Page 8 of Wish You Were Her
“Stay humble,” Allegra chided, but it was with the smallest, proudest smirk.
“You are the greatest kid on this earth. Even if you’re barely a kid anymore.”
There were enough things weighing on Allegra’s mind to make her feel like an adult. She had a schedule and a team and a public image.
Now, she just wanted a fun summer. It was owed to her, after years of call sheets, invasive questions from journalists and no friends.
It was funny. As a child, she had dreamed of glamor and glitz and glimmering people. Now that she had seen those things up close, she wanted something real.
She shook away the thought and focused on the road ahead. Woodland had started to appear and the trees held a green color that she had only ever seen in the glorious technicolor of her movies. A large, clean sign waited for them and it was no mirage.
WELCOME TO LAKE PRISTINE
Allegra found herself snapping pictures on her phone of the little town as her mother pulled into Main Street because she knew a dozen set designers who would find it so inspiring. It looked like something from a movie. They found a parking space by a shop called Vivi’s Cupcakes. Allegra stared through the window at the creative concoctions, cakes with pastel-colored icing and famous faces made out of confectionery. There was a vintage clothing store, a haberdashery, a sweet little cafe and a laundry, all on the corner where Allegra and her mum were standing by the car.
The sun was so bright, it made the streets of Lake Pristineglisten. They gleamed in the aftermath of a small summer rainstorm, more welcoming to Allegra than anything she had seen in months.
People were heading toward the woods, in the direction of the actual lake that the town was named after (Allegra had seen it briefly on their way into town: a large, emerald body of water that the mid-thirty-degree heat called for) and as Allegra watched them in their swimwear, carrying their coolers and deck chairs, she felt suddenly at ease. Already it was everything she had imagined.
“This is exactly what I need,” she said quietly.
An elderly couple on the other side of the street looked over at them. “Roxy!” the woman called. “You’re back. Good to see you.”
Allegra stifled a laugh as her mother grimaced but offered a polite wave back. “Good to see you, Ginger. Doug.”
“How’s the city job?”
“Good. Fine.”
“I didn’t like that crime author you published. Too gruesome.”
The woman was yelling from the other side of the street, with no self-consciousness.
Allegra watched as her mother turned back into a teenager. “Sorry to hear that, Ginger.”
The couple moved on, either indifferent or oblivious to Allegra.
“Oh my God, Ma.”
“Don’t say a word,” muttered her mother. “You’ll be dragged into this small-town nonsense soon enough.”
Allegra, laughing, moved to the trunk of the car and retrieved her old suitcase. Across the town square, connected to Main Street, was Brooks Books. It was one of the largershops in town, and she knew her father’s two-bedroom flat was located just above it.
“Well, that’s you for the next four months,” Roxanne said gamely. “Within walking distance of books, beach and cupcakes.”
Allegra closed the trunk and beamed at her mother. “Perfection.”
Jonah felt as though he had been on the phone to this customer for as long as he had been alive.
“It’s kind of an annual tradition,” he said into the phone, and it was the fifth time he had uttered this sentence. “People rent out their spare rooms, the one tiny inn fills up, and everyone else comes in on these shuttle buses. The whole town’s population triples over the summer. It’s… nice.”
He did not exactly care for the sudden influx of people himself, but it was wonderful for business. It set them up until Christmas and so it was his duty to promote it.
“But I’ve called the inn for a booking and they wouldn’t give me one!” barked the man on the other end of the line.
“Yes,” Jonah said, shocked at his own patience. “Most people book really far in advance. We open soon. Most readers have booked accommodation already.”
“Then where the hell am I supposed to stay? You haven’t even announced the program yet!”
