CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER THREE

Diane POV

May

I inhale deeply, reveling in the crisp ocean air as land approaches ahead. Two layovers, a flight delay, and fifteen hours later, the

fifty-five-degree day’s high had dipped to the low forties, and I had to take my jacket on.

“Have you ever been to Palawan before?” the captain, a soft-spoken white-haired man named River, asks, his hands resting easily on the ferry’s wheel.

I shake my head, my gaze drifting over the sea of evergreen and rock as far as the eye can see. We left the dock thirty minutes ago. It didn’t seem like it would take that long to cross, but Bay is vast and wide and unlike anything I’ve ever seen.

And on the other side of it is my home for the next four months. I’m so glad I remembered to pop an Antivert an hour before boarding. I’d be puking over the rails by now had I not. Boats and I have never coexisted well.

“So, what made you come?” I can tell River likes to talk, as much for conversation as to assess the foreigners coming to his homeland.

“A brochure,” I answer simply, honestly.

He chuckles. “Yeah, it’ll do that, all right. Lures plenty of folks our way.”

I smile, though his words resonate deep inside. It “lured” me. Yes, that’s exactly what it did. Frankly, the brochure didn’t need to work too hard. When things take an ugly turn, people are always saying they’re going to pick up and move far away.

And then I went to that job fair in the city library, more than a little panicked about what I was going to do this summer. Recruiters were peddling administrative and counselor positions, trade internships, and daycare. I was interested in something else.

I needed to separate myself from it and its bitter memories, if for only a few months until school started again in the fall.

That’s what happens when you grow up in a small town and then go away to college with your high school sweetheart, who’s also the reverend’s son, whom you were supposed to marry the summer after you both graduate college.

Who you’ve been saving yourself for.

Who you caught with his pants down and thrusting into some raven-haired woman. It’s been months since D-Day, or what I like to call D*ck Day when I caught him. September 2, to be exact.

Why do they all think I’ll want to take him back?

He broke my heart that day and has continued breaking it daily every time I see him walking hand in hand around campus with her.

He’s not just showing... They’re dating now.

So when I passed by the Dela Paz Hotels booth at a work fair a month ago and spotted the pamphlet with a beautiful vista of snow-capped mountains and forest, I immediately stopped and started asking questions. Within ten minutes, I knew that was my ticket away from sadness, at least temporarily. I just needed to get myself to breathe.

They’d provide transportation to the hotel, subsidized accommodations and meals onsite, and weekly transport, if needed, and in turn, I’d work like a dog and keep my mind occupied.

The best part? It was almost 3,800 miles from everything I knew.

It sounded perfect. And unattainable.

I walked out of that interview feeling hopeless, assuming that there was no way I’d get the job. And yet, I’m standing here today. I call that divine intervention.

God knew I needed this miracle. Needed.

It came in the form of a phone call a week after the interview, with an official offer for a position on the Landscaping and Maintenance crew. I screamed. I even shed a few happy tears, which was a nice change from all the sad tears I'd spilled since that day.

I would be leaving my dorm room the day after my last exam and hopping onto a plane... that’s the only reason I’ve held it together this long.

The ferry turns left to run along the coastline, farther into the bay.

“What are those places over there? Do people live out here?”

I point toward the little huts speckling the shore, camouflaged within the trees.

“Nah. They’re mostly lodges and cabin rentals.”

I study the structures, like yurts on stilts overlooking the water. “They’re nice. Rustic.”

“They are, indeed.”

“Not like the taste of the company, though.”

River chuckles softly, shaking his head. “Not quite.”

If the pictures in the pamphlet are at all accurate, my Mama’s convinced that it’s all computer generated, that nothing that luxurious would exist in Palawan. And my Mama was thinking of something horrific about the place. At first, she flat-out told me that I wasn’t allowed to go. I hung up the phone on her that night, the first time I’d ever done that.

Probably the first time anyone’s ever had the nerve to hang up on a woman like her. I half expected her to drive the nine hours and slap me upside the head.

Two days later, after she’d cooled off, she called and tried to persuade me. I was making a grave mistake, leaving everything behind and Justin.

