I work the front desk at this little boutique hotel on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York. It’s a nice, quirky place with great staff and interesting clientele. Life is rarely boring at the Azur Regent. And most of the time, I really like my job. I get to meet all sorts and hear stories from all different parts of the world. Because we’re not as fancy as say the Waldorf but a bit fancier than some of the cheaper places in Midtown, we are a pretty busy place most of the year.

Except for the beginning of February. The beginning of February was a really slow time for the Azur Regent.

Which made this week at work even more difficult. If I’d been busy, I wouldn’t have noticed being exhausted quite so much. But on slow days…

Miguel Diez, the morning front desk clerk, gave me a hand wave from behind the reception desk, some of his attention on the computer under the raised front of the wooden desk, some scanning the lobby. Which was dead quiet. Usually, this time of day with checkouts still underway and check-ins just around the corner, the place was hopping.

The lobby today had exactly two people sitting near the huge front window, sipping to-go cups of coffee from one of the franchise coffee places a few blocks away. I prefer the coffee I get from Mr. and Mrs. Oligante across the road at the bodega, but to each their own. The lobby’s wooden floors were polished to a shine, the tourist brochures were neat in their rack next to the glass and wood front door, the fireplace was of course empty but for some flowers—it was fake but it added to the ambiance. All was well. Just quiet.

I stopped at the desk before heading back to the breakroom with my food. I worked the afternoon shift, handling check-ins more than checkouts, and I still had fifteen minutes before my shift started. But I always liked to get the story on what was happening in the hotel, so I knew what to expect.

“Jake sent an extra scoop of rice just for you,” I told Miguel, raising my bag with my lunch. “I think he’s feeling sorry for you working so hard in here.”

Miguel snorted and closed the computer screen. “Off my feet,” he said with a sigh. He crossed his arms and leaned against the lower counter behind the desk. “Nothing new or interesting at all going on. The guests in 408 are extending their visit another two nights. We were able to keep them in their same room. Otherwise, everyone due to check out this morning is already checked out. And no one’s been in too early. Maria says she’s got Yolinda and Vicky giving some of the rooms a deep clean since they’re empty.”

“You know, I know this is normal for this time of year. It happens every year. But the owners are still going to lose their minds at having empty rooms. You’d think they’d know this pattern by now. By St. Patrick’s Day the place will be buzzing again.”

“At least you’ll have an easy shift. That makeup is only going so far with those circles.”

I rolled my eyes. “Gee, thanks. You know just what to say to a girl.”

He snorted. “How’s Lilith doing?”

“She’s almost recovered and back to getting some sleep. Becky, on the other hand, is not so much. And when they don’t sleep, I don’t sleep.”

“You should take a day or two. It’s not like we’re being overrun.”

I shook my head. “I’d rather be out of the apartment at the moment. When I’m there, it’s a constant stream of WebMD’s most unlikely but still possible explanations for Lilith’s stuffy nose. I’d rather force my eyes open at a quiet desk than listen to another day of that.”

“Poor Becky. My cousin’s sister-in-law, who has germaphobia, turns into a nurse when her kids get sick, and turns their entire house into a sterilized hospital.”

“Cold and flu season must be fun for her.”

Miguel nodded, his mouth pursed. “I can’t help with the circles, but let me know if you need help with those nails. My girl has some openings later in the week.”

“Is this because I got you extra rice?”

Miguel took immaculate care of his hands and always had perfectly manicured nails. He didn’t share his nail care provider with anyone normally because he didn’t want her booking out and not being able to get in himself. I figured I must have looked really ragged that he was willing to share her with me.

“Might be,” he said. “Or maybe I just don’t like seeing the state of your hands right now.”

I laughed, which felt good, and took my food to the back after one last scan of the lobby. The two people drinking coffee ignored me and Miguel, leaning close as they chatted. There seemed to be some intensity to that discussion but also a lot of smiling so I assumed it was a good conversation. Good for them. I liked happy people in my lobby.

I did not fall asleep into my lunch, but only because I’d moved my lunch to one side when I put my head down on the breakroom table. Otherwise, it would have been a face plant in the spiced chicken. Miguel would have been very disappointed if I’d messed up his rice snack.

Benjamin Smith shook me awake. I blinked up at him. Benjamin was our best bellhop and had worked at the Azur Regent for years too. Usually, he was too busy to turn up in the breakroom this time of day. But slow for the front desk was also slow for the bellhops.

“How long was I out?” I asked, pressing my fingers to my eyes and trying not to screw up my makeup by rubbing them.

“Not too long. Shanda covered for you so you could get an extra ten. We all get it. Plus it’s not like things are going crazy out there.”

“Thanks.” I covered my yawn with my hand and winced. “The nap helped. But I think I’m gonna need a week of sleep to make up for this.”

“Could be worse,” Benjamin said, grinning. “You could be listening to Becky’s new medical diagnoses.”

I groaned as I cleaned up my food. I noticed the extra scoop of rice was gone. Miguel had taken his food and left all without waking me. That was some impressive food acquirement.

By the time I reached the front desk, I’d managed to wake myself up enough I wasn’t going to drop to sleep again. Fortunately, I wasn’t working the desk alone. I shared this shift with Shanda White and we got along like a house on fire. On these slow days, that gave us lots of time to chat and I could use some non-baby related gossip.

We’d just settled into her telling me about the date she’d had the night before when the lobby door blew open on a stiff gust of wind and someone came inside. I didn’t recognize them, and they had a suitcase, so I was assuming it was someone here for early check-in. Easy enough to accommodate at the moment. Shanda and I both faced the new guest and put on our professional smiles. But the guest, a woman somewhere in her middle years, with short black hair and an impressively large pair of sunglasses on, glanced our way, then went to one of the chairs near the fireplace and sat down, her small, rolling suitcase tucked up beside the seat.

