AM AT A MOTEL IN THE CITY

by Cory Cone

The yellowed lampshade on the bedside table goes bright, goes dim. It buzzes, threatens death before settling into a weak, cool glow.

Rory says, "I remember when we were eighteen." She stares at the ceiling, recalling. "We ran through the rain to Meyerhof House because the soda machine was broken in your dorm." She bites her fingernails, spits splintered bits into the shadows beside the bed. She reminisces whenever they're here, in this same room, on this same bed. "We were soaked by the time we got back. You ended up sick and missing classes for a week."

Jake asks, "Have you remembered where we first met?"

Rory's hair covers her face. It hides the tear Jake knows is struggling free. She doesn't answer.

She loses a little something each time.

Jake does what he can to work whatever that something is back out, but it's useless. What's gone is gone.

Rory lights a cigarette. Her lipstick is more brown than red and it stains the filter.

"It's a non-smoking room, now," says Jake. "And you shouldn't be smoking."

Rory stands on the bed and reaches for the smoke detector on the ceiling. From where he sits, Jake can see beneath her shirt, to the gray flesh of her stomach and chest, to the protruding indications of her ribs. Thin strands of listless silk flutter along her skin like loose threads from a shirt. Rory twists the base of the smoke detector free and pops out the battery. She pockets it and sits back down, puffs on her cigarette.

"I wish we'd never found him," she says.

This hangs in the air with them a while, as thick as the smoke from Rory's cigarette.

"You'd be dead," Jake says, breaking the silence. "I'd be alone."

Rory's looks across the bed at him. The first time, three years ago, they had been in a constant tight embrace, both of them terrified, confused, but excited.

He supposes that he wanted it more than her. Needed it more. Watching the smoke leave her lips and caress the side of her face, tangle with her hair, he wonders if he'll ever forgive himself.

There's a knock at the door. Not loud. It could have been nothing.

Wasn't.

Rory drops the cigarette into a glass of water. It hisses, dies. "I can't," she says. "Jake please, I can't."

"I'll get it," says Jake.

"Just a minute more alone. Just me and you…"

In the struggling lamp light Jake sees how tired she looks, and, because he must, he leaves the bed and opens the door.