The Nightly Disease (Serial Novel)

by Max Booth III

  George clears his throat. “So, this guy slightly stabs you—”

  I shake my head, grimacing at the taste of coffee overkill in my mouth. “The mugger was a woman, not a guy.”

  George pauses, waiting for the rest of a joke that was never born in the first place. “Seriously?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Wow.”

  “Fuck you.”

  He sniggers, sipping his coffee. “Hey, man, I’m with you, that ain’t funny at all.”

  “Fuck you. You weren’t there. She had a knife.”

  “So she stabbed you—slightly stabbed you—and…what, robbed you, I guess? Took your wallet?”

  I don’t respond, just stare at him, and he stares back, trying to solve the puzzle. The server comes to the table with a plate of pancakes, and as she sets it down, George suddenly shouts, “Oh shit, the wallet!” The server screams, jumps back, dropping George’s pancakes to the floor.

  After George apologizes a thousand times and helps the server clean up the mess, he collapses back into the booth. “That asshole’s wallet? She took it?”

  I nod. My body’s shaking from too much coffee. It’s a tick I’ve grown accustomed to since starting at the hotel.

  “Ha-ha-ha, oh my god, I can’t believe it.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Forty-five fuckin’ hundred dollars, man.”

  “I know.”

  “Jesus Christ.”

  “I think I’m going to kill myself.”

  “What did the police say?”

  “I didn’t call them.”

  “What? Why not?”

  “Well, I’d just finished drinking with you. What if they could tell?”

  “So what?”

  “I’d get fired, for one thing.”

  “There’s no law that says you can’t drink on the job. It’s just frowned upon.”

  I don’t know enough about the law to challenge him on this point, so I move on. “Anyway, what does it matter? I didn’t really have shit in my own wallet besides my license and a debit card to an empty bank account. It’ll be a pain in the ass to get a new license, but whatever, I can handle that. But Hobbs’s wallet? Shit. I can’t talk about that to the police. I wouldn’t just get fired, dude. They’d fucking arrest me.”

  George sighs, drinking his coffee. His face tells me it’s finally sinking in what I came to terms with hours ago. There’s not a damn thing I can do about any of this. I robbed somebody, and now somebody robbed me. The circle of life. “Well,” he says, “this sucks.”

  And I nod, because that’s all that’s left to say about it.

  This sucks.

  * * *

  It dawns on me too late that no wallet means no debit card, which means no way to pay for my coffee. George spots me, and I tell him next time I’ll pay. He laughs and tells me that’s what I always say.

  When I get home, it’s a little past ten, and all I want to do is pass out. Stress has eaten me to nothing. But I can’t yet, because I have to call my bank and cancel my debit card before my thief spends what little money I do have in my account. I give some thought to busting my iPad out from my bag and watching some porn, but fall asleep before I can seriously consider the idea.

  The alarm clock on my bookshelf tells me it’s 2:34 P.M. when my eyes open again. I’m still sitting down, my neck sore from leaning back against the headrest of the futon. My work clothes stick to my body, glued by sweat. I undress and peel off the bandage on my stomach. The cut is barely visible, save for the dried blood smeared around it. I hop in the shower and throw on a flannel and some jeans. The coffee pot brewing in the kitchen sounds like heaven. It’s the only noise that can calm me down, that can numb thoughts of suicide and self-loathing. I pour a cup into an unwashed glass and lace it with sugar and cream. Most of the characters in books I read tend to drink their coffee black. It’s supposed to signify someone is a badass. I tried it black once. It tasted fucking awful. I climb on top of the bar stool in my minuscule kitchen and eat on my shitty excuse of a dining table. It’s really just half a brick of white concrete built into the side of the wall. But from here I have a decent view of my sliding back door, which I suppose doesn’t come with every studio apartment in the world, so maybe I’m not as poor as I’m convinced I am. Of course, outside my backdoor, the only visible landscape is the wooden fence built around my tiny porch. It’s a good fence, though. I’m proud of this fence. I may not have a license or forty-five hundred dollars or a job that’s worth a damn, but at least I have a fence, so maybe life isn’t too bad, after all.

