“What about downloads?” asked Cash.
“I don’t even say that word,” he answered.
“Can you stream it?”
“Shut it.”
“I don’t even know how those tape things still play,” offered Teresa.
“Don’t get him started,” sighed Cash.
Too late.
“There are two things I really know how to do; fix cars and 8-tracks. They’ll both last a lifetime if you treat them right. With tapes, it’s all about repairing or replacing foil tabs and fuzzy pads. I can show you someday, if you like. Cash has seen me do it.”
The girls exchanged glances. Teresa gave her friend a he’s cute pout. Cash smiled in agreement.
“Would love to see it when we get back home,” smiled Teresa.
Then it was before them. The Las Vegas Strip. It was daylight, yet somehow things still got a whole lot shinier as they passed the landmarks one-by-one: Stratosphere, Encore, Wynn, Venetian, Mirage, and more, almost too many to grasp. Fewer tourists than they’d expected, though.
“Which one are we staying at?” asked Cash. “I can’t take the suspense!”
“I told you—it’s a surprise,” answered Rob.
“Caesar’s! The Hangover!” chuckled Cash.
“Aaaand the Ides of March,” added Teresa, gazing out the passenger side window as they approached the Bellagio and its legendary fountains.
They motored on.
City Center, Paris, MGM Grand, New York, New York, Luxor and others.
A huge jet lumbered over them as it descended on McCarran airport. It felt reassuring to the trio, after several days of no aircraft, save for the occasional military fighter.
“Well, I guess it’s Mandalay Bay,” offered Cash, pointing at the last of the big beautiful casino resorts at the south end of the strip. “Cool!”
Mandalay came and went. Rob drove on. The Killers were on the radio now.
DRIVE CAREFULLY. COME BACK SOON, said the backside of the famous WELCOME TO FABULOUS LAS VEGAS sign.
About ten wordless minutes after that, Rob pulled into a motel parking lot. Three young men in hoodies huddled together in a handicapped parking space, blowing smoke rings toward the sky.
IN-ROOM HBO bragged the weathered sign.
“I’m borderline certain that said ‘In-room hobo’,” sighed Cash.
In the modest motel lobby, Rob checked in while the girls did their best to recline on a tattered sofa.
“I bet this couch was the bomb in the days before this guy took it out of the Caesars Palace dumpster,” said Cash.
“This is our ‘surprise hotel’? O-M-G,” Teresa said.
“Yeah. Rob said he thought since the address was on Las Vegas Boulevard, it had to be part of the strip. He said we can’t afford those nice ones because they quadruple their prices for the weekend.”
“How ‘bout we stay weeknights in a nice hotel, then spend the weekend in a cardboard box behind the Palazzo?” They both laughed as Rob dealt with the clerk behind the desk.
“One room, two hotties. Well played, my friend, okaaaay,” coughed the middle-aged turtle, with an unlit cigar hanging beneath his thatchy mustache.
“It’s not like that,” answered Rob.
“Sure you don’t want the room with one king bed?” he replied, sounding like a garbage disposal on the fritz.
“I’m sure, bro.”
“Mackey. Call me Mackey. We had a cancellation. I can slide you twenty percent off. Okaaaay?”
“I’m marrying one of them. The other one is her best friend.”
“Sweeeeeet,” replied the clerk, transforming the explanation into one of his fantasies. “Which one is the bride-to-be?” he asked, more loudly than his previous mumblings.
“We’re both brides-to-be,” replied Cash as she sauntered up to the desk, “ . . . eventually.”
The clerk studied her carefully enough for Rob to want it to stop. He smiled broadly, revealing the teeth he had retained to date.
“I was telling your groom about a Honeymoon Suite we have . . . ”
“I wanted to ask you something,” interrupted Cash. “Is the name of this place actually ‘In-room HBO’? Because that’s the only sign we could see out front.”
“Cash . . . ” said Rob.
“No, there’s a small temp sign. We’re having the main one redone,” answered the clerk. “We’re in the middle of renovations, but you’ll like your room. All three of you . . . Cash.”
The name suddenly sounded dirty.
