Stuffed Up

1. Getaway

The woman behind the reception desk at the hotel had seen all sorts of customers in her thirty-three years working there. However, the seven woman that stood before her right now were certainly something she had never seen before. They all looked to be in their mid-twenties and were wearing smiles as vibrant as the outfits they had on. Each of them had wheeled in a luggage bag that looked new, acting like they were novice travelers as they all crowded around a map of the area that they had snagged off a rack near the door. None of that was out of the ordinary to her. She was used to seeing young women and men taking trips together before. What was surprising to her was that they each had a stuffed animal tucked under their arms, clutching it close to them as if they were their child.

"Excuse me ladies," said the receptionist, clearing her throat and trying to hide her confusion behind a well-rehearsed smile, "Are you checking in?"

"Ah, yes!" said an auburn brown-haired woman as she broke away from the group and scuttled over to the counter. The receptionist noticed that the woman had left her luggage behind but not her stuffed animal. Instead, she still had the bright pink bunny tucked underneath an arm.

"What's the reservation under?" asked the receptionist, turning to look at her computer monitor to try to bring up their information.

"Charmaine," she said to the receptionist's surprise. She recognized the name Charmaine. That family was richer than rich. They owned twelve companies internationally that specialized in high-end fashion. As it was, she knew for a fact that she was wearing a Charmaine original that she had just bought from a discount store.

'Maybe this woman isn't even from the same Charmaine family,' thought the receptionist as she tried to fight the blush coming to her cheeks as she typed the name into the computer.

The receptionist tried to keep the shock from her face when she saw that this woman before her was indeed a Charmaine from that same family. Lorelei Charmaine was the youngest daughter of the billionaires at just twenty-five-years old. If the receptionist remembered the tabloid article correctly, Lorelei was one of the most sought-after bachelorettes of the decade. She had all the handsomest bachelors at her disposable, all seeming to want her heart and a merger that was bound to make them set for life. The receptionist chided herself for not recognizing Lorelei or the stuffy she carried around. After all, that pink bunny stuffy was one of the reasons the gossip magazines claimed she wasn't married yet; that her stuffy was chasing all the bachelors away because they all thought she was too immature still.

Lorelei knew that the receptionist recognized her, a kind smile coming across her face as she watched the receptionist tried to get out the signature pad in a composed fashion. Lorelei signed the pad before the receptionist took it back to exchange it for a room key.

"Your suite is upstairs. You can take the elevator and I'll call a bellboy for your luggage."

"Oh, that's alright. We can take our luggage upstairs ourselves. We don't have that much."

"THEY HAVE STREET TACOS HERE!" came a squeal from behind Lorelei just as she grabbed the key. Chuckling, Lorelei turned around to see that Talulla was practically doing a happy dance with her pale blue horse stuffy at the news.

Lorelei's life was a crazy one indeed, being born into the lap of luxury. She was thankful to her six friends for keeping her grounded. It helped that she had become friends with them at a young age when she had been allowed to attend public school still. Being little when they first met, they developed a close bond that wasn't dependent on the money her family had. Due to becoming close friends when they were little, the bond just strengthened as they got older. Her friends still treated her as the Lorelei they always knew and not the Lorelei with tons of money. Lorelei just wished the rest of the world would treat her the same way. The six of them had proposed this trip with Lorelei to an out of the way part of the world where they thought she could relax and be herself; where she might be able to go unrecognized for a while. Unfortunately, that was already proving to be short lived.