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Show 113 CITY MOTEL Mr. and Mrs. Jackson lay on the bed in Room 2, Harold asleep and Eva measuring her own breathing with that coming from the walls. It was a slow, heavy, tired breathing that sounded like a muted chorus of all the exhausted travelers after a hard day on the road-the truck driver who backed his t r a i l e r onto the cracked pavement of the parking lot at 1:00 a.m., his bleary eyes straining to miss the post that supported the sign, "City Motel, Kitchenettes, Vacancy"; the couple who couldn't wait until the door was closed to kiss passionately; the family who had made a lot of noise congratulating themselves in the hallway on finding such a cheap place (all they needed, after a l l , was a bed and shower, nothing fancy); and the salesman who folded his road maps and locked his uniform samples in his white station wagon. Eva Jackson had seen them all from her vantage point behind the Venetian blinds. The breathing was steady and resigned, a slow inhalation, a slower exhalation. Which room did i t come from and who was the breather, Eva wondered. Was i t a man next to their heads on the other side of the wall, covered with one sheet? Or was i t a woman hanging onto a metal vent with her fingernails, breathing into the slats? |
