They sat there, too impassive to even make a motion. Only the occasional sniffling of Samantha punctuated the crypt like atmosphere of the room. Even the sensations of self-pity and self-loathing seemed suspended in air. Instead, they could only face the pain of the immediate, a stark pain, more infinitely palatable than a thousand confessions or a thousand prayers. It was the infinite hunger for the present, confronted with an uncertain future and an unabsolvable past.
Decades might pass before either one of them would have the strength to leave the confines of that motel room. Decades might pass before either one of them could share a single word. The only thing they could share was a breath, but even that seemed tainted. Even the shadows seemed impure, like an obscene charade. Their clothes seemed like shackles, but they had already seen through one another to the very nakedness of their being. When stripped of both self-respect and self-denial, what is there to strip down to?
It was 2:30 in the morning and they still sat there silently. Outside, a drunken couple fought. They heard the sound of doors slamming, and high heels walking stealthily across pavement. Belches and the lung piercing hacks of tubercular coughing. They could smell, even at this late hour, the smell of cigarettes and last minute sexual excursions hanging in the air, even from outside their room. Their bodies felt withered. Perhaps they were finally home after all.
Samantha turned her head to face him. She uttered in a soft, uncertain voice, quavering with every word, “Dez… can I… sleep with you tonight? Just… hold me. That’s all.”
He wrapped his arms around her as she curled her face against his chest. His breathing seemed shallow and alert as she closed her eyes.
She felt him kiss the top of her head lightly as she drifted into sleep.
CHAPTER TEN
If there was ever a more pitiless sun in Craig County—or in all of Oklahoma for that matter—Dez and Samantha hadn’t known it. It came in mercilessly, despite the thickly drawn curtains, reminding them both that tomorrow had come, and there was no solution to be found. They were stuck with themselves.
It had been a restless night when they finally rolled out of bed at 7:30. Both had slept in fits and starts, and both were surprised to find that they shared the same habit of waking up precisely at a quarter past 4 in the morning, unable to fall back to sleep for another hour or two.
Despite the heavy lids of her sleep-deprived eyes, Samantha found herself quickly becoming mentally alert. She supposed she should have felt hungover; but only the dull, dry taste in her mouth claimed evidence of any excesses from last night. The throbbing pain she knew in her body reminded her of the assault, but it was nothing compared to the shame she felt for having fallen victim to it. And the shame she felt for having opened up so freely to an absolute stranger.
Dez, on the other hand, was practically immobile. Though his wide-open eyes indicated he was awake, his body was so pensive that he could have passed for a hypnosis patient. His brain felt swathed in leather, and he could feel the straps tightening with every incessant chirping of the birds outside. Samantha tried to nudge him.
“Hey… hey you. It’s morning now. Come on. Let’s get showered. We’ll grab some coffee or some donuts or something.”
The supine body on the bed refused to acknowledge her. He just stared straight ahead, his mouth agape.
“Come on, now. There’s time to fret later. For now, we gotta get up.”
The body didn’t budge. She laid back down and poked his rib a few times. She thought she saw him grinning, so she seized on the advantage, and began to tickle his stomach. Soon he was laughing uncontrollably. As if by automatic reaction, Samantha did so as well. Soon, it seemed like the entire room was spinning and colliding like a funhouse ride as they began play-thrashing one another, eventually stopping only to catch their breaths and collapse, staring into one another’s eyes.
They stared back at one another wordlessly for what seemed like hours. Dez took a long look at her. The resilience and glow of her skin was supernatural, even despite all that she had been through during the past twelve hours, there was a radiance to her that was elastic, tickling his nerves. Her fine mouth seemed carved to present a perpetual question; a question that held no answers and no clues. Her hair, unkempt and free, clung to her head and shoulders like a shawl, and one look into the jade green hue of her eyes and he knew he would be lost. The question was for how long?
He shut his eyes and pressed his lips to hers. Her breath tasted pure, and her mouth yielded without struggle. When they finally stopped, she smiled sweetly at him and ran her fingers through his hair. Dez leaned in for another kiss, but she squirmed away.
