Mike started his letter on the airplane. She was right, there was more to tell.
Dear Daya,
There once was a painter who fell in love with an actress. As the years went by, the painter became a digital artist, an early adopter of the marvelous tech, highly sought after by the budding gaming studios and the movie industry. Meanwhile, the actress became a flight attendant.
The cursor blinked every time Mike took his eyes away from the snow-capped Rocky Mountains and woke up his tablet. But he let the cursor sit at the beginning of the empty line for the short flight to Vancouver. For one, the mountains were pretty, for another, trying to tell Daya about his parents made him doubt his own story. After all, he composed it in his teens, and had never revised it since.
Maybe the time to revisit the past was now, to the tune of the Christmas songs. At the very least, his questions could fill in the awkward pauses between his mother and himself, instead of relying on Don to do it.
So, the letter to Daya could wait. Should wait.
***
Vancouver greeted him with wet clumps of snow and low clouds. The driver picking him up from the airport left the windshield wipers running, while he locked Mike's suitcase in the trunk.
As bitter as the neighboring Alberta's climate was vs the coast, its boundless sky and the triple brightness of sunlight improved one's disposition.
Mike sighed, wiping his glasses. Why couldn't it ever be perfect? Warmth without gloominess? Sunshine without the frigid winter? Carol said that he'd miss the rhododendrons blooming on UBC campus in February, when Calgary was locked in the snowdrifts. Maybe he and Daya could escape to the indoor gardens together... if she returned. That was a big if.
Mike watched his hometown drift by out of the limousine's window, then the famed scenery of the Sea-to-Sky Highway to Whistler. It would have been prettier if the wilderness didn't make him feel so lonely.
***
The lodge, tucked away between the mighty trees, did little to lift his spirit, despite the porter's bright smile.
"You should try our treatment rooms," he said, visibly adjusting his stride to Mike's limping gait. Making him carry the light suitcase was an insult to the guy's snowboarding-ready physique. Mike should have asked the guy to grab the car just for the heck of it.
"Skiing accident?" he asked Mike after propping the reception's door open with his gigantic boot... obviously, not relying on a person weakened by the big city's stress to manhandle it.
Mike scowled, reaching for the faint Italian accent his mother took on whenever she needed to up the charm at a party. "You should see the other guy."
"Hydrotherapy is the best." The guy's head bobbed after each word. The lucky sod still had every confidence in the canned answers.
"A lovely lady once told me it's the ice that does the trick." Mike pried open a blue curtain to look out of the window and hide his smile. A small skating rink occupied the plaza between the three-story spa complex and the individual cabins. A few ruffled boys dashed around it with their hockey sticks.
"Ice is good," the guy cheerfully agreed.
Meanwhile, the receptionist finished her phone call with the cheerful if there is anything else you need, please call us and cheerfully tapped his name into her computer. Apparently, he was still on the lands where the use of electronics was permitted.
YOU ARE READING
Winners Don't Have Bad Days (Watty 2020 Winner, Romance)
ChickLitWhen a total stranger knows what eats you, maybe they are your one true love. Even if you don't know it yet. || On Friday the 13th, two twenty-something, Daya and Mike, end up in a mutually beneficial arrangement: she is his caregiver after he break...
