M19-A Room At The Inn(Denise Arnault) Life was no longer going smoothly. This thought idly rumbled through Janine’s mind as she drove down the freeway. It just did not seem fair! Why could life not run smoothly like her little Hyundai? The inexpensive car rolled along like it was gliding on a cloud.

Having recently graduated college near the top of her class, she had expected to be very excited about the next stage of her life. Those expectations had crashed to the ground in a heap, after Jonathan, her boyfriend almost the entire time that they had been at Northeastern University, had explained to her over breakfast that he would not be going with her to visit her mom at the bed and breakfast that she operated. Apparently, he had experienced an epiphany and was going to California to pursue a career in broadcasting. There had been no hint of this happening.

It was high school graduation all over again, Janine fumed. She and Darien had been a thing all through junior and senior years, and then the day of graduation he informed her that he was joining the Army and would not be going with her to college. What WAS it about her and graduations? Why did love fail her just as she was supposed to be enjoying new adventures in her life? Well, she certainly would not be pursuing a master's degree any time soon! No third time’s a charm attempts for her!

Now, here she was driving along Interstate 95, heading north from Boston, to help her mom with the family B&B in Ogunquit, Maine. It was not enough that her dad had died halfway through her senior year of college, now her love life was in the toilet again too.

She was worried that the B&B was getting too much for her mother to handle by herself. She mentally pulled herself up short and made an effort to center herself before she dialed her mom’s number. She had not yet told her mom about Jonathan, or even that she was already on the way home. Her mom would be expecting him to come with her.

She had to get her head straight, so she did not cause her mom any more undue distress. When she was ready, she told Siri to dial her mom’s number. Alice, her mom, picked up on the second ring.

“Hi, mom,” Janine said. “I’m on my way home.”

“Already?” Alice replied, “I thought that you would not be coming for a few days yet.”

“Hi Jonathan! I know that you are really going to love our little place.” Alice continued, assuming that she was on speaker in Janine's car and greeting the boyfriend she assumed would also be in the car listening.

There followed a few seconds pause during which both parties started thinking the worst.

Janine decided that it would be best to just put it all out there and broke the silence, “Jonathan won’t be coming with me mom. He chose to go to California instead.”

“What!? I thought…” Alice started.

Janine interrupted her mother, “We can talk all that out when I get there, mom. It should only be a little over an hour. I have to answer another call right now. Bye!”

With that Janine ended the call. She just stared at the road ahead of her as she drove, there being no other call.

* * *

Alice was sitting at the old ornately carved desk in the office of the bed and breakfast that she had been operating for over twenty years. There were a number of pieces of correspondence, mostly bills, spread over its surface.

She fished a specific item from the mess. It was from her physician. Of course he had called about the contents first, but the letter was still devastating. It was from the testing company she had visited a couple of weeks ago to confirm what the doctor suspected. She had ovarian cancer, probably a death sentence at her age.

The news was hard to deal with but at least it would solve the other problem weighing on her, she thought wryly, and smiling crookedly. The pile of bills on her desk attested to the failing inn. People were not coming to Ogunquit for vacation these days. More was going out than coming in. Too many rooms were waiting empty.

Interrupting this sour mood, the old landline telephone on her desk jangled for attention. She frowned at it and then laughed quietly to herself about the irony of being upset by a call from a potential guest.

Picking up the receiver, she said, “Hartwell House Inn, how may I help you?”

The voice of her daughter, Janine, came through the wire. “Hi, mom.”

The conversation did not last long. Janine was on her way home but without the boyfriend that she had expected to accompany her. There were lots of questions there, but Alice acceded to her daughter’s request to hold off further conversation on the subject until she arrived home.

At that moment, Paul, her maintenance man came into the office.

“Hey Mrs. G,” he said. “I finished fixing that shower in 121. Anything else on the list for today?”

Alice looked up at the grinning handyman a little slowly. “What? Oh, yes.”

Paul was surprised. Alice seemed very distracted.

“Everything all right, Mrs. G?” He asked.

“Yes, everything is fine,” Alice replied beginning to gain her wits about her again.

“That was Janine on the phone. She says that she is on her way,” she continued.

“That’s great!” Paul exclaimed. “You were hoping that she would stay here a while after college.”

“Yes, that’s true,” Alice agreed. “She sounded strange on the phone though. That boy she was dating, Jonathan, seems to be out of the picture now. She said that she would tell me everything when she got home.”

Paul tried to hide his feelings about this news, but his face gave him away. Alice did not notice, however.