I know it’s not going to be that simple.

So I dug my heels in. I’ve been “good girl Diane” all my life, sitting next to my parents at church service every Sunday, keeping company with like-minded people, and staying away from the “bad kids” who drank and had s*x.

Always listening to Mama.

Maybe if I’d just spread my legs for Justin, my heart wouldn’t have been smashed into a thousand pieces.

While she’s my Mama, and I know she wants what’s best for me, she, too, thinks that Justin and I belong together and that our reunion is inevitable once he gets “the devil” out of his system.

I had to bite my tongue before I pointed out to her that the girl currently sucking Justin’s d*ck is a significant obstacle in this reconciliation of ours.

I scan the approaching buildings, my excitement triumphing over my exhaustion.

“Where is it?”

“This whole is the hotel.”

River chuckled softly again. He’s such a pleasant man.

“Hotel Dela Paz is the name that their ancestors had. Dela Paz family has a lot of history up here with the gold mines. That’s where they made their first fortune. Though I’m sure they could afford to have it renamed if it came to that. They’re a successful lot. Generous, too.”

Man, to be a part of that family. They must have a lot of money to risk opening a location like this all the way up here and set their employees up the way they’re doing for us and all the benefits.

“Hey, thanks for coming back for me. I didn’t want to stay in a motel.” It was just River and me on the ferry and a deck full of crates and supplies. He was kind enough to make another trip across the bay and pick me up after my flight delay. Apparently, he carted a full load of college-aged employees over hours ago.

“We didn’t want to leave you stranded. Especially on the first day. I would had to come back for the supplies first thing in the morning, anyway.”

I glanced at my watch with dismay.

“I missed the orientation session.” It started at seven, almost an hour ago. The skies are deceptively light for this time of evening.

“I can’t believe how bright it still is.”

“Wait ’til June.”

“Less than five hours of darkness on the equinox, right?”

He grins. “Someone’s been doin’ her homework.”

“I like to be prepared.” The day I applied for the job, I ran home and researched Alaska late into the night instead of studying for my exams. The further I dug, the more excited I became, and the harder I prayed that I’d get the job.

“Well, I’m sure one of the ladies will be kind enough to fill you in on what you missed. They seemed like a nice group. Polite youngsters like yourself, for the most part anyway.”

At twenty-three, it feels strange to be referred to as a youngster, but I guess next to River who’s got to be pushing seventy, that’s exactly what I am.

"Here it is. The Hotel."

My eyes widened. “Whoa. The brochure pictures weren’t fake.” And they don’t do this place justice.

River chuckled again. “No, they certainly weren’t.”

I stare at it quietly, mesmerized. The main lodge towers over the water. Even from this distance, I can see that the lodge is grandiose in its design and massive. I can’t make out the details to appreciate it yet, but there’s no doubt it’s something to be admired.

“They just made the finishing touches two weeks ago. Been working on it for almost three years now.”

“Is it still opening on Sunday?” Bea, the woman who called to formally hire me, said that these first few days would be focused on training and last-minute preparations.

“I’ll be ferrying in the first guests at noon. I’ve been bringin’ employees in by the boatload over the last two days. There are a lot of you. A high staff-to-guest ratio," I heard someone say.”

“How is the family going to make any money?”

“I’m guessing the twelve-hundred-dollar-a-night price tag will help.”

My mouth drops open. “Who can afford that?” I barely scraped together the eleven hundred I needed for my plane ticket here.

‘If you build it...’”

I smile. It’s only my dad’s favourite movie.

He winks.

We fall into a comfortable silence as we approach, and I realize that I’ve been rolling my promise ring around my finger unconsciously this entire time. It’s been three months since Justin and I broke up, and I haven’t been able to bring myself to remove it.

Now, I slip it off, letting the cheap metal rest in the palm of my hand. A part of me, the hurt, angry part, wants to toss it into the water

and be done with it. A symbol of my faith in Justin.

But I can’t bring myself to do it just yet. So, I slip the ring into my pocket and try to focus on the months to come.

Like I always said, feel the pain Diane...