  A rectangular flat object falls from the sky and lands in my backyard, in the small patch of grass between my porch and fence. I set my coffee down and step outside. The porch is cold and wet against the soles of my feet. In the grass, amidst the dead insects and discarded cigarette butts, is a welcome mat. I straighten it out and read on the front: FUCK OFF AND DIE. Probably the most welcoming welcome mat I’ve ever seen. It’d fallen from the balcony above my apartment.

  I roll it up and go through my apartment and out the front door. An elderly woman stands across the patio, in front of her own apartment, arm raised and key inserted into the lock. She stares at me, body frozen except her face, which smiles and says, “Good morning.”

  “Good morning.” I jog up the cagey steps to the second landing, hoping she doesn’t try to continue the conversation.

  The door is slightly ajar, so I knock lightly on the frame and shout, “Hello?” through the revealed crack. Thirty seconds pass and nobody answers, so I do it again. Another thirty seconds, still nothing. Fuck it. I drop the welcome mat in front of the door and go back downstairs. The woman is still standing across the patio from my apartment, holding the key in the lock.

  She tells me good morning.

  * * *

  Hobbs stands in front of the hotel smoking a cigarette when I pull up at five past eleven. He’s not as loose and out-of-it as usual, but standing straight, skin actually a normal complexion. There’s a look in his eyes like he has a purpose for once.

  Those eyes are directed straight at me as I hesitantly get out of my car, lock it, and head toward the entrance.

  Looking at me like he knows what I did, but that’s bullshit. There’s no way in hell he knows.

  “Good evening, Mr. Hobbs.” I step around him, holding my breath.

  As I enter the lobby, he calls out, “You got my money?”

  But he doesn’t follow me inside, so I pretend like I didn’t hear him, I pretend like a trickle of piss didn’t just spurt from my dick. If not for the color of my work pants being black, the color of my crotch would be a prime target for ridicule.

  Yas waits behind the front desk, making a whole show of checking her wristwatch as I come around. Who even wears wristwatches anymore?

  “Sorry I’m a little late.”

  “Tell it to Javier.” She walks out without another word and tosses the register keys behind her. They smack against the wall and drop to the floor.

  I shout and tell her to drive safe, leaning over the front desk and watching her walk out, except I’m more worried about Hobbs standing by the trash can. What happens once he finishes his cigarette? I scan the front desk for anything that could potentially be used as a weapon. Maybe a stapler.

  This is why the hotel needs a shotgun. This is the exact fucking reason.

  The front doors slide open and I’ve run out of time. I grab the stapler without thinking, flicking the top open with my thumb.

  “So did anyone find it or what?” Hobbs says.

  “Find what?” I grab the stapler tighter, concealing it behind the front desk. One false move and I won’t hesitate to take out one of his eyes or, at the very least, slightly graze his cheek.

  “My wallet, man. I fucking lost it last night. Javier told me he’d have y’all looking for it.”

  “Oh.” The piss in my trousers recede back into my dick. “I just walked in, haven’t heard anything about it. Let me check.”

&nb
sp; I walk around the front desk, picking up random papers and acting like they hold some kind of importance. I pause and think. “Let me go check the lost and found.”

  I run to the back office, through the laundry room, and open up the head of housekeeping’s office. The room is dark and cold and pleasant so I sit on her desk for a moment, waiting the appropriate amount of time someone would take to check for a lost wallet.

  When I return to the lobby, Hobbs is half over the front desk, snooping through random documents.

  “Hey, man, cut that out.”

  He jumps up, at first startled, then angry. “Did you find my fucking wallet?”

  “Nah. I’ll keep an eye out for it, though.”

  He rubs his eyes, grinding his teeth. “I need that wallet back.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He punches the front desk and winces. “You don’t even fucking understand, man. You don’t know how much money was in it.”

  “I think I have some idea,” I say, and immediately scream in my head. Why did I just say that?

  Hobbs eyes me strangely. “You do, huh?”