“More importantly,” he continued, “unlike them big casino hotels, we ain’t had even one incident yet, okaaaay?”
They understood, especially after the conversations they’d had with Paul Bhong upon leaving the police station, but it was not something they wanted to think about until some official facts came out from an ominously silent presidential administration. Quite likely, the current situation did not lend itself to immediate transparency.
The clerk handed over the keys while studying the registration form that Rob had filled out.
“1983 Chevy? Really?” asked the clerk as he eyeballed the card.
“Really.”
“I gave you all a room on the penthouse level. Best views of beautiful and romantic Las Vegas.”
They all knew the place consisted of two floors.
The tired trio gathered their luggage and headed for the door. The desk man caught Teresa’s eye.
“Hey slim,” came the words from his gravel pit of a throat, “if those two ever need their alone time, you can always bump by and chill with me. I got some Four Loko bouncing ‘round the mini-fridge, okaaaay . . . ?”
The door closed.
The sound of a running shower echoed in the distance as Cash and Teresa lounged in separate beds.
“Can’t believe we are finally clean and in bed,” said Teresa.
“Feels nice,” answered Cash. “I don’t think I can even raise my arms.”
“Not surprised. I’d be shot too if I disinfected the place inch by inch. You could perform an appendectomy in here now,” smiled Teresa. She craned her neck to be sure Rob was still in the bathroom.
“Well,” replied Cash, “it seems this place has two room types; smoking and chain-smoking.”
“So, have you been thinking much about a wedding?” whispered Teresa.
“Been thinking maybe I should go for it, but I don’t know.”
“He loves you so much.”
“That’s not it. Weddings . . . I mean his mom left him. Left his whole family. His father turned to drink and then there was the fire. He hasn’t seen or heard from his own mother in years. My parents split up. When do I hear from them? Sometimes marriage is like the kiss of death.”
“That’s all true, and what do I know?” responded Teresa. “But that guy in there would never leave you. Never.”
Cash smiled, “Cars, old music, and me.”
“You’re ahead of the cars and the 8-tracks,” said Teresa. “I’d trade places with you. Have you kept score of the losers I’ve dated?”
“Well, Rob keeps mentioning that guy John G from California. Swears you’d hit it off.”
“Not a fan of blind dates.”
“If we do get married here, he’s coming in as best man, so it might not be too awkward in that situation.”
“But you’ve never even met this John G guy, Carrie, and Rob never answers my question about how tall this mystery man is.”
“They were best friends till they were twelve, but John moved to Cali before I ever met Rob.”
“Tall Paul is pretty cute,” offered Teresa.
“If you like the you-can’t-believe-anything-I-say type, then maybe, T.”
“He’s just a joker. Seems pretty smart, too. Sounds like he knows a lot about everything,” whispered Teresa, as she stared at the peeling motel ceiling. The shower water stopped. Sounded like the little shampoo bottle, or something, fell to the floor. Teresa continued, “Some of the stuff Paul said
about whatever the hell is going on lately is pretty scary. I don’t know if it’s true, but if it is, you might want to think about getting married before this world goes completely ass up.”
No response.
“Carrie, you hear me?”
A bit of heavy breathing. Teresa lifted her head to peer over at her best friend. Rob rattled around in the bathroom.
“Ca?”
The strong breaths turned into something of a mild snore. Teresa laughed to herself and tried to snuggle into her thin, hard pillow.
The three of them were torn from their dreams by the same tumultuous boom. The room was much darker than it had been when they’d drifted off. Teresa checked her phone. 3:15 AM. Sounded like a wrecking ball was battering the motel. As heads cleared, they realized it was the room next door.
Bangs, crashes, muffled voices.
“What the hell?” moaned Rob.
“Rough sex,” sighed Cash.
They shared a brief chuckle till they heard the growl.
Is an Alaskan Grizzly getting laid in room 29?
“Quiet please!” yelled Rob, as he pounded the wall.
Seemed to stop for a few seconds, then it resumed, like two wrecking balls.
Was that a scream? And a shattering table lamp?
“I’m calling the cops,” groaned Teresa, as she grabbed her phone.