Paul had always carried a torch for Janine, who was the girlfriend of his best buddy when they were all growing up. There had always been some reason why his interest in her was hopeless. Now, it seemed that she was coming back into his life, possibly with no reason for him not to pursue his long pent-up desires. His heart throbbed in his chest, but he got his face and more importantly his voice under control.

“That’s nice,” was all he could trust himself to say. Turning, he left the office.

Still in somewhat of a daze, Alice watched Paul leave. Once he was gone, everything that she had been thinking weighed down on her.

“Lord,” she whispered out loud. “Help me to get through this. Help Janine to get through this.”

Somewhere, she was heard.

* * *


Janine arrived home a few hours later and filled her mother in on all the details of her failed love life and her plan to stay and help with the Inn while she sought work in her degree field.

Alice was relieved to hear this news but did not share her health concerns with Janine. She decided that there was no need to burden Janine with this information yet. She did admit to the financial problems that the Inn was experiencing. Janine said that she might have some ideas in that regard. She left Janine in the office to review the bills while she went to relax.

As Janine was sifting through to pile of papers trying to make sense of them, she noticed someone standing across the room.

“Hello, I didn’t hear you come in,” she said.

“It’s these soft soled hiking boots,” the man said. “People are always saying they don’t hear me.”

“Can I help you?”

“Yes. I need a room for a week or so.”

Janine was pleased to have a long-term guest so soon.

“Excellent!” she said. Then, as she started to slide a registration form over to him, she finally focused on his face and took in a sharp breath. Her old high school sweetheart was standing before her on her first day back home from college.

The man smiled as Janine gasped, “Darien!? What are you doing here?”

“I’m back in town to conduct some research for my firm,” he replied. “It should take a week or maybe a little longer.”

“Great. Well, we don’t have any rooms ready this early in the day, but we can have something ready in a few hours.”

“No problem. If you could just let me have a key. I’ll get some things taken care of and come back later.”

Janine agreed and gave him the keys to room 112.

“See you in a bit,” she said as he turned to leave.

Darien looked over his shoulder and just nodded as he left.

Paul, who was coming to the office to discuss the day’s maintenance projects, thought that he heard Janine talking to a guest, but he did not get a glimpse of them as he entered the office. The guest must have gone out the other door.

“Oh. Hi Paul,” Janine said, a touch of surprise in her voice. “I didn’t know that you were working with mom. We need to get room 112 ready for a new guest.”

The news that they had to get a room ready validated his assumption that she had been talking on the phone.

“Sounds good, and Welcome back home!” he greeted her. “Yeah, I’ve been filling in part time for a year or so,” Paul continued. “It’s nice to see you again. Will you be staying long?”

“At least until I find a job.”

“That’s great! We should go get some coffee over at 'Mornings In Paris' later and catch up.”

“Coffee sounds good. I missed breakfast this morning and it was a long drive up from Boston. Let me finish going over these papers and we can get some lunch too. I don’t remember any place by that name though.”

“Right. It wasn’t there when you were here last. It’s up on Route 1. I’ll come get you and we can go over together so I can show you.”

Everything being agreed upon, Paul left to get the guest room ready and to take care of some repairs.

* * *

As they had planned, Paul picked Janine up at the office about an hour later and they drove out to Route 1, which was the principal local road in the area. It only took a few minutes to get to Mornings in Paris. Nothing was very far away in this small New England town.

They got their coffee and croissant sandwiches and sat at a small table on the patio.

“So, how was college?” Paul asked when they were settled.

“The classes were great!” she replied. “Some of the experiences, not so much.”

“Nothing too awful I hope.”

“Just man trouble. Dated someone for years only to be dumped at graduation.”

“That’s terrible!”

“It wasn’t fun, but maybe for the best. Now I’m all free for a new start.”

This conversation was moving along just as Paul had hoped. Maybe his chance had finally come with Janine.

They chatted for about an hour before they agreed it was time to go. Paul had to pick up some eggs on the way home and drop them off at his mom’s house.

Janine said that there was no need to drive her back to the Inn. She wanted a walk to clear her mind of all the recent changes in her life. Paul was not so sure that it was such a good idea, and secretly wanted to see how it would go when he dropped her off, but Janine insisted that it was only a short distance, and she could really use the exercise.

Paul reluctantly agreed and said goodbye, heading for his car. Janine got up and started for the sidewalk.

As she was opening the gate in the fence that separated the table area from the street, she saw Darien standing a short distance away, blowing on a cup of coffee that he held close to his lips.

“Hey Darien,” she greeted him. “Did your room turn out to be OK?”

