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Show City Motel 115 that her anxiety about getting home later than she should was being calmed by the steady inhalation and exhalation, something she didn't know she was hearing. The Roberts family, on the other side of the Jacksons in Room 3, was arguing about who would sleep on the floor, who would get the bed, and about who would shower f i r s t in the morning. Thelma Roberts was numb, her eyes sagging in diagonal s l i t s , her voice too tired to command any respect. Al Roberts was undressed and under the covers with his eyes closed. The decision about who would get the bed was thus made, but the children s t i ll thought that argument would make a difference. They were making too much noise to hear the sounds in the walls. Mrs. Jackson, however, was tuned i n . She was sure that she could see a slight movement of the walls as she looked backward over the top of her head. They puffed out slightly, then cinched i n . She started imagining lungs in the walls, gigantic cavities between drywall that sucked breath from the motel customers until they turned purple and woke gasping. While Mr. Jackson slept peacefully, Eva Jackson checked the rise and f a l l of his chest every few minutes to see i f her worst fears were being realized. Then she started wondering i f there were people in the walls, folks who hadn't paid their b i l l s and were plastered in the walls until they paid up or died. Mrs. Jackson listened for whispering or t i t t e r i n g . She imagined the different clothes that the prisoners might be wearing-night shirts, T-shirts, peach nightgowns, and jockey shorts. She imagined their faces, each different, yet each with two eyes, a nose, and a mouth, and listened on to the slow, unified, unadulterated breathing. |
