The Lankville Daily News

Dick Oakes, Jr.

It was a windowless, ill-lit room. I sat there for awhile. You could hear the rain on the roof.

After awhile, a big guy came in. He huffed it to the other side of the table and sat staring at me.

“This idn’t any of my business,” he said. “I’m just here to make sure you get some papers. We got charts, you know. Pie, flow, horizontal stacked bar, scatter, triangle. You name it, we got it.”  He tapped a folder and then stared at his hands.

“Nobody’s going to god damn catch me unawares,” he whispered.

I couldn’t figure on any of it.

A woman came in. She was a big girl, selling it pretty well up front but the back was shot to hell. When she sat down opposite me, her chair squeaked resentfully.

She talked me through it and I nodded along idiotically. I could barely pay attention. Buck up Oakes I kept saying to myself. You wanna’ be a charity case all your life? It didn’t matter none though.

When it was all over, she said, “I’ll give you a tour.”

We stood up.

“What about the papers? I got my charts to do,” the big guy said.

“Later.”

I followed the woman out. The big guy had taken a chair and slammed it down on the table. You could hear pieces of it flying all over the place. Nobody seemed to give a damn though.

We came to a big open office with no windows. Boxes of garbage crammed into the corners. The floor was covered in scratched and streaked tiles. Bunch of grey-skinned middle-aged women wearing men’s clothing sitting in cubicles. There was something chilling about it. I couldn’t piece it together none.

We approached a closet with a battered steel door.

“And this is our kitchen,” my tour guide noted. “The microwave doesn’t work. We put in for one months ago but…” She trailed off.

She saw me staring at the blood that faintly stained one wall.

“Yes, someone killed themselves in here. We should…probably paint…”  She trailed off again.

Two days later I was entering senseless data into a computer.

By Dick Oakes, Jr.

It was mid-afternoon when I got off the bus. It was getting towards the end, I knew it. It was just a matter of finding a room.

I wandered into town. The sidewalks were in deep oppressive shadow but it was hot as hell. There was a fat lady in a floral-patterned dress standing in front of a pharmacy. She was reading a magazine that had a bunch of igloos on the cover. She looked me up and down as I passed by– I didn’t know what the hell to make of it.

I reached the end of town, then doubled back to the pharmacy. The fat lady was still there. She had tossed the igloo magazine into the street and was now staring at a calendar. Her fat finger slowly passed over each day of the month, then switched to the next month and continued the same. It was all senseless- who knew what to do with it?

I bought a couple of razors and a pack of cheap cigarettes. “You want some shaving cream? We got a new brand in that’s a soothing green color. The gel protects your face from nicks, cuts, and irritation– leaves you feeling refreshed and rejuvenated,” the young guy behind the counter said. He was enthusiastic– really wanted to help me. You had to admire it. But I knew I wouldn’t need it and declined. As I was leaving, I turned around to see the kid fiddling with a shotgun. I moved a little faster.

It was down at the other end– just a mean god damn place done up after a border style twenty years out of fashion and built into a rough, brown hill like someone had shoved it there angrily– like they had said get the hell in there, you abominable little godless motel. Nothing but hate, pigheadedness and perversity, done up in white enamel.

The guy behind the counter looked the part. About seven foot tall, hairless– he never said a word but slammed the coins down on the laminate counter enough to crack it through. He pushed a desk calendar with a saturated photo of the place and an ashtray towards me before stalking off towards the office.

I looked out towards the parking lot– empty, stained and streaked with oil and tire tread and then headed off to the room.

There was a scratchy blue bedspread with a pink blanket over top, made so tight that I could barely get into the damn thing. I pictured that same dark, looming figure, angry as all hell, preparing the rooms with a convulsive fury. I’ll bounce a whole roll of quarters off this god damn bed, this god damn cradle of impiety, of vice. I will bounce a god damn pie plate off it I heard him say. It seemed real– like he was in the room with me. I didn’t know what the hell to make of it.

I lay there for a long time. When I got up, it was dark. The guy hadn’t put any outside lights on at all– I stumbled around for awhile until I found a chintzy desk lamp that put out a sinister little beam of light. I heard the guy suddenly– this time I knew it was him. He was out there in the breezeway, fiddling with an ice machine. Want some god damn ice? HERE’S some god damn ice. I could hear the bucket crash against the access door. 1/4 pound of ice per god damn second– what do you grotesque abominations think of that? 

What do you?

That last, directed at me.

I fumbled with the razor. There was a second boom, louder, like the entire ice machine had been tipped over. And then the guy was going at the compressor with his boot– over and over again, plastic and metal being sent into a dangerous ricochet against the concrete walls and the guy just howling now.

I found my sports jacket– removed the tattered bus schedule from an inner pocket.

Damned if I remember how I got out of there.

Dick Oakes, Jr.

It was evening. Some guy pressed a booklet into my hand. “This booklet is your assurance of quality, comfort, safety, cleanliness and friendly hospitality,” he said. I asked him what the hell it was to him, anyway– he tried to answer but then he vomited in his mouth a little and lurked off.

It was a side-stapled guide from the Lankville Motel Association. There was a little sign on the front with their name on it. Above, it said, “Look for Our Sign”. I skimmed through it but I didn’t figure on it mattering none.

I wandered around the spent downtown area for awhile but there was nothing going on. Then, I headed for the outskirts. After a mile or so, I saw the place up on the left.

I walked into the office. Bunch of lobby furniture done up in pea greens, saffron and flowers. There was an old paunchy man with glasses behind the counter. I couldn’t figure on any of it. I lit a cigarette and tossed the match into an ashtray.

“Those ashtrays have the name of our establishment printed on them,” the man said. “It says “El Patio Motel”, did you notice?”

I coughed. It started to rain heavily. The old guy wasn’t noticing it. The rain was slamming against the front doors now but he kept his eye on the ashtray. I heard a loud boom from upstairs somewhere. None of it was figuring right but I rented a room anyway.

It was done up in pinks and oranges. There were more ashtrays– too many ashtrays, all with “El Patio Motel” printed on them. Then I noticed everything had “El Patio Motel” printed on it– the guy had really gone to town. The trashcans, the complimentary soaps, the chairs, the carpet, all had it.

I pulled the shades and got undressed. I could see the little town down the ways, twinkling sickly, like the embers of a campfire in need of being stamped out. I heard the boom again, upstairs again but I didn’t mind it none. Then, a knock came.

It was the paunchy guy. “Need any ashtrays?” he asked. He had a whole stack of them in his hand. “I think I’ll be alright,” I said. I held the door against my unclothed frame. “Well, if you need any, you can use the service telephone there on the desk. It has our name printed on it. Just dial the number seven. That’s printed on there too.” He went away.

I put the television on. There was static, then some organ music, then a picture. It was a feed of the front desk. Nobody was there and then the paunchy guy was there, organizing some hand towels. It went on like that. I couldn’t make sense of none of it. I tried some other stations but it was all the same, all just the front desk.

I got in bed and slid some lurid pamphlets purchased earlier in the day out of a brown paper bag. After awhile, I put the TV back on. I couldn’t figure on why.

This is how you picked it, Oakes, I said to myself.

The night passed.