some sort of Hotel California situation. Especially considering that we were both willing participants in our travel delays. In fact…“ He gave her a meaningful look. “You might even say we volunteered for our travel delays.”

But Claire just rolled her eyes at him and went back to looking out the window. It had a twofold benefit, in that she got to admire the passing scenery while also hiding the smile that had spread across her face. Of course they were both excited for the extra time in Munich, a little extra adventure, but that didn’t mean she needed to be so expressive about it.

At the hotel, Klaus appeared completely unsurprised to see them—or else he had the best poker face Claire had ever seen. “Welcome back, Mr. Holloway and Ms. Davis. We received your reservation from the airline, and we have upgraded you to a suite per their request.”

Ah. So that was why he wasn’t surprised to see them. Of course he had already spoken with the airline staff, but…

Hang on a second. What did he say? Claire thought, but Jack was already speaking up.

“I think there’s been a mistake, Klaus,” he said, leaning in with concern. “We need two rooms, and neither one of them needs to be a suite. Ms. Davis and I aren’t traveling together.”

Klaus raised a skeptical eyebrow. “I knew this was happening yesterday, but still I played along with your whole role-playing charade. But when the airline called and said the two of you were coming back again and then asked for an upgraded room given that it was the second night in a row you would be staying here, the truth was revealed. I’m afraid the reservation is locked in the system and unless one of you wants to pay out of pocket for another room, then it’s the presidential suite for you. Such a hardship, I’m sure.”

Jack’s hand reached for his pocket, but Claire put a hand on his forearm to stop him. “It’s okay,” she said with a small nod. “We don’t need another room.” She hated the thought of Jack spending his own money on nothing more than a bed to sleep in that night just as much as she hated the thought of whipping out her own credit card and letting Klaus run it through the machine. She looked back at Klaus then. “I’m sure the room—the suite, in fact—has at least two beds, right?” When Klaus nodded, she looked back at Jack. “Then it’s fine. It’s hardly any different from having two adjoining rooms like we did yesterday.”

Klaus pursed his lips, but when neither of them raised additional objections, he began to speak again. “The presidential suite features a king size bed with an en-suite bathroom, as well as a kitchenette and living room with a fold-out couch. Will you be needing linens for the fold-out couch as well?” He raised an eyebrow as if he were asking the question of our mere formality, but Jack nodded.

“Yes, please,” he said. “I’ll sleep on the couch.” 

Claire smiled and nodded along, though she felt the vaguest flash of disappointment. It wasn’t that she wanted to share a bed with Jack, necessarily, or that she was unaware of just how awkward it would be to do that—what, would they build a wall of pillows down the middle to ensure that no touching happened? It might be Jack’s perceived resistance to being near her that was making her feel a bit off, or it might just be the fact that she was practically on the verge of living out one of her favorite romance tropes to write, only to have it pulled from her grasp.

“Only one bed” is way better on paper than in real life, she reassured herself. In real life, it’s all awkwardly positioned bodies, no rest for anyone, and it ends with morning breath and pre-caffeine conversation. At least this way we’ll both get some sleep and still have the maximum amount of time to hang out as well.

Klaus handed them their keys, directed them to the already familiar elevator, and assured them that a housekeeper would be up with extra linens soon. Jack and Claire thanked him for his help and were silent until the elevator doors closed behind them.

As soon as the last sliver of the lobby disappeared behind the silver doors, she chanced a glance at Jack, only to find him already peeking in her direction. When their eyes met, laughs bubbled out of both of them and built until they had dissolved into a fit of giggles.

“That was…” Jack trailed off. “I’m not sure what that was. The pinnacle of awkward human interactions? Something that should only happen in the pages of one of your novels?”

Claire dabbed at her eyes. “I just don’t know if I’ve ever been misunderstood that badly before. It’s like, no matter what we say and no matter what we do, he is determined to believe that we’re a role-playing couple who’s been together since the very beginning, but we just like pretending that we’re strangers. I mean, I know things like that happen…I’m just pretty sure they mostly happen in movies, I guess. Not at sleepy little hotels that should be closed for the holidays, anyway.” She looked suddenly at Jack with a sober expression. “Do you think that’s what it is? He’s just bored and needs a little excitement? If so, who are we do deprive him of that?”

They approached the door of their room—their suite, Claire reminded herself—and Jack swiped it open with the key. As the light turned green, just a second before he turned the handle, Claire felt a flash of something stir inside her. Excitement? Nerves? Who could say which one was dominating? All she knew was that she was about to be alone inside this hotel room with Jack Holloway and there was no part of her that was prepared for what that might mean.