He turned at the sound of her voice saying, “Yes. It is just fine. You’re not following me, are you?”

“No,” she replied with a chuckle. “I was just having coffee with your old friend Paul. I’m walking back to the Inn right now.“

“That’s convenient. I was just about to do the same. Mind if I join you seeing that we are heading the same way?”

“I’d like that,” Janine said, looking down for a moment and then back into Darien’s eye. “That would be nice. We can catch up.”

The two walked slowly along speaking amiably about small events in their lives, each steering clear of sensitive topics such as their messy breakup. It did not take very long for them to traverse the mile or so to the Inn.

As they walked past the office, Alice, who was inside heard Janine saying goodnight to their new guest.

“Have a nice rest,” Janine said to Darien as he continued down the hall to his room.

He once again looked back at her over his shoulder with a thoughtful look in his eye as he called back, “I will. You too!” He then entered his room and was out of her sight.

Janine stood for a moment looking at the closed door to room 112, thinking. She wondered what was she feeling? The evening was a tumult of emotions. First, she had such a good time with Paul, and then the walk home with Darien had awoken old feelings and thrown her heart for an unexpected loop.

She turned on her heel and started for her own room, putting thoughts of men out of her mind. Only this morning she had sworn off men for good and now a few hours later her emotions were being pulled between two of them.

* * *

The next day, Janine was driving along, getting to know her hometown again, and noticed that she was passing her old high school. She wondered for a moment if she had turned that way because Darien was back in her life.

On a whim, she decided to park and look out over the school football field. It held a lot of fond memories, her cheering on Darien as he played, and others. She stood at the chain link fence facing the field but really seeing what was in her mind’s eye rather than what was in front of her.

She did not notice that Darien was standing a short distance away watching her. When he eventually stepped forward and said hello, it startled Janine.

“Remembering the old times?” he asked. “I come here sometimes to do the same thing.”

Embracing the old pain, Janine replied, “Yes, we had some good times here.” She refused to let her watering eyes spill any tears.

“I wish I had never gone away, but I felt that I had to do my duty,” Darien finally filled the silence.

“We both made the decisions that we thought were best at the time,” Janine said.

Another extended period of quiet fell between them.

Finally, Darien was once again the one to dispel the silence. “I saw that Paul was working at your Inn now. You know that he always liked you?”

“I knew, but WE were US then,” she said.

“Yeah, it was,” Darien said a little lamely, then continued, “I have to get going. Meetings and all.”

When Janine nodded, he turned and headed off through the cars. He stopped after a short distance, and turning asked, “Do you want to go with me tomorrow for a horse outing? My friend at the Living Wells Farm stables said that I could take the horses out any time since business is slow and they need the exercise.”

“That sounds nice. I would love that!” Janine responded enthusiastically.

“See you at 8:00 AM tomorrow then, at the stables,” Darien said and turned again to head for his car.

Janine watched him leave, her heart doing strange things in her chest. She was so confused. She was starting to like Paul a lot in the brief time since she had been back, and he seemed interested in her. She had never expected to even see Darien again and certainly did not think that she would consider letting him back into her life but here she was making a date and feeling excited about it.

She did wonder briefly why he wanted to meet at the Living Wells, which was a bit of a drive, when they were both coming from the Inn and presumably returning there, but she decided that he might have an earlier task that meant that it would not work out for them to drive together.

* * *

Paul and Alice were discussing the day’s maintenance needs in the office at the same time that Janine and Darien were talking at the football field.

“We’ve got that sink to unclog in 223,” Alice was saying. “And then the sticky window in 119.”

“I’m on it,” Paul assured her. “Does Janine seem all right to you? Her mind always seems to be elsewhere.”

“I know,” Alice said. “She has acted very distracted since she got back. I guess that the breakup with Jonathan is weighing on her.”

“That’s probably it. She seems to be looking off to nowhere a lot and talking to herself sometimes,” Paul added.

“She’ll get herself sorted out, I’m sure.”

“I expect so,” Paul agreed. "I certainly enjoyed when we went for coffee.”

“You two would make a great couple,” Alice said with a small smile.

“If only,” Paul said. “Well, I better get on those tasks.”

* * *

When Janine arrived at the stables, Darien already had the two horses fitted out with saddles and tack. He met her at her car and helped her to mount before doing so himself and they headed out on one of several trails leading into the wooded area, which grew right up to the lot.

The ride was relaxing, winding through beautiful scenery. After about an hour the two broke out of the tree cover at a beautiful overlook, where several other riders already were enjoying the sight of the wide valley below.