“There’s plenty of time for all that later. Right now, I’m going to take a shower. I think I deserve it. Want to fetch us some coffee from the lobby? Cream and two sugars in mine, if you could.”
The sun seemed even more unrelenting as Dez stepped into broad daylight, and he knew in all likelihood he was irrevocably, resolutely and irredeemably fucked.
When he returned, he halfway expected to find Samantha vanished, along with his jacket—and his pistol. But she just waited on the bed, combing her long dark hair in her t-shirt and jeans, the androgynous attire doing nothing to deflect from the delicate femininity of her body.
He carried a road map and a newspaper under his arm. He rested in the naugahyde sitting chair, and begin studying the former. “Sorry ‘bout the coffee. Weaker than hell, but what do you expect? Now, if we just head east on 44, seems like we could be in St. Louis before nightfall…”
“St. Louis? Missouri?”
“No, I mean St. Louis, Pennsylvania…. Of course St. Louis, Missouri.”
“Why the hell you want to go there?”
“I got an old army buddy out there.”
“You were in the military?”
“That’s not something I wanna talk about right now.” Dez’s face suddenly grew sullen and he knew he shouldn’t have brought it up. But Samantha just dismissed it.
“But what about my cousin?”
“I think your cousin can probably take care of herself for once.”
“She’s only 16.”
“Weren’t you only 16 once? She’ll tough it out. I’ll see if Reg or Dim can keep an eye on her. Loan her some money. We can wire it Western Union, if we have to. The key is... it ain’t safe for us in Oklahoma. Not until I get word from Reg. We can hold out for a few nights in St. Louis - maybe a week. Two weeks, tops. You’ll like it there. You ever been?”
“I’ve never even left this state!”
“It’s a fun time. Laid back. We can lay low. I’ll get you on a bus back to Tulsa after a few days, once everything’s cooled down; my buddy can loan us the bread. And from there, I’ll try to make it out to Chicago. Maybe even out west. Always wanted to see the desert… you know, cactuses and all—”
“Stop!”
“What’s up?”
“Didn’t you say I’m a potential accessory?”
“Yeah, but the thing is, they probably ain’t looking for you after a few days. They’d be looking for me. Besides, don’t you want to go home?”
“What makes you think I have a home?”
“‘Scuse me?”
“I said,” Samantha’s voice suddenly grew adamant as she reemphasized each syllable resolutely, “What. Makes. You. Think. I. Have. A. Home?”
“Well you just said you lived in Tulsa all your life now, didn’t you?”
“That don’t make it a home. That makes it hell.”
“What do you wanna do instead? Live on the road with me?”
Her face grew even brighter, and she gave him a wry smile.
“You can’t be serious,” Dez said. “I already feel guilty enough about everything. Taking you on as a responsibility—”
“Who says you’d be taking me on as anything? I can look after myself.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
Samantha’s face soured. “Well, what the hell is that supposed to mean?
”
“I ain’t holding nothing. And even if I was, I wouldn’t give ‘em to you. From now on, I’m clean. Getting out of this game. Too much hassle. Too much heat.”
“How dare you!” she exploded, practically hissing the words through tersely drawn lips. “How dare you even think for a moment that I’m—”
“Strung out?” Dez walked over to Samantha and rolled up the sleeve of his striped jersey, revealing an array of scabbed over, fading needle marks and abscesses dotting his arms. “Probably cuz I’ve been there. In the exact same boat you’re gonna be in. I know what it’s like to be sick and wanting and craving. I know what it’s like to do things you never in a million years would have dreamed of just to get a taste - to degrade yourself. I’ll leave you to guess just what I mean,” he spat out bitterly. Samantha’s face turned ashen at his exclamation. He simply continued. “The point is, when I say I’m staying clean, I’m sure as hell mean that I’m gonna be staying clean. And you’re gonna be finding yourself hurting. I can’t abide by that. And I sure as shit can’t stand to witness it.” He trembled visibly as he sat back down, resting his head in his hands.
