Free Lost in Hotels by M. Martin Page A

wouldn’t. Then there was the question of where David might be staying, and how close I could get without being too close.
    With the Plaza Athenee and Le Meurice fully occupied, my choice was between the super-cute but sort of removed Hotel Tremoille or the Ritz in all its aristocratic glamour. Plus, the fact that it was soon closing for renovation made me want to see it one more time in all its fabulousness, especially on someone else’s dime. I also figured its close proximity to the Costes, Bristol, and InterContinental increased the chances that I would bump into David.
    The driver takes the grand approach to the Ritz from Rue Saint-Honoré before turning into Place Vendôme, which brings a jolt of wheels over cobblestone pavers as the plaza’s column comes into view. Built by Napoleon from bronze derived from his enemy’s canons, yet it was years before I ever really knew what it was despite seeing it all the time.
    It’s hard to imagine Place Vendôme being anything but a fashionable square, but under its glittery commercial facade lays a history of almost constant friction and a centuries-old struggle between those who have and those who don’t. How unlikely that a working-class girl like me would be staying at its most fabulous hotel just a few centuries later.
    Paris is a city truly unafraid to tear down monumental things, whether a landmark to Louis XIV that once stood at the center of this square, or the former Tuileries Palace that burned nearby during the Paris Commune, which I can still hear my college history professor describe in detail. Even this column was a replacement for another destroyed by an angry mob, only to be rebuilt a short time later by Napoléon with a statue of himself secured back on top.
    A flurry of activity outside the Ritz has us sitting idle. My eyes are transfixed on its fairy-tale facade with its white canopy awnings and windows that seem to each tell a different story of the guests within, despite their almost identical, symmetrical architecture. By the end of the ride, I’m a bit more charmed by the driver as well—the kind of guy who would take you to an edgy Paris party or nightclub for a long night you would never forget—even though no more than three words and a few more glances have been exchanged between us.
    “So if you need anything while you are in Paris, please do not hesitate to call me to be here,” he says in his boyish tone, looking through the mirror and into my eyes at the end of the sentence.
    I take the card and notice his long fingers that taper between thick knuckles and come to a head at a rounded, well-trimmed nail.
    “What hours do you work? I may need a driver for an afternoon or evening depending on my work schedule.”
    “I work all day and night; you just call and I come.”
    He looks away as the traffic clears in front of him, and a dapper bellman whistles his attention as the car moves forward. In my mind, this kind of man is who you have an affair with, the type who is attractive and sexy-wild, yet also the type you’re eager to leave as soon as you’re finished and not linger in a romantic sugar coma that consumes everything that you are.
    Staying at the Ritz is a benefit of the journalism world that makes up for years of low wages and long hours. The valet lacks the sexy brutes that line the front of the Costes or the quaff haircuts of the Athenee; these courteous kinsmen have been at the Ritz for more than a generation with eyes that can assess your breeding and social credit score without uttering a single word. Their uniforms have the fit of being worn over years with slight shoulders and stuttered movement that make you hesitate to hand them your heaving luggage.
    The driver readies the credit slip as the men rush the car, his left hand gripping the pen in an almost boyish apprehension about the paper of someone who spends very little time writing much of anything.
    “Please add twenty percent if possible,” I say.
    “Thank you