Colorado 02 Sweet Dreams (2 page)

“You think you’ll find peace in a Harley bar?” Jim-Billy asked what was possibly a pertinent question and I looked at him.

“I think I can get to work on time, do a good job, feel good about myself because I worked hard and did my best and go home and not think about a Harley bar. I can think about myself or what I have a taste to eat for dinner or what might be good on TV. Then I’ll go to sleep not thinking about anything and get up and get to work on time again.” I turned to the blonde. “That’s what I think. I’m not looking for a thrill. I’m not looking for adventure. I’m looking for nothing special because I can be content with that. That’s what I’m looking for. Can you give me that?”

The blonde said nothing just looked me in the eyes. Her face was blank and no less hard and it stayed blank and hard for a long time.

Then she said, “I’m Krystal. I’ll get you an application.”

* * * * *

I stood at the window of my hotel room holding the curtains back with a hand and staring at the pool.

Carnal Hotel wasn’t much to write home about. A long block of building, two stories, all the doors facing the front, fourteen on top, fourteen on bottom. I was on the bottom in number thirteen. The rooms were clean, mine had a king-sized bed and a TV that had to have been purchased fifteen years ago was suspended from the wall. The low four-drawer dresser and nightstands stuck out of the wall and had no legs. The closet had two extra pillows and an extra blanket. The bathtub and kitchen sink had rust stains but even so, they were clean too. The whole of it was below average but it would do.

That pool, though, that was something else. It wasn’t big but it was pristine clean. The lounge chairs around it weren’t top of the line but they were okay, in great repair and obviously taken care of.

I looked from the pool to reception. It wasn’t so much reception as a tiny house. I tiny well-kept house with a little upstairs. It also had big half barrels full of newly planted flowers out front. It wasn’t quite summer but it was the end of spring so the flowers hadn’t come close to filling out.

Carnal was in the Rocky Mountains, a small valley surrounded by hills which were surrounded by mountains. It was closing on May, there was a nip in the air and I wondered if those flowers were hopeful.

If they were, whoever planted them had the capacity for a lot of hope. There were more flowers in window boxes in the front windows of the reception-slash-house. There were also more flowers in half barrels intermittently placed by the poles on the walk in front of the hotel rooms with more window boxes on the railing of the balcony in front of the rooms upstairs. And lastly there were more half barrels dotted around the pool area.

The parking lot was tidy and well-kept and the hotel and reception-slash-house both had a good paint job.

All of this indicated that Carnal Hotel might be below average but the people who owned it cared about it.

I had checked in with a nice lady at the front desk who said anything I needed, change for the vending machines or laundry room, Wi-Fi access, menus for restaurants and takeout in town, “just holler”.

Then I’d unpacked my car. All of it. I unpacked it for the first time in four and a half months. Then I cleaned it out. All the junk food wrappers, discarded pop cans, fallen mints, lost pieces of candy, bits of paper. The flotsam and jetsam of a killer road trip. I lugged my suitcases (there were five) and boxes (there were two) into the hotel room and took a plastic bag I’d found and filled full of trash to the big outdoor bin tucked close to the side of the hotel not facing any streets.

Then I unpacked my clothes.

Over the past four and a half months, I’d been in tons of hotel rooms but I’d never unpacked. I’d never stayed beyond three days. I’d only stayed long enough to do laundry, take a breather and decide where I’d head next in my search, zigzagging across so many states I’d lost count in my search for Nowheresville.

After I unpacked, I’d walked into town which amounted to me walking by room number fourteen and turning the corner. Carnal Hotel was on the edge of town right before the road opened up to nothing again. I’d found a deli, bought a pastrami on rye and ate it on the sidewalk, chasing it with a diet pop. Then I’d walked the town up one side and down the other.

Bubba’s was in the middle, five blocks from the hotel and it was definitely a biker bar because Carnal was a biker town. There were two bike shops and one bike mechanic at the opposite end from Carnal Hotel and it had a sign that said “We take cars too”. There were also three motorcycle paraphernalia shops that I could see looking in the windows sold a lot of leather bike accessories and more leather biker clothing.