Samantha was shaken, and walked over with some trepidation resting her hand on his shoulder. “Dez, it’s rush, not smack. It’s not the same.”
He glared at her. “No, it isn’t. It’s worse. Takes you maybe a day or two before you start feeling back to normal. That’s when it lies to you. Tells you since it only took a day or two to kick, can’t be that bad. So you start using again. Then you stop, and start the whole seesaw all over again. It’s a cycle. Just like dope. It just builds and builds up on itself.”
“How long did it take for you?”
“For me to what?”
“Clean up.”
“For which? The dope or the rush?”
“Which came first?”
Dez let out a deep sigh. “Back before I served, we were always toolin’ around. Bennies… inhalers… shit was legal back then. Easy to come by. Had all these dreams… music, poetry -the whole Beat generation gig. Kinda corny now, but we took that seriously. But the war ended all that. Back when I was in service, overseas, I got strung out. Dope. Lotta guys did over there. Easier to come by than bennies. Cheaper too. When I was discharged, I landed without any means to survive. That’s a different story.” He lit a cigarette from a fresh pack. “In any case, I had a habit. Crashing here and there, ‘til friends got sick of me. Then it was the park or wherever or whoever would take me in… the Missions, wherever. I was pretty gone by that time. Even skinnier than I am now.”
“I find that a little hard to believe.”
He answered her with the same enigmatic smile she had seen last night in the bar. “Connections were getting scarce,” he continued. “Long time, most we could get was Demerol. If we were lucky, dilaudid… and that was sold like it was some kinda vintage wine. I needed to clean up. I mean, that much was obvious. I was living just outside Kansas City, and I heard about this doctor. He had a limited test run he was trying of methadone. This was about five years ago now. I was lucky enough to be one of his patients. It was almost like a lottery. Just sheer dumb luck that I won. This test trial was real secretive, at the time. Could only ‘officially’ get it in New York. You know about methadone, right?”
Samantha nodded.
“Now, what they don’t tell you is, it’s just as hard to get off of as dope, actually - a hell of a lot trickier. It’s just a substitute, nothing more. So when I tried to wean myself off, I kept having symptoms. Had to taper ‘em with something. Rush took a little bit of the edge off. Helped make me feel less goddamned tired, that’s for sure. Eventually, I cut back in such rapid time, the doctor said I was a case for the textbooks.” He chuckled, and drew on his cigarette. “Course what I didn’t tell him was that I had switched to a massive amount of speed in order to quit his fucking methadone! At the time, I was dealing a little here and there, but mainly I was using. To make a long story short, I met my ex-wife. I was still shooting a hell of a lot of crank, and she, well, I ain’t gonna hold nothing against her. She was the one who convinced me to stop doing drugs, to get a job, just sort of clean up my act. ‘Course it was only after the birth of my daughter that she gave me that ultimatum, but that’s another story too. To tidy this all up for you, I’ve been clean for about three years now. Took my last hit the same day I found out my kid had been diagnosed. Matter of fact, we both did.”
“We?”
“My wife and I.”
“I… see…”
Samantha looked at him, trying hard to hold back the tears misting her eyes. Her face blanched, and all she could do was meekly hold on to his knife-like wrist, knowing deep down that to apply anything more than fleeting touch would be to wound him all over again.
“The temptation’s still there, but…”
“But?”
Dez paused. “The temptation’s still there, that’s all. Sometimes you don’t have any answer for than to admit your own temptations.
“So if the temptation’s still there, why did you sell?”
“Simple. I had a kid to provide for. That’s one way to answer for your temptations.” He paused and let the cigarette smolder in the ashtray. He took her trembling hand in both of his, clasping them so tightly that she gave a sharp wince. His eyes were clear and penetrating, but his face loomed against hers. “Now, you tell me. What do you have?”
Samantha thought long and hard. She sat gnawing at her thumb—a childhood habit she was never fully able to break—before answering. “A different life,” she said with no small amount of certainty.
