From The Chrysalis BREW Project: Dive Bartender: Flowers in the Desert by T.K. O’Neill takes us on a roller-coaster ride. The hair-raising action sequences, the breathtaking descriptions of the desert, and the uninhibited consumption of drugs and alcohol actually made me feel like I was living in the wild west of the seventies.
Frank’s head was on a swivel, searching the nearly empty, Old West-themed streets for cop cars, motels, all-night restaurants or anything that might provide an alternative to the present situation.
But mostly cop cars…
The local cops had a reputation for hard-ass behavior, the Gold Dust Twins had said earlier in the evening.
Not knowing what else to do, Frank kept cruising around, sweat dripping from his armpits one cold drop at a time.
And then Evelyn was pointing across the way at a grand old structure that looked like it’d been there since the fifties, Frank thinking maybe Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and the Rat Pack had comped suites for life.
Sign on the front said, Hotel Valley Ho.
“I could get a room there,” Evelyn said, the words struggling to come out. “Always wanted to get a look inside that place.”
Frank looked at the dashboard clock.
Nearly four a.m.
And the needle on the wagon’s temperature gauge was up way too high all of a sudden.
What the hell?
Must be a coolant leak, he thought. All the hot weather taking its toll.
And that fancy hotel had to cost two hundred a night, at least. And Evelyn would need another blast to go through the lobby and maybe want another when they got to the room and then Frank would be stuck in there listening to a bunch of coke-and-Tuinal-fueled nonsense until she could go home and Frank could get the fuck out of town.
So the Valley Ho wasn’t going to work, no matter how cool it looked.
Frank kept on driving, the Hater back front and center in his head and letting him know what he thought of all this.
Hater wasn’t very kind.
And then, just as suddenly as the lights had appeared upon reentering Scottsdale, the surroundings got darker and the buildings became fewer and farther in between.
Frank’s eyes were jumping from the temperature gauge—needle precariously close to the red line now—to Evelyn’s nodding head and then back to the dark streets. Repeating the cycle every few seconds
Then—hallelujah—he caught sight of what seemed to be a major artery. A north-south highway according to the compass mounted on the Ford’s dash, one of the former owner’s additions to the wagon’s accessory package.
His hands sweaty on the wheel; Frank approached the highway cautiously and was uplifted by the sight of a neon sign on a frontage road to his right.
Tru West Motel.
Icy AC.
Cable TV.
In-room phones.
A place only Norman Bates could love.
Frank swung in the lot, stopped in front of the Office sign.
Evelyn looked at him from behind her haze. “You gotta be shitting me,” she said, her lips slack. Then her head lolled against the car door and she was out.
Frank was grateful for the small favor.
He got out and went up to the office door, wondering if he’d be able to raise anyone at this hour. There was a button on the wall next to the door. Sign below it said Push for After-hours Service.
He pressed it and heard a faint ringing behind the door.
He shuffled his feet and looked back at Evelyn.
Still out.
He waited.
Time passed slowly.
Behind him a few cars went by, lights reflecting on the motel’s windows.
Feeling antsy, he pushed the button again and heard the bell.
“All right, I hear ya. Hold your horses,” said a voice.
The door opened.
Guy standing there in a thin baby blue robe over a white strap undershirt. Small feet in old-time brown slippers. Fit Frank’s idea of someone who’d own a place like this. Short and fat, with a white beard, horn-rimmed glasses askew on a gin blossom nose and a scowl on his face that let you know he wasn’t a jolly, roly-poly type of guy, even though he kind of resembled Santa Claus.
Of the department store variety.
But who could blame the guy? Four in the morning confronted by a big stranger with booze on his breath and—Frank looking at his hands now—bloodied knuckles. The result of scraping against Bryce Parker’s teeth. And, oops, there was some blood on the top of his Adidas sneaker.
“Sorry to bother you at this hour, sir,” Frank said, polite. “But my wife and I have been driving all night—we’re from Minnesota—and—”
“You need a room. Hell else you’d want at this hour?” He stepped outside and looked at Frank’s car, checking the front license plate and peering in at Evelyn.
“My wife’s asleep. We’ve been on the road since Colorado.”
“All right,” Desert Santa said, giving Frank a sure-you-have look. “That’ll be fifty dollars. In advance. Checkout time is noon. You wanna stay longer it’ll cost you extra.”
Frank pulled his wallet from the pocket of his khakis and thumbed out two twenties and a ten.
“Gotta come in and fill out the card,” the guy said.
(End of Chapter 33)
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