  I pause, clear my throat. “I imagine quite a bit, is all I’m saying. Since you’re so worked up about it.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “If I find it, I’ll let you know.”

  Hobbs steps forward, sober for the first time since he’s started staying at the hotel. “And if you don’t find it, I won’t be the only one who ends up with a switchblade up his asshole.”

  Part 8

  He knows. No he doesn’t. He does. He can’t. He’s onto me. Fuck him. Prove it. He doesn’t need to. Courts don’t issue switchblades up assholes. Dangerous criminals do. Psychopaths do.

  There’s only two ways he could find out I took the wallet. One, I crack and admit to it, which ain’t gonna happen. Two, he bumps into the bitch who mugged me, which seems unlikely, unless Hobbs is in cahoots with the mugger and he’s just screwing with me.

  Otherwise, he doesn’t know shit, and he isn’t going to know shit. I’m not talking. Nobody else knows. Nobody except…shit.

  I call the Other Goddamn Hotel. George answers on the eighth ring.

  “Thanks for calling the—”

  “Did you tell anybody?”

  “Uh…?”

  “Did you tell anybody about the wallet?”

  “No, man, you know I wouldn’t. What the hell?”

  “Hobbs is on my ass about it.”

  “Who”

  “Hobbs. The—the fuckin’ guy whose wallet I took.”

  “Oh. Oh shit.”

  “I think he may just be fishing for a confession. He might not know anything.”

  “Should we kill him?”

  “Not yet. But keep the lye out and ready.”

  The elevator beeps, but not to signal somebody is coming down. It’s the sound indicating someone’s already down in the lobby, and they’re about to board the elevator and go up to their room.

  Who the fuck is in the lobby?

  Shit shit shit.

  By the time I climb over the front desk and get a look at the elevator station, the person is already inside and the doors are closed.

  I want to laugh but I can’t remember how.

  The rest of the night is spent pacing from one wall of the back office to the other. I haven’t even touched my book. Who the fuck can read in a time like this? The words would melt off the page and burn into my flesh like acid.

  I’m too scared to nap, too freaked out to masturbate on the roof. My night is ruined. I walk outside and stare at the owl logo for TripAdvisor stuck to the front door and an hour passes. I print out guest receipts and slide them underneath doors. When I reach Hobbs’s room, I stand outside it for a moment, afraid to disturb the frame. In the end, I can’t do it and just toss the receipt in the trash can behind the second floor elevator.

  I’m moving on hyper-speed as I prepare breakfast. It’s not even 4:30 by the time I finish, a half hour before the cook is scheduled to show. I sit down in the dining section, alone, trying to calm down in the darkness. My heart’s going to break out of my chest and a part of me can’t figure out why that would be such a bad thing.

  I pour a cup of shitty coffee and sip it as I wait for the cook to show up. At ten ’til five, the phone rings. Not an outside call, either, but from a guest’s room.

  I don’t register the importance of room 209 until Hobbs speaks.

  “Hey, there, partner, I’m gonna need some new towels up to my room, pronto.”

  “Uh.”

  “Hello? Some towels? You think you can do that?”

  “Yeah. Sure.” I clear my throat, swallow dead lip skin I’ve managed to suck into my mouth. “I’ll have them waiting for you at the front desk.”

  “Nah, I don’t think so. I’m not getting dressed again. Just bring them up, all right?”

  “Well—”

  “Thanks, buddy. See you soon.”

  He hangs up and I sit in the dining area a few more minutes, sipping my coffee. It’s awful, but it beats the alternative. It beats a switchblade up my asshole.

  The phone rings again.

  “How’s those pillows coming along?”

  “I thought you wanted towels.”

  “Yeah. You coming or what?”

  I hang up. Fuck this. Fuck him. This doesn’t feel right at all. I stare at the phone, expecting it to ring again. If it does, I don’t intend on answering. Instead I call Javier and ask him if he can come in early so I can go home, I tell him I’m feeling like shit, some stomach bug, I’ve been vomiting all night.

  “Actually, I’m just across the street at the Walmart. Since we need bananas and bread.”