“Guess she’s not ready to check in after all,” Shanda leaned in close to whisper. She opened the computer and started scrolling through the guests we were expecting that afternoon.

Only three rooms were checking in today. One with a single woman. One with two men. And the third a two-person reservation with a woman’s name on the booking. The second name wasn’t in our records. Which wasn’t the usual procedure. We liked to have the names of everyone staying in each room—the bosses liked to send follow up marketing to everyone without discrimination. But sometimes people left the names of the other people staying in the rooms off if those other people were minors.

Given who we were expecting, both Shanda and I assumed the guest by the fire must be the woman sharing a room with an unnamed companion. If she was the woman with the single room, she could have come right to the desk and checked in already, getting up to her room early. But if this was the woman with an unnamed companion on her reservation, that unnamed companion wasn’t likely a minor. If a minor, where were they?

So I had to assume that second guest was an adult and the reason the woman by the fireplace was waiting. And since it didn’t look like we were going to get a jump of activity any time soon, Shanda and I went back to quietly talking, keeping our voices low so they didn’t travel across the open lobby.

Still, I was curious. I’m always curious about people. It’s one of the reasons I loved my job. You meet all kinds of people in a New York hotel. Especially a hotel like the Azur Regent.

An hour later, we got our single woman, and the two men, who turned out to be a couple on their honeymoon! So we did a whole thing upgrading their room and getting permission from our day manager, Tara Lang, to have some champaign and chocolates delivered to their room—after checking for allergies, of course.

If we’d known ahead of time, we like to set up rooms especially for honeymooning couples. That’s the benefit of booking a boutique hotel, and the owners encourage it. But we did a whole thing once we did know and hopefully got their honeymoon started right. They picked a good time of year for a honeymoon in New York in some ways. No kid holidays to fill up the museums, there were usually tickets for Broadway shows to be had, and while the weather was pretty iffy this time of year, nothing was packed so you could do most everything.

Once the celebratory setup was done and the happy couple sent up to their room, I glanced across at the woman with the suitcase still sitting and waiting by the fireplace. She was the only one in the lobby now, and she was reading stuff on her phone, not looking bothered by the fact that she’d been waiting for more than an hour. I was tempted to ask if she needed anything, if she wanted to go ahead and check in and get up to her room. We try not to be pushy about these things, but, like I said, it was quiet. And after all the fuss with the happy couple, I had a second wind and was wide awake now.

Shanda shrugged when I suggested talking to the woman and gave me a little hand motion to indicate it was me gonna do it if either of us would. I didn’t mind. Like I said, I’m curious about people. My sister likes to say it’s really me being noisy, and maybe she’s right. But I prefer the word curious.

I rounded the reception desk and crossed the lobby, glancing at a lobby door that remained firmly closed, and out the huge front windows, to a relatively quiet sidewalk as the early evening darkened the street. This time of year, it’s fully dark by five, and we were in that twilight time when lights were starting to come on and things were harder to see than even full night. The Azur Regent was located on a relatively busy block with shops and restaurants and bodegas and us, so the sidewalk was rarely empty. But with the harsh winds blowing, it wasn’t exactly busy outside either.

The lobby’s recessed lighting had come on just a few minutes earlier, slowly rising to make the interior of the lobby a bubble of brightness that only highlighted the gloomy twilight outside.

I stopped close enough to the waiting woman to get her attention but not so close as to be hovering over her—I don’t like to hover over guests—and asked, “Can we help with anything?”

“I’m just waiting for my friend.”

Up close, the woman’s age was still that sort of middle years range that could be hard to tell. Mid to late thirties or early forties. Her makeup was perfect, and her eyes, now she had the sunglasses off, were a very sharp shade of blueish purple that you didn’t see very often. Her dark hair was sleek and smooth. And she wore a perfume I couldn’t place but was willing to bet was expensive based on the subtle musky flower scent that didn’t make my nose twitch. She was the kind of woman I thought of as “put together.” Those people who could wear jeans and a t-shirt and still look styled somehow. She wasn’t wearing jeans and a t-shirt, she was dressed in soft gray wool dress slacks and a cream silk shirt with subtle jewelry that included a necklace with a small diamond charm and dangling earrings, but it was the overall way she presented herself. Just…put together.

“Of course,” I said, again not wanting to rush her, but we weren’t busy so I wanted to make sure she knew we were there to help. “Would you like to check in now and we can send your friend up when they arrive? It’s not a problem. You don’t have to both be here for check in.” Sometimes people assumed they had to check in together. It wasn’t a rule here, though, and I liked to clarify, just in case.

She glanced at the time on her phone, then out the window to the gloomy sidewalk beyond. Finally, she faced me again and smiled. But the smile was strained. I didn’t ask all the questions I had, but my curiosity was definitely peaked.

“Yes. Yes, let’s do that. I wouldn’t mind getting up to the room.”

At the desk, we got the woman checked in, card on file, identification verified, and a nice clean room for her and her small suitcase. Her name was Angela Yergunson. And turned out she was a doctor. I have to say, I’m glad Becky wasn’t there to see that. Didn’t matter what specialty Dr. Yergunson had, Becky would’ve grilled her about baby stuffed noses and asked if that meant Lilith had cancer or something—I am not exaggerating when I say Becky has lost her mind over Lilith being sick.

As we got Dr. Yergunson checked in, I tried for some casual questions—because as I mentioned I’m nosey and we weren’t busy—but she wasn’t very forthcoming. Here on business. Didn’t need tickets or restaurant recommendations. Wouldn’t be needing to extend her stay. No, she didn’t need help with her luggage. Yes, she’d appreciate a call when her friend arrived and checked in.