“What a view!” Janine exclaimed to Darien.

Before he could answer, one of the other riders perked up and glanced over with a look of concern. “Is everything all right miss,” he said.

“Everything is wonderful, thanks,” Janine replied. “You can see for miles up here!”

“Yes, but did you have another rider with you?” The solicitous stranger asked.

Janine looked back to Darien in confusion, but he was not there. Just an empty saddle.

“Darien?!” She called and heard him reply from within the nearby trees. “I’ll go back and get him,” she informed the nice man.

Leading Darien’s horse she headed back to where she had heard him call out. When she saw him, he was bending over looking at something on the ground.

“Look at this!” he said excitedly. “It’s an Edelweiss blossom. That’s almost unheard of in Maine!”

Janine dismounted and holding the reins of both horses stooped to examine the flower. It was pretty.

“There were other riders up at the clearing and we didn’t know what had happened to you,” she explained an edge of what-the-heck in her tone.

“I’m sorry,” Darien explained. “It was such a rare sight. I just slid off the saddle for a better look.”

Mollified, Janine accepted his explanation without addressing the matter further. She did bend down a take a quick picture of the rare flower with her phone.”

“We had better head back, though,” Darien said. “I just got word that I’m needed back in town.”

Janine started to protest that surely, they had time for a quick look out over the valley but decided not to press the matter.

The trip back was not as eventful as the ride out. It never was. Darien did take a moment to mention his old friend Paul’s interest in her again.

As they approached the end of the trail, they heard voices coming from the area of the stables. A groom came out to greet them. He turned out to be the same man who had tried to help at the clearing. Their group must have returned on a shorter path.

“You couldn’t find your other rider?” he asked with some concern, looking past her.

Janine turned to see what Darien was doing but once again an empty saddle greeted her questioning look.

“Well, I guess I don’t know where he got off to this time,” she replied. “He was right behind me a moment ago.”

She and the groom were both confused by the awkward situation but neither dwelled on it. The groom just took the horses leads after Janine dismounted and led the steeds to the barn as Janine made her way back to her car.

That man was going to get an earful from her when she saw him again. This was not as bad as dumping her after high school but embarrassing her at the stables with no explanation was pretty high up there.

* * *

Back at the Inn, Janine stormed up to the door of room 112 fuming over recent events. When she discovered that the door was not locked, she turned the handle and pushed her way into Darien’s room without knocking.

Strangely, the room did not have the appearance of one that was being used. Nothing was out of place. There was no luggage. Nothing indicated that he was staying there except for Darien, who was standing in the center of the room.

“Not a word from you!” she said tersely. “That was unconscionable!”

Darien just stared back at her, complying with her demand for silence.

“How could you just run off and leave me like that?” Janine continued, tears starting to fill her eyes and her voice. “How could you?”

She had demanded that he be quiet and listen, but she did seem to want an answer, so he took a chance and said, “We need to talk.”

“That’s an understatement!”

“I have something important to tell you,” Darien continued. “Things are not as they seem. I have to be honest with you.”

“That would be refreshing. Please do!” Janine replied, trying miserably to clear the tears from her eyes with the backs of her hands, and also failing to control the intense beating of her heart, her voice becoming lower and steelier.

Darien took a deep breath and said, “I am not really here.”

The blank look on Janine’s face betrayed her lack of understanding.

Darien continued, “I died two years ago in Afghanistan. I’m a Messenger now.”

Janine was convinced that this was the worst apology that she had ever heard. He was making no sense. Of course he was not dead. He was standing right there! She was talking to him. He was talking to her!

“I know this is a lot to take in all at once, but I am a Messenger now. I am one of the invisible ethereal beings which try to help people in need.”

Janine said nothing and he went on, “I normally cannot be seen unless I use my energy to appear. It takes so much more energy to appear to everyone so I have been becoming visible only to you.”

The words spilled out faster and faster. “No one but you have been able to see or hear me. I came in response to Alice’s plea on your behalf. Normally they would not send someone so close to you, but I requested that they allow me the opportunity to correct a past wrong.”

“I wanted to tell you that I was sorry that I had to go off to war. My friends Harry and Jeff were going, and I thought that they needed me to look out for them. I thought that it would only be a couple of years and then we could pick up where we left off. It turned out that it was me that needed the looking out for. They both came home.”

“I guess no one ever told you,” Darien concluded and then waited to see what Janine would say.

She said nothing. She just turned on her heel and went out the door without a word.

She was having trouble seeing the hallway through the tears streaming down her face as she tried to make it to the office before she collapsed.

