Sun’s Up Motel
Everything I own fits into one plastic grocery bag. I could list the items on the back of my hand. Count them on my fingers. Stuff them inside a pillow case, if I had one to call my own. They could even fit inside a mailbox.
We do have a mailbox still, if nothing else. It’s yellow and has our name on it, and it might be the last thing that still belongs to all of us collectively.
“What are you writing?” Gabe asks. He hops onto the desk and leans over sideways to catch a glance at my paper. I instinctively put my arm over the words I was just writing.
“Nothing,” I say, and give his leg a poke. “Get off the desk.”
“Why? I like being tall.”
“Because it’s not ours, and it’s also not for sitting on. Where did Mom go?”
Gabe hops down, his feet landing with a thud on the light blue shag carpet of the shitty motel room. He immediately gets onto the bed instead, because sitting still is nearly impossible with him.
“Outside,” he says, looking towards the door as he begins making snow angels on the floral comforter. “Talking on the phone.”
“With who?” I ask, rolling the pen between my fingers. It’s cheap plastic, colored black with a tiny logo of a sun and the words Sun’s Up Motel written in yellow script across it.
“Insurance people,” he replies with a scrunched up face. He flips over onto his stomach and props his head up, looking at me.
“What?” I say, raising an eyebrow back. The pen slips from my fingers and rolls back onto the desk.
“What?” he says.
“Stop looking at me, weirdo.”
“Are we homeless?”
I feel myself suck in the stale motel room air. I turn in the chair, away from his prying eyes.
“No, of course not,” I tell him as calmly as I can, though I can hear the squeak in my voice at the end. “We’re not homeless.”
“Are you sure?” he presses. “Because we don’t have a home, and I think that’s what being homeless means.”
“We’re not homeless,” I’m quick to snap back.
“But-”
“We’re just,” I interrupt, pausing. “We’re just in an in-between spot, okay?”
“For how long?” “I don’t know,” I tell him. “Why don’t you go get a shower? You smell like smoke.”
“I can’t,” he objects, squirming beneath the covers and pulling the blanket over his head. His voice comes out muffled. “I saw a roach in there.”
I stare at the lump in the bed as another one grows in my throat. I can hear Mom’s raised voice from the other side of the door. Gabe’s breathing steadies.
The paper on the desk taunts me. The handwriting, at least, is something I can call mine. Pretty handwriting doesn’t make the list any better, though.
Things I Own
1 set of smoky pajamas
1 motel gift shop t-shirt
1 travel toothbrush
2 pairs of underwear
1 dead cell phone
I stare at the list until the words blur before my eyes and the sunlight seeping through the grimy window turns to dusk. Mom comes back into the room and slips into the tiny bathroom before I can catch her eye. I hear the shower start running.
In the harsh yet dim glow of the fluorescent desk lamp, I add two more items to my list:
1 Sun’s Up Motel pen
1 depressing list
I crawl into bed and dream of roaches on fire.
