His sincerity took her off guard. She paused and looked skyward at the lofted ceiling to hold back tears. His concern moved her in a way she didn’t want to be moved. His question, so human, so nice, pierced her somehow and made her freshly aware of how raw she still felt about the loss of her mother and the shock of this dramatic turn in her life. She loved working at the resort, she did, but the familiarity of Jerry and the talk of Lake Beulah made her feel as homesick as Maryellen had felt—only Sherri couldn’t indulge these pangs of emotion, because she didn’t have anyone to return home to. She couldn’t sort it all out, so she did what she was trained to do: she smiled. “Oh, I’m just fine,” she said. Gloria had told her that she needed to speak in a higher voice so the guests could hear her over the din, that she needed to e-nun-ce-ate. “I’ll be right back with those drinks.”

She walked away as quickly as she could, her legs pressed tightly together, her springy hair bobbing up and down. She made a beeline for Carmen and asked if she could cover for her so she could change into a fresh costume. She was fighting back tears, her ankles wobbling just a bit.

What was wrong with her? Sherri didn’t know then that the entire architecture of her life existed in that moment, and that Arthur and Jerry Derzon would become the post and beams of her future.

CHAPTER SIX

Sherri’s mother once told her that when you’re young you have good days and bad days, but when you get older you have good years and bad years. Sherri had occasional bad days, like the one she’d had when she broke down in the locker room after meeting Arthur, or days she missed home or was blindsided by grief. But those days were folded into the mostly good ones. And on those good days, Sherri could feel herself grow larger and more expansive. She was learning how to unapologetically take up space in a room. She began making grand entrances at the start of each shift, puffing her hair and walking with her chest proud as a lion’s.