“Oh, that hotel was too overpriced.  We found another one down the road.”

By my previous understanding of this world, nothing significant should be heard in those words.  Nor did I understand that, in a city bursting at its seams like Houston, the socioeconomic demographic might plummet to a fiery death or scale Mt. Everest between two squashed neighbors.  Finally, my mother did not tell me the full story with those two sentences: I thought she meant we were off for a cheaper hotel, whereas she actually meant the first hotel was run by college freshman but so overpriced, it cost just as much as the five-star St. Regis drowning in its neon valence garden two minutes away.

When Dad wheeled his massive Toyota truck into the front, I figured we must be turning around.  I mistook it for a floral design business desperate to attract attention.  Or perhaps a funeral home, honoring a privileged cadaver.  Then I saw the bellboys in sleek Italian suits of black and cream, and the golden luggage cart emerging from the shade of the skyscraper, and realized that multiple hotels must share the same parking garage… we’d stopped for directions.

The nearest bellboy opened my door with a sweeping arm and a slight bow.  “Ma’am?”

I quite suddenly forgot how to undo my seatbelt.

He stood with his polite smile while I fumbled with my sketchbook, notebooks, and regular books.  His hand extended to me.  The metal end of the seatbelt smacked my face as I stepped down, mumbling “Thank thank thank,” like I might get shot if anyone heard.

I retreated to my mother.  “Where’s the parking garage?”

“Honey, they’ll drive it there for us.”

Very much not a stop for directions, then.  I held my breath as my father allowed one of the walking Italian suits to climb into the driver’s seat and steer the Toyota out of sight.

My parents turned around and strode for the doors, leaving me standing next to the valence drive-in.  Surely they were joking.  My lack of social skills wasn’t just learned - I’d inherited it as well.  And it’s not like we had the money to afford valence, let alone a hotel that organized valence.  How could they walk so calmly?  Well, okay, to be fair - my father rarely did anything without a war plan mapped out in his head.  He might be possessed and held hostage by a phantom, and you’d never see it on his face.  Appearance was paramount - that’s why he wore collared shirts and next-to-slacks all the time.  To see his vanilla hair uncombed or his jaw unshaved was legend, even among my siblings.

Then I looked at my mother again.  She dressed as nicely as possible, too, sure.  But not for road trips.  This day, she wore yoga pants.  Underneath a dress.  And a necklace.  And hairspray.
They’d planned this.  They’d prepared for it.  And I hadn’t heard a word!  I wore black skinny jeans and a chain around my waist!  I carried Michael Grant novels in my arms, beneath a sketchbook open to a page of cartoon doodles.  My tuxedo-colored cat would have blended in better than I.

Unsure of what punishment this travesty might attract, I rushed to follow on my parents’ heels.

By the time the bellboys and a man whose nametag identified him only as BUTLER led us to the concierge desk, I felt the eyes of the staff burning holes into my hoodie.  The guests seemed not to care either way - they were too busy drifting in and out of the attached jewelry store, or fixing the leashes on their pets.  The lobby was reminded me of an oven: warm shades of gold and brown, and big enough that nobody had to step within ten feet of us.  Save for the bellboy who looked very annoyed waiting for me to hand my books over.  I clutched them to me - I’d rather be in a horror-ridden Michael Grant novel than fearing the wrath of so many gleaming strangers.  Here, I felt like little more than an intruder.

BUTLER eventually pointed us in the right direction, and we navigated our way through the labyrinth of marble floors and soaring arches to the elevator, next to a table adorned with orchids.  Yes, real orchids.  I touched them to be sure.

At least, once we retreated into our room, the pressure of social inadequacy began to evaporate.  My parents sighed in unison as they kicked off their shoes in favor of the free slippers in the closet.  Someone had turned the television on already; it greeted us with our names on the welcome display.  I set down my five books and examined the stout wooden lamps.  It would take us half an hour to figure out how to turn them on.  The solution was so obscure that I’ve since forgotten it.

The room sported 500 square feet of the same baked-crust-and-cinnamon palate as the rest of the cavernous hotel.  It included a fridge full of everything from M&Ms to drinks even my parents couldn’t name, a room service menu detailing meals from the five-star restaurant downstairs and the different teas butlers could bring guests during their wakeup calls, and a phone mounted between the toilet and the shower in case one found themselves in the compromising position of running out of toilet paper or towels.

The last of my anxiety and guilt for reacting to this rare surprise with fear shattered when my six-foot-four father hummed “MM MM I’M SO FANCY!” and flopped down on the rollaway bed, a cylindrical pillow clamped in his arms.  He looked up at us and confessed, “We’re going to get kicked out of here.”

My mother covered her mouth and laughed.

The hotel went from a towering signal of our economic and social shame to a place of adventure.  We explored every inch of that room with glee, rehearsed the operation of the lamps, familiarized ourselves with the heavenly pillows, and so on.  The intimidation turned into a giddy high - I felt like the protagonist in a novel.

The only thing I’d guessed correctly about our stay was the cost; we had no money to spend on this.  For ten years, my parents had saved and planned for a vacation in Hawaii for their twentieth anniversary.  As a result of that trip, we now had  decade’s worth of “hotel points” - an electronic currency awarded for staying in hotels, useful for buying nights in MORE hotels - to blow on this little college trip together, one of the last nights I’d spend with my parents away from my siblings before leaving the nest.  As for the money we’d planned on spending at a much cheaper hotel, we could now spend it on a dinner from the restaurant downstairs, complete with a delivery butler.

The butter came in special dishes, molded into a “St. R” logo so elegant we decided to eat without it.