The only thing she was uncertain about was whether or not Dez would be a part of that life.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
However exhausted and uncertain Dez was, however tempting the still rumpled bed-sheet was some twenty feet away, one thing was certain in his mind. He needed to clear out altogether. And he needed to do it alone.
She’s just a kid, he thought. Only 21. Shit, when you were 21, you were jumping across state lines trying to avoid the draft. But this - this is different. You got her into this mess, and it’s up to you to get her out. She doesn’t need this aggravation. Count your losses, and high tail it out of here while you still can.
Dez took his billfold out of his jacket pocket and looked again at his daughter. Leah. This time next year, she’d be five. Was that too old for the Easter Bunny? What about Santa Claus? What if there wasn’t going to be a next year, anyways? The thoughts hurt sharper than any knife. He couldn’t think about that right now. If her treatment—and subsequently her mortality—depended on his support, then he needed to skip town. As strange as it sounds, he needed to try his hand elsewhere just to feed a family that was no longer his.
He counted his money. There was still $185 left. More than enough to get him through a few weeks in St. Louis while he looked for a job. Any kind of job. He could take on any trade, or deal dope on the side, or any number of ventures. The directive was simple, however: Save up. Move on. Wash, rinse, repeat. But for how long?
He took a look at Samantha, stretched on her side with the bed-sheet clinging to her. She was resting peacefully, her eyes closed and her hands together in front of her face, as if she was praying; not the prayer of a child, or even the faithful, but the prayer of a somnambulist whose only grace was in staying alive to breathe through another night.
He wanted to crawl back into bed, to put his arms around her. Gently hold her sleeping head in their crook. Run his fingers through the length of her auburn tresses. Gently kiss her dream-flushed cheeks. To feel the warmth of her body dispelling the heartbreak of his, stripping all the layers of petty pride and doubt away from him like a much-needed spring shower. But he knew he couldn’t. He felt a lodestone within him, crippling him, anchoring him to the worn carpet of the shabby motel room with its cheap velvet paintings and mold-ridden walls. He reacted in the only way he had ever known; by fleeing.
He peeled out three ten-dollar bills from hi
s wallet and left them on top of the night table. Finding some blank motel stationary, he left a note:
Sam,
I can’t take you with me in good conscience. I’ve already put you through enough. You still have a whole life ahead of you and god knows I’d only drag it down. You don’t deserve that. Take the money I left you and take a bus back home. Eat something. Be clean.
Dez
He crept quietly towards the door, and slipped into the blinding white of the late morning Vinita sun. He trotted briskly through the parking lot and opened the door of his Trans Am. In less than a minute, Dez Cawley was heading east.
It wasn’t even 11 o’clock yet. He estimated that, traffic notwithstanding he could hit St. Louis before sunset. His head felt faint as he continued to drive into the vernal heat, both with relief and hunger. He could sense the waves of heat coming off the asphalt starting early this year. The smell of diesel was enough to make his stomach churn as he headed towards the exit. He had no other choice but to submit to the whims of his stomach. A mere fifty feet from the exit, Dez pulled into the parking lot of a Howard Johnson’s and treated himself to a coffee and some pancakes, eavesdropping on the other patrons as he waited patiently. Having renounced a happy ending, he felt truly alive for once in his life. Still, the chatter of his fellow customers wedged its way into his sleep-parched brain.
“Four years wasted… four years of my life wasted… before I realized it wasn’t what I wanted to do with my life after all….”
“Do you love ME the same way you love HER?...”
“Wouldja look at that…”
“Doctor’s say chances of beatin’ the odds gonna be pretty slim… way I see it, I still play the tracks with even less odds…”
Dez was about barely halfway through his order when he felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He couldn’t continue. Not at a Howard Johnson’s. Not in Oklahoma; and definitely not in Vinita. He left five dollars on the table, and rushed out, to the bewildered looks of patrons who whispered among themselves, “that there boy must be on something.”
ROMANCE: THREESOME : Billionaire Brothers' Party (MFM Menage Romance) (New Adult Contemporary Threesome Short Stories) Page 102
