Chapter Eleven

Amos

Rug! The rug!” He heard Larry Levine’s voice booming from behind the concierge station. Always a tumult from the Tummler, he thought.

“Amos, the rug! Your rug!” Larry’s voice was incessant.

Amos’s hand flew to his head. What was wrong with his hairpiece? He had just used his pocket comb to tame flyaways a few minutes earlier. Amos still hadn’t adjusted to his newest accessory. He’d been bald for at least a decade and never really fretted about it, even when the hairs had started collecting in the shower drain at an astounding rate. He cared a heck of a lot more that his back creaked and his knees were arthritic. Fanny was perfection in many ways, but a beauty contestant she was not, and Amos didn’t feel pressure to keep up. Though he’d run a summer resort for nearly six decades, the work mostly kept him indoors, shaded from the sun’s punishing rays. But in Florida, where his days were far too empty and taking up golf was a requirement of declaring residency, suddenly his baldness was presenting something of a problem.

“Wear a hat,” Fanny had chastised him. “I can get you a nice sun hat right at the Publix on Collins Avenue.” But he didn’t want to wear a hat like the other geezers on the golf course. He wanted his hair back, especially now that he had retired to an over-sixty-five community in Boca Raton and was feeling his age more than ever before.

Suddenly Larry was in front of him, awash in panic.

“What’s wrong with it?” Amos asked, wondering why the guy had to yell “your rug” so loudly. Also, did he need to call it that? Sure, that’s what he and Fanny called his hairpiece jokingly, but not publicly.

“It’s on fire!” Larry yelled, moving with surprising speed across the lobby toward the coffee and tea station. Amos was momentarily heartened to see the old guy move so quickly. Earlier that day when Amos had wished Larry good morning, he could have sworn the Golden’s lifelong concierge had responded, “I think Mondale’s really got a shot.”

Realizing, finally, that Larry was not referring to Amos’s head and was running toward a spot on the actual rug, Amos followed his eyes to where a group of bellboys were dumping water on a burst of flames smoldering on the lobby carpet.

It was then that Brian came dashing into the room, grasping a walkie-talkie.

“Call the fire department,” his son yelled to no one in particular, though Amos could see the flames were already extinguished.

“It’s fine,” came a chorus of voices from where the fire had erupted, and Brian swept his forehead in relief.

“I got this, boss,” called out Victor Herbert, the head of the maintenance crew.

Brian put up praying hands in Victor’s direction. “You all right, Dad?” he asked, putting a hand on Amos’s back.

“Yes, totally fine. Not sure what happened.”

“Me either,” Brian said. “Guess this might be Diamond Enterprise’s problem, though, not ours.”

“Not necessarily,” Amos said, though he wondered if that morning’s meeting had just been for show, to make the old folks feel like they had a say.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Just when I see all the problems, sometimes I think it could be nice to wash our hands of this place.”

Amos looked around. He didn’t like discussing business around prying ears.

“I suppose. The place really isn’t what it used to be, is it? I don’t see how we can compete with the fancy-schmancy hotels with the Netflix and the coffee gadgets in every room. Those things never used to matter to our guests.”

“It’s not Netflix that’s the problem. And we have a crazy coffee maker, too. It even starts small fires,” Brian said, smiling broadly.

Amos took pleasure in his son’s good looks. Such a handsome boy, who always seemed just a bit lost. He and Fanny had been beyond grateful when it had seemed his life was settling into a predictable rhythm—marriage, a job with his father-in-law he couldn’t screw up, children likely. They’d felt so much more relief when Brian had married than Peter, who they’d always known would land on his feet, if he ever decided to leave them at all. Though seeing the hours Peter put in at the office, how he always had those white things sticking out of his ears so he could participate in never-ending conference calls, didn’t fill him or Fanny with satisfaction. They worried about both their boys. Maybe it was the plight of parents generally, but it did seem like their two were an especially big handful. They worried Peter would keel over dead at the office, and they worried Brian would fall into a deep depression, and that was before they even got into their worries about their two grandchildren. Michael was going the struggling actor route? And was he missing the obvious when his grandson had brought a “friend” to the hotel last year and declined a second room? How would Fanny react if his suspicions were correct? Then there was Phoebe, whose job existed only on her cell phone. By his granddaughter’s age, Amos had already been engaged and a business owner. What was this generation waiting for?

Amos lowered his voice to a whisper.

“Brian, I’m worried about you. If we sell the hotel, what will you do? Your mother and I are in Florida now almost all the time. You’d be welcome to come down there if you’d like. A lot of young people like South Beach.”

Brian looked wistful as he tugged at a loose thread on his shirtsleeve. Amos wondered if Fanny was still sending Brian clothing from Bloomingdale’s sales.

“I think it’s time I figure out the next steps on my own. Without your help. But I love you and appreciate you both.” Brian rose and moved in the direction of where a small crowd was still gathered by the scene of the fire. Amos thought to join him. There was still life in his bones. He could figure out how to hide the damage in the rug, and where they could get a replacement coffee urn quickly. But as he went to lift himself up, he felt the weight of his legs keeping him down, like he had ankle weights working as resistance. It was as though his body was telling him to rest, that running a hotel was a younger man’s game. Self-consciously, he scratched at the rug on his head. Who was he kidding? He took nine pills each morning and swallowed a bottle of antacid each night.

“Take this at least,” Amos said when Brian returned, pulling two crisp hundred-dollar bills from his wallet. “For the fire inspector.”

“Dad, it doesn’t work that way anymore,” Brian said, pushing away the money.

It doesn’t? He and Benny had handed out bribes at least once a week. They’d practically put the police chief’s kids through college.

“Besides, the Golden will be just fine,” Brian said. “We’re going to have bee pollen facials at the spa. Oh, wait, we don’t have a spa.” He flashed his killer dimpled smile again.

“Well, at least we have a working fire extinguisher,” Amos said, remembering Benny and their shoestring days. They had purchased the fire extinguishers secondhand. He remembered the twinkle in his best friend’s eyes. “Something’s gotta be used. It’s these or the towels.”