  I quickly put together my audit pack and close my shift. I pack my bag and stand outside and wait for him to arrive. A line of guests wanting to check-out builds in the lobby but I don’t care. They’re not my problem. Eventually they’ll lose their patience and leave their keys on the front desk. One might lack the intelligence to follow along and instead stand in the lobby until starvation takes him down. At least, that’s the dream.

  Once I make it home, I actually do puke. My stomach’s all in knots. A mixture of stress, fear, and paranoia. I text Javier and ask him if he can get Mandy to cover me tonight, see if she’s willing to work three nights in a row, since tonight’s my last night of the week, anyway. When I first send the text, I wonder who he’ll think I’m talking about: Mandy 1 or Mandy 2. Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea, propping up a corpse at the front desk to cover a shift now and again. She wouldn’t be any less effective as I am most days. Javier’s first response is a negative, so I send him a JPG of a man inserting an eel into his anus. Ten minutes later he calls me and tells me to take the night off and he’ll see me Monday morning, after my return on Sunday night. I manage a weak “thanks” and collapse on my bed, shaking.

  Hobbs fucking knows. He knows.

  But maybe he doesn’t.

  Of course he does.

  He heard my phone call. I admitted to it.

  Oh, Isaac. You stupid garbage person.

  * * *

  Three days to kill. Three days of worrying about Hobbs and what he’s going to do with me. I call and cancel my debit card and request a new one in the mail. I masturbate a lot. I do not shower. I eat. I replay the brief conversation I shared with the bulimic girl the other night and realize I probably should have been more sensitive about the bulimia. Now I may never get a chance to speak with her. What business was it of mine, anyway? What do I care if she throws up her food? That’s her choice. People do tons of disgusting shit to their bodies. They insert golfball-sized plugs into their earlobes. They tattoo their genitalia and anuses. They subject their eyeballs to Tyler Perry movies. They stick their dicks into practically anything that they can fit them in. I once read an article about a guy who had gotten arrested for fucking one of those umbrella stand holes found on top of park benches. Apparently it’s not that uncommon. So what the hell. Who cares if someo
ne wants to puke up their breakfast? It doesn’t make a person less beautiful. It just makes them more human. I think about the amount of time I masturbate in a given week. What’s more shameful?

  I frequent bulimia support forums I’d previously bookmarked to distract myself from thinking about Hobbs. No one’s talking about “the hotel asshole” yet, and the more I think about it, the more I doubt she has access to the Internet. If she can’t afford food or a second set of clothing, then she probably doesn’t own a laptop. A cell phone, maybe. Even homeless people have cell phones. If she frequents these kinds of boards, I’m clearly not intelligent enough to crack the case.

  The forum is still interesting, despite the lack of people complaining about me. A whole community of those suffering from bulimia, bonded together. The way they talk about the illness, none of them seem too proud of their actions. Like most “mental disorders”—their words—purging is out of their control. Sometimes posters start threads to document their progress as they attempt to get better. A cynical part of me suspects these threads serve as entertainment to the other posters, the ones encouraging the thread-starter’s progress. Maybe they take bets on the side, predicting how long it’ll take before he or she purges again. Like some kind of twisted countdown. Three, two, one—puke.

  Other threads attempt to romanticize bulimia. They share war stories about past purges. People who’ve burst blood vessels in their eyeballs or have gotten toothbrushes stuck in their throats. Women who have accidentally dunked their breasts in the toilet bowl or have forgotten to tie their hair back before kneeling down.

  Many complain of constipation. Constant vomiting blocks you up. Your body grows dependent on rejecting food and forgets how to properly digest, so all the food just sits in your stomach looking at you stupidly, wondering, “Well, what the fuck do you expect to do now?” Laxatives are on every bulimic’s budget. Maybe I should buy some for the girl who comes to my hotel. Some kind of peace offering. She walks into the hotel and I hand her over a small gift-wrapped box containing laxatives. She’d probably do much worse than punch me in the face this time.

  If she does decide to show back up, I just won’t mention the bulimia. It’s none of my business. I don’t even know this person. I’m only incredibly in love with her for some stupid goddamn reason.