There was also the deli, a diner, an Italian restaurant, a pizza delivery place and a coffee house which was strangely called “La-La Land Coffee”. Again looking in the windows of La-La Land, I saw it was not run by bikers but hippies that were so hippie they wore tie-dyed shirts with peace signs on front and had long hair. One of the two behind the counter had on round, blue-tinted sunglasses even though he was inside and the other had a thin braided headband wrapped around her forehead. They looked in danger of dropping cross-legged on the floor and singing Kumbayah.

This all was intermingled with a discount tobacco store that sold all types of smoker delights for all types of things you could smoke; two discount liquor stores; a drug store; a tailor who seemed to specialize in stitching biker patches into leather (or at least that was what the sign in the window said); two convenience stores, one opposite the hotel, one at the other end of town opposite the mechanic; a busy grocery store about a quarter the size of the mega-grocery stores that every other town in the nation seemed to have and it looked like it’d been there since 1967; a bakery; a hardware store; a flower shop; a gas station and a variety of other Nowheresville places to fill a Nowheresville town.

There were people on the street and I knew they were friendly because most of them smiled at me.

After I checked out the Main Street (called Main Street and it was also the only street with businesses, the rest was residential) of my new home, I went back to reception at the hotel. I bought a week’s worth of Wi-Fi from the nice lady who took that opportunity to share with me that her name was Betty. I shared my name too and decided to go ahead and pay a week in advance on my room when I got the Wi-Fi. This decision overjoyed Betty and I knew that because she told me.

“Sweetie! A week! I’m overjoyed!” she’d shouted.

She would be. Mine was the only car in the lot and she had a flower and pool habit and those weren’t exactly cheap.

Nevertheless, she was friendly and open and I decided I liked Betty.

After telling her I was glad I’d brought her joy, I went back to number thirteen and dragged out my laptop. Then I logged in. Then I ignored all my e-mail and sent a message to my parents and my baby sister that all was well, I was fine and I’d check in with more information later. I saw that they’d sent e-mails to me but I didn’t read them. I didn’t read them because I knew they would freak me out because I knew my Mom and Dad and sister Caroline were freaked out. They weren’t big on me upping stakes and roaming the country looking for nothing special. They were bigger on me moving home and sorting myself out and finding a decent man and starting over (in that order).

I shut down my computer, sat on the big, soft bed, stared at the wall and thought about the next day when I was supposed to be at Bubba’s at eleven to train to be a waitress and start my new life.

Then I smiled.

Then I watched TV until it got dark and the pool beckoned me.

Now I was standing and looking outside to see the pool looked clean and enticing and it was all lit up. In fact, the parking lot was all lit up. Seeing it, I knew four things about Reception Betty. She was friendly, she liked flowers, she was proud of her below average hotel and small but clean pool and she wanted her guests to feel safe.

That’s when I saw the car pull in. It was a convertible, an old model something. It looked like a Chrysler, not great condition but also not a junker.

It parked outside reception, the door opened and a woman folded out.

I stared at the woman.

She had thick, long dark hair and long legs most of which I could see coming out the bottom of her very short, frayed-hemmed jeans skirt. She had a tight tank top and more cleavage than Krystal (but as much as me). She wasn’t petite or slim, she was long and
very
rounded but it was clear she didn’t care. A mini-Buddha belly and a hint of back fat didn’t bother her. Not in the slightest. In fact, she
worked it
.

She sashayed into reception and I saw a man was there. He was Betty’s upper-middle-age. He smiled at her like he knew her and she waved and smiled back giving the same impression. I knew this was the truth when he handed her a key without doing any of the usual checking in business. She took the key, put both her hands on the counter, lifted herself up, booty pointed up in the air, feet in high-heeled stiletto sandals on tiptoe. She kicked back one foot and leaned toward him, giving him an across-the-counter air kiss. Then she strutted back out to her convertible, got in and drove through the parking lot to park three spots down from my Lexus. She got out, didn’t grab a suitcase and walked toward a door where I lost sight of her.

