Page 80 of Only One Tour Bus

“The room you made us share because they ran out of rooms and the driver needs to be well rested?” Asha says just as loudly, trying to undo the damage. But it’s already done, bless her for trying. “It’s fine. Very professional. For the sake of professionalism.”

She does not lie well under pressure. Good to know for the future. Not that we’re going to have a future. I suppose we’ll have a future if future means the Italian portion of the tour.

The silence in the first few seats is quickly replaced by whispers. By the end of this short bus trip, everyone is going to know what happened last night. Or they’ll know part of it and speculate, correctly as it turns out, about the rest of it.

“Thanks, Laura,” I mumble at her. Darkly, so she knows what she did. Little chance of us bringing her back cheese from the demonstration now.

But knowing how kind (tender-hearted, soft, naive) Asha is, she’ll fold and bring Laura some anyway, but I won’t be. I’ll even pretend to take some for her and eat it myself.

We usher the group into an outdoor theater area and stay in the back to watch the presentation we’ve seen dozens of times before. A woman dressed in the traditional Swiss outfit of a dirndl, hair in braids with a friendly cow behind her, takes over the group’s attention.

“I’m definitely going to be taking a selfie with that cow later. She’s going to be great on the social media,” Asha whispers to me when the Swiss woman is talking about the pressing stage of cheese making.

“You have a problem,” I whisper back, knowing I’m going to be taking that photo. Or in it semi-against my will.

“And then I’m going to eat all the delicious cheese that cow probably produced. I love this demonstration.”

“I think you’re going to have to fight nineteen hungry tourists. I heard a lot of them skipped lunch.”

“Damn it.”

“Come on, you know you want to shove them out of the way, maybe step on a few, so you get the cheese and they get a lesson in not skipping meals.”

“Are you inviting me to the dark side with the promise of cheese rewards?”

“I guess I am.”

“It’s a good attempt; if anything was going to get me over to the dark side of beating up our babies, it was going to be cheese.”

“The demonstration is wrapping up, you better get to that cheese before it’s gone.”

Asha turns and fast walks after the group into the farm building, stopping to take an unnecessary selfie with a cow that has a bow on its head, and one with me in it as well. It’s a good thing they always keep some cheese separate for us.

“You and Callum are sharing a room?” By the time I catch up to the group, Asha has cheese in hand and is being harassed by Kevin. I glare at him since the tone is a little more judgmental than I need to be hearing from him.

“No rooms left,” Asha says with a full mouth. “All part of the job.”

“Nice job.” Thomas leers at me.

This is why I stick to families. “It’s not as nice a job as you’d think.” Especially when I have to deal with people like this. I keep the glare up until Asha steps on my foot. Probably for chastising her obnoxious babies.

Thomas shrugs and gets distracted by the barristers. Both men wander over to the other women while I steal some cheese off Asha’s plate.

Asha lets me, unusually subdued. Maybe her mind is on other things.

“They’re all semi-rested and high off that clean Alpine air. And there’s a bar-slash-club in the chalet we’re staying at. Tonight is going to be rough,” I say.

CHAPTER 35

ASHA

I shepherd the group back into the chalet for fondue night. It’s my favorite group dinner of the trip, because bread and cheese, but instead of my mind filled with visions of gooey, warm cheese and buttery bread, I can’t stop thinking about Callum. Wondering if we’re going to continue with this after the tour. Or even continue it after we leave Lauterbrunnen.

We’re so different. I can’t imagine living like Callum does, constantly refusing to see the good in people. But it’s not exhausting being around him; his negativity isn’t toxic like I thought it would be.

It’s interesting to see his approach to life, especially because it differs from mine so much. And the ways he bends and goes against his own grumpy instincts by doing something sweet. Or when I realize his grumpiness is mostly a facade and behind it is someone who genuinely loves history and loves sharing it with others. And it is kind of entertaining. Seriously, who is so bothered by laughter?

No, I don’t mind being around him at all.