As she came around the corner near the office she almost barreled through Paul. He caught himself and said, "Janine, what is going on?"

She just pushed past him saying, "Excuse me, Paul, we can talk over dinner tonight. I have to get myself together right now."

He watched her go into the office and close the door behind her. He could hear Alice's stunned voice through the door. He considered following her into the office but decided to heed her request for privacy. He brightened when he realized that he now had another date but was still very worried about why she was in such as state. Deciding that he should let it go for now, he turned and left.

* * *

Alice looked up when Janine barged into the office a mess of tears and anguish written across her face. She rose immediately and folded the girl into her arms.

"Baby," she said. "Whatever is the matter?"

Janine just sobbed uncontrollably against her mother's shoulder for a few moments and then pushed away far enough to look her in the eyes, but not so far as to break the embrace.

"Mom, I think you need to sit down. I know that I need to sit down," Janine said, her voice becoming more controlled with each word. "I have something to tell you."

Those kinds of words, especially when delivered by someone in such a state, always have the effect of raising tension, but the two women both sat down in silence. Alice waited for Janine to be able to go on.

"Darien says that he is dead," Janine began.

"Oh, honey," Alice responded, rising from her chair, thinking to herself that was a strange way of phrasing the statement. "Everyone knows that. What has gotten you so upset about it now? It's been years."

Janine just looked at her mother for a few seconds and decided that it was not important at this time to discuss the specifics of why no one had yet told her about this momentous news.

"You don't understand," she eventually continued. "He is our new guest in room 112."

Alice interrupted, "That cannot be. He's dead. I don't think that the guest in room 112 has even arrived yet."

Janine shot back, "Mother, he says that he is some kind of ghost or angel or something. I have been talking with him for days now."

In response to Alice's disbelieving look, Darien chose that moment to appear in full to the room. He glowed with a soft golden light as he became visible just inside the closed door.

Seeing the boy her daughter had loved so long ago and who should be dead in full glowing reality, Alice sank back into her chair, her legs no longer able to keep her up.

"It's true Alice," he said. "I am a Messenger now. I have come to help Janine recover her equilibrium as you asked."

The three talked for about half an hour going over the intricacies of how Darien could be there, and how Janine and he had been meeting when everyone else thought that she was just talking to herself in an empty room.

When Darien said that he had to leave them now, he took a moment to say a few last words.

Looking at Janine tenderly, he said, "I know that you will be fine. I know that you have been starting to have feelings for Paul, and I know that he shares those feelings."

Janine just nodded.

Then Darien turned to Alice. "I will probably get in trouble for telling you this, but Ben asked me to tell you that he will be waiting," he said with a smile.

Once again, Alice's legs failed her, and she sank into her chair.

"My Ben is OK? He is up there," she said looking up.

"He is perfect, and he says that there is no hurry. He will be waiting," and with that final piece of information, there was a small bright flash of light, and Darien was gone.

Alice sat back in her chair stunned, but happy. She decided that she needed to let her daughter, who also seemed somewhat overwhelmed by what had just happened, know the truth about her health.

Steadying her voice as much as she could, she told Janine about the letter from her doctor, the state of the Inn's finances and her hopes that Janine would be able to spend some time at home before she got a job elsewhere.

* * *

Paul went to Janine’s room just before 6:00 PM. She was waiting for him, trying to decide if she should tell him of the day’s events. He had a right to know but she was not sure how it would affect their budding relationship. She decided that she needed to have all her cards on the table.

“Paul, before we head out, there are some things that I need to get clear with you,” she told him.

His experience was that conversations that started out like this rarely ended well for him. He waited for the other shoe to fall. He was thoroughly surprised with her next comment.

“I know that you have some feelings for me. I have to admit that I have some for you as well.”

“That’s true and good to hear,” he replied, thinking that this might go OK after all.

She proceeded to tell him everything. Paul listened to it all without asking any questions to disrupt the flow of information, but his facial expressions gave away how he was taking it. When Janine was done, a silence fell between them as she let Paul digest all that she had told him.

“So, Darien, always the hero, did his best to help again, even after death,” Paul finally said. “You gotta expect that, I guess.”

“It was quite the moment, for sure,” Janine replied. I guess it certainly answered some questions.”

“Do you still want to go get some dinner?” Paul asked.

“Yes!” Janine said enthusiastically. “I want to go try the Ogunquit Beach Lobster House, and I want to get to know you better.”

Paul said that he agreed with all that. Messenger Darien, who was watching invisibly, was pleased that his matchmaking efforts seemed to be bearing fruit.

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