I had a feeling I was going to have to buy some tank tops to fit in in Carnal.

I dropped the curtain and went to the dresser. Most of my clothes were folded and sitting on top, there wasn’t enough room for them all in the drawers and closet. But at least they’d been released from their suitcase captivity. In the drawers I’d put my underwear, socks and pajamas. I’d also put my bathing suit in there.

Seeing my clothes laid out I thought it wasn’t much but it was more home than I’d had in a good long while and it made me feel weirdly settled.

It had been a warm day but it couldn’t be over sixty-five degrees outside. Still, I loved pools, I loved to be in water and for some reason I really wanted a swim so I figured it would be like any time you got in cold water. Once you were in, you’d get used to it. At least I hoped so. If not, so what? I’d just drag my carcass out and come back to my room.

I changed into my swimsuit, put on a pair of track pants, a sweatshirt and some flip-flops. Before I could chicken out, I grabbed a towel and my room key and headed to the pool.

I slipped off my shoes and sweats and decided to dive right in. Better to get it over with all at once. I moved to the side of the pool, braced for impact and dove.

The pool was heated.

Heaven.

I swam five laps of the short pool and had to stop because I couldn’t breathe. This, I told myself, had to do with the fact that I was in the Rocky Mountains, at altitude, and it did
not
have to do with the fact that I was seriously out of shape.

I forced out four more laps and had to stop again.

Then I forced out one more lap and put a hand to the edge to turn back for another lap when I heard the roar of bike pipes.

Stopped at the edge of the pool, holding on and peering over the side, my eyes followed the black and chrome Harley gleaming in Reception Betty’s parking lot lights as it glided along, pulled in and parked next to the convertible. Then my eyes watched the man shove the stand down with his booted foot and swing his leg off the bike.

His back was to me so all I could see was that he was tall and he had a
great
behind. He also had on faded jeans, a black, long-sleeved, thermal t-shirt and he had a head of thick dark hair that also shone in the lights, just like his Harley

One of the hotel room doors opened and the woman in the mini-jeans-skirt ran out and threw herself at the tall man. Her arms wrapped around his neck and I couldn’t see it but I could tell her lips latched onto his.

He didn’t even go back on a foot when her body impacted his. He just curved his arms around her and leaned into her kiss.

That’s something special.

The thought just popped into my head and I didn’t know why. I didn’t know what was happening. I didn’t know these two people. All I knew was that it
looked
special. So special, all I could do was stare.

They stopped kissing and she tipped her head back and laughed with pure delight, the sound ringing through the air, filling it with music.

I decided I hated her and I didn’t know why. I didn’t know who she was or what was happening. I just knew she had something special and I didn’t and never would and that sucked. It wasn’t a nice thought which was unusual because I was normally a nice person but it was the one I had.

She disengaged from him and came to his side, wrapping her arm around his waist and propelling him forward.

He looked down at her and I saw his profile in Reception Betty’s bright parking lot lights and when I did I held my breath.

If he was that handsome in profile, so handsome he was breathtaking; he’d be sensational full on.

That’s when I decided I
really
hated her.

They got close to the door and he moved suddenly and quickly. Swinging her up in front of him, she wrapped her legs around his hips, her arms around his shoulders and tipped her head down to look at him. But he seemed to be peering in the room like he expected to see something or someone, something or someone important, something or someone he was looking forward to seeing. But before he found that something or someone, she fisted a hand in his hair, tilting his back, her mouth went down on his and they entered the room necking.

He closed the door with his booted foot.

Yes, sensational. If he could pick her up like that and carry her anywhere, he was beyond sensational.

“Like the pool?”

I jumped and pushed off the side with my foot, my head jerking around as I stared at the Reception Guy who checked in Lucky as Hell Girl that I hated. He was standing at the side of the pool and looking down at me. I was so engrossed in Handsome Harley Guy and Lucky as Hell Girl I hadn’t heard him coming.