Kindred Souls

Chapter 8

     "DeLonge," Tom said to the woman at the hotel check-in counter. She had long blonde hair and glasses, and she busily typed at her computer screen as soon as Tom gave his name to her. He rested his forearms on the counter as he watched her work. I stood behind him and slightly off to the side.

     Our ride to the hotel was pretty uneventful after we got through the craziness of navigating the airport and finding our Uber to the hotel just outside the Las Vegas Strip.

      "I have your reservation right here, let me pull up the details," she briefly looked up from her computer screen at Tom, then at me, and smiled before she continued typing.

     "Should be a suite with a king sized bed, yeah?" Tom asked her, shifting his weight between his feet as he continued leaning on the marble counter.

     "Yes, sir. If you can just grab me the credit card you used to hold the room you'll be all set."

     Tom nodded before he reached in his back pocket and pulled out his slim black wallet. He pulled out his credit card and slid it across the counter to the clerk.

     "How's your day going?" Tom asked genuinely as she entered his card information on her end.

     "Not too bad, got the weekend off here. Probably going to go to the When We Were Young festival. Gonna see you guys play," she said completely casually.

     Tom coughed and then laughed to himself, but then replied cooly, "sweet. I hope we give you a good show."

     "Enjoy your stay, Tom. Call us if you need anything to make your stay more comfortable."

     "Thank you," he replied before turning to me and looking at the pamphlet he received along with his key card.

     I gave the front desk lady a wave and a thanks before following Tom through the fancy and warmly lit hotel lobby toward the elevators. People buzzed and bumbled about the lobby, some of them clearly not sober, and I was quickly reminded that we were in Las Vegas. Tom adjusted the bag on his shoulder as the elevator signal dinged to let us know the elevator had arrived at the floor our room was on.

     "Think she knew that we're fuckin'?" Tom said as we stepped out of the elevator. He opened the small key-card holder and checked the room number, then turned to his left to walk down the corridor lined with rooms.

     My heart sped up as soon as the words left Tom's mouth, but he didn't seem phased at the slightest. Did that mean he actually wanted to sleep with me? Did that mean that he thought about it as much as I did? It was a complete bullshit statement by him, but we hadn't done much aside from fooling around with our hands up to that point. There was really nothing stopping us except for the fact that neither of us wanted to move too fast. He was sort of recently divorced and I was too clingy for my own good.

     I attempted to keep pace with him while dragging my suitcase behind me, "maybe, but what she doesn't know is that we're saving that for marriage."

     Tom stopped in his tracks and turned his head slightly to look down at me, a small smirk playing on his lips. I felt anxiety well in my chest as I realized that marriage was a pretty big word for someone who just got out of one that lasted seventeen years.

     "Exactly," he nodded and turned back to walk down the hallway. The anxiety left my chest on the following exhale and we stopped at our room near the end of the long hallway.

     "Oh, fuck yeah," Tom said with a hint of excitement in his voice as he opened the door to the suite we were going to be staying in for three nights.