“I’m gonna knock on their door,” said Rob.
“No, you are not,” replied Cash. “First, I think we are hearing some 3AM, Sin City, in-room hobo sex. But either way, you are not getting murdered, Sam Cooke style, in a shitty motel.”
“Sam who?” asked Teresa.
Ignoring the question, Rob declared, “Then I’m going to the manager’s office. Maybe they have a security guard or something. What if a woman is being hurt in there? Or if someone flipped out in one of those . . . schitzo . . . or whatever those episodes are . . . ”
“I got a recording,” said Teresa. “Now I’m on hold. I think I’ve called the cops once in my entire life and now it’s becoming routine. Just great.”
Boom! The wall thumped.
Rob was barefoot as he reached the motel office. There was no one behind the desk, but it sounded like a TV on in the back office. He pounded the bell so hard it stuck to his palm.
“Coming,” came the voice from the back. Rob hoped the verb was being used in the traditional sense.
The office manager appeared. Looked like the same guy from the day shift.
“Hey, uh . . . Mackey,” said Rob, “do you have any security at the motel?”
“One, I ain’t Mackey. Two, yes I do.”
He bent down for a second, then stood and dropped a thirty-one-ounce Rawlings aluminum bat on the desktop.
“You’re not Mackey?”
“Nope,” replied the clerk. “He’s my brother. Works days here.”
“Really?”
“Yep. I got more choppers than him. See?”
He proudly displayed a mouth that was almost full of teeth. Rob preferred to look at the baseball bat.
“This here bat is signed by both Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera,” he said.
“There’s something going on in room 29.”
“I’m sure there is.”
“No. Not that. Sounds like a fight or even . . . ”
“Okay, let me ring the room.”
The clerk picked up his phone and dialed. Rob felt a bit of relief.
“So you and Mackey are twins, I’m guessing.”
“Nope,” he replied as the phone rang in room 29.
“What? You look . . . ”
“Triplets.”
The phone continued to ring.
“Yeah,” the manager continued, tapping two fingers on the bat handle, “I’m Jackie. Then there’s Mackey—who you met—and then there’s . . . ”
Rob found his mind zipping through the alphabet searching for a third rhyming name.
“ . . . Galileo,” said the clerk.
No answer from room 29.
“Papa liked the stars,” he concluded, as he grabbed the bat. His voice did sound less like drywall than Mackey’s.
Rob and Jackie inched up to the door marked 29. Rob noticed that beyond the railing behind him, one floor below, the three hooded teens he’d spotted over twelve hours earlier were still in the parking lot, still smoking. Unless they had gone home and then returned—or were three entirely different hooded teens.
“Galileo works at a fancy joint out in Lake Las Vegas,” whispered the clerk. “He don’t make no time for his brothers.”
“Let’s listen,” mouthed Rob. He shot a glance at the door a few feet down, hoping it remained locked the way he told Cash and T to keep it.
Jackie leaned in toward the closed egress. Rob tried to find a crevice in the dark curtains behind the rectangular motel window glass. He wondered why there were no moths or flying insects bouncing off the unwashed pane, as there had been in all their previous cross-country stopovers. Then he remembered they were now in the desert.
Silence.
The motel manager shot a look at Rob. Their bodies relaxed a bit.
Then it sounded like room 29 exploded. There was a short, sharp scream. Jackie plunked the aluminum bat to his shoulder and pounded on the door. Rob moved next to him and turned a bit to the side, preparing himself for what might come.
Footsteps. Loud ones.
Jackie stood with his Rawlings slugger as if his last name was Robinson.
The latch clacked. The doorknob turned. Then another clack, but from behind the door to Cash and Teresa’s room.
Both doors began to open simultaneously.
“What . . . the . . . fuck . . . do . . . y’all . . . want?” the man jawed as he came into view in the partially-opened entryway.
He was at least six and a half feet tall. Maybe that wide, too. Bald, black, and buff, he stood completely naked, save for the towel that was not wrapped around his waist, but hung like a sheet on a clothesline from his obviously blessed and fully erect penis. The phallus came through the doorway, followed by the rest of him.
“Put that bat down before you eat it, girlfriend.”
Jackie complied. Quickly. The heads of Cash and Teresa popped out from their room next door.
“Go inside,” said Rob to the girls, to keep them from any possible danger, and to prevent Cash from seeing a stark-naked Adonis with a dick like a five-dollar-footlong. They obliged, or pretended to. Rob wasn’t sure because his attention was back on the giant before him.
“Excuse us, but we wanted to be sure everything was okay,” offered Rob, while Jackie was already turning to leave.
The large man huffed as the breeze fluttered the towel that draped his manhood. “Come here,” he yelled to someone in the dark room behind him. A slight and pretty Hispanic girl appeared with a sheet half-draped around her. A detailed tattoo of the face of Jesus Christ covered the area between her neck and breasts.
“Hi,” she smiled. She was about five-foot-three, and looked like a preschooler next to the behemoth.
“These superheroes are worried about you, baby,” said the man. “You need help or anything?”
“No. All good,” she replied, staring into Rob’s eyes.
“Let’s go,” said Jackie to Rob, reaching for his shoulder. “Sorry to disturb you,” he apologized to the couple.
“I’m the one who needs help!” yelled a different female voice from somewhere within the room.
Rob and Jackie eyed each other.
Oh, shit, was all Rob’s brain could muster.
“Sir, would you open the door, please?” asked Rob, hoping he wouldn’t soon be swallowing teeth.
The muscled fellow just laughed as he pushed the door wide. Light from the street lamps flooded the room. There she was. Another slight woman. Caucasian. Completely naked and bent over a steep-angled, red microfiber sex wedge that sat atop the disordered bed.
“I need the help of my big man, honey,” she slurred.
�
�Mother . . . fucker,” sighed the ebony-toned weightlifter.
His lone towel had fallen to the concrete as his softened shaft could no longer tent-pole it.
LAS VEGAS BOULEVARD
Captain Jack Sparrow stood there in the afternoon heat, right beside Spongebob Squarepants. Their costumes were slightly tattered, and a bit soiled. They stood proudly on the sidewalk, near the curb, not far from something resembling Minnie Mouse. But her character head was off and tucked under the arm of the role-player—a bearded, greasy-haired phlegm machine with a brown Tiparillo dangling from a bottom lip as parched as the hot air that engulfed him. Cigar smoke danced around his red and white polka-dotted skirt. They all wanted the same thing: your photograph with them in exchange for a decent deposit in their tip jars. Several feet from these urban entrepreneurs stood Rob, Cash, and Teresa. They leaned against the railing of the beautiful, eight-acre manmade lake that housed the famous Fountains of Bellagio. Though best viewed after dark, Cash was impatient and wanted a daytime experience as well. The next musical presentation was due to start momentarily. A family of ducks floated by, all in a row. The water was just a couple of feet deep by the edge, and the bottom was lined with coins from those hoping for a granted wish. The crowd was a bit sparse for the midday viewing, but there were still enough tourists to make it difficult to grab a prime center-railing spot.
“This is amazing,” said Cash.
“I hope I can keep my eyes open for it,” replied Rob, raising his sunglasses to reveal a slight redness.
“We’re not destined for sleep during this trip,” added Teresa from behind her Starbucks cup. “Did that shit really happen last night at In-room Hobo?”
“We def need to learn more about sex,” laughed Cash.
“Speak for yourself,” replied Rob with a grin.
“Huh?” said his girlfriend. “Buddy, you’re one to talk. I think your favorite position is the ten and two.” Her hands were gripping an imaginary steering wheel. She gave him a light kick to his shin.
“Too much info,” added Teresa between coffee sips.
A man paraded behind them holding a sign warning people that Jesus would disapprove of anything they decided to do in the city of sins. Spongebob hurried after a couple who neglected to fill his tip jar. Cash’s driving jab had caused Rob’s thoughts turn to his old Chevy. He was happy he chose to park in the Bellagio garage because it seemed safe. Not that the one older security guard who waved them up the ramp was much of a deterrent to thieves, but it was better than nothing.
Canni Page 4
