Laying in a half mooned motel on a half mooned night

The motel stood on the corner of a curving road. It was funny I was here again. The first time I had come across the place was after an argument. Mainly, me raging hormones, I don’t know, yet I could not live the way I was living. Too new, that was the charm but communal living wasn’t my thing I was on a timetable. The novelty did not wear off but each person had different ideals. Common enough yet, well my first time in California. I would just follow the old plan. My old plan initially consisted of one resolution to get my own apartment. I had had enough of roommate shares, this one though did keep some of the ghost away. I stormed out of the club house. I had no spending cash until the end of the month I was stuck. I was new to the area and did not know where I was going. After thinking about walking around to find a hotel, I called a cab. I had walked two blocks over to the Hotel that was right on the beach. It had been turned into apartments. I looked up at the windows, I also remembered that some members of the house had friends living there. Not, a good idea. I asked the cab driver for the nearest motel. Someplace inexpensive. He turned and looked at me. He then rattled of a list of places.

“The cheapest ones are on the sunset strip but I wouldn’t let my worst enemy stay there. Plus, I have a sister and you remind me of her.” I was scared and had been crying. I figured my depressive state is what he meant since the taxicab driver was a white male and couldn’t possibly be my brother.

“ There is another place over on…” , he named some street.

I looked out the window, “yeah that’ll be fine”. The taxicab pulled away from the curb.

It drove about then minutes away from the clubhouse. The fight had been with Patrick . Funny.

I wondered if he and his friend were still on the balcony.

“OH, Singa I have know her for years. She is my best friend”.

My only response was, “uhuh”. I mean I didn’t mean to cramp his style. Californication, I guess I got the rules mixed up. It’s easier knowing and getting what you want or having a better focus when you live alone. Mentally, I was like “Jesus they should be the ones renting a room for the night”. Instead physically, I was. On his part, it was serious thrown in your face move for the area that I grew up in. Yet, a mediocre – this is how or the way we do things here move for California. It was all too, I don’t know ‘grit’ for me and too ‘green’ for them. Enough, mediation and meditation.

“How much is the room here”. I asked the cab driver.

“ I don’t know, about forty or sixty dollars your fare is twenty, though”.

I paid the fare and got out of the cab. I looked in the direction of the area from where we came and then towards the direction of the ocean.

“Okay, tomorrow morning, I said to myself, I just walk in that direction and I will be back at the Meditation Center”. I turned towards the walkway entrance of the motel and went up to the main office. A protective glass partition resembling the type used by fast food restaurants and certain gas stations greeted me. I rang the buzzer outside the window. A skinny short Asian man came to the window. He pushed the glass panel aside.

“How much for a room?”, I asked.

“Fifty- five dollars. One night and you have to bee out by noon tomorrow. Check out is noon each day for how ever long”.

“ Fifty- five dollars, thanks.”, I turned and walked out of the courtyard area.

“This was stupid, I thought to myself. I am going back home, maybe they have finished by now”. I only had forty dollars left and I needed it to get me through to the end of the month. They should have been the ones taking a cab and finding a hotel to stay in for the night. I walked up the block to the cross street. I knew to keep straight on that street and it would bring me out somewhere near the street to turn. It was the street where Paesano’s and the other hostel were. I made it home that night. I walked on the beach before going back to the meditation Center. They had left the balcony. She had left. When I came back, Guillarmo was on the couch, asleep. Peter was sitting on the balcony with his feet up. He turned and looked at me, as I tried to quietly put my things by my couch i.e. my bed. His brother Albert was asleep on the other couch. He had commandeered earlier in the week. His being on the couch meant that Grain was not at his girlfriends apartment tonight. Peter got up from the balcony and walked into the room. He watched me as I crawled into bed , pulling the covers over me. He stood by his bedroom door. Our eyes met briefly. Mine perplexed. His were a cold, hard, and mature twinged with a bit of sadness. A smirk or twitch found his lips, he turned and went into his room. “Do you understand was heard in my mind but words were not said”. At the sound of the door shutting close, his brother Albert turned around on his sofa , looked at me and said

“Don’t do that again.” He turned back around his face facing the back of the sofa. The balcony door had been left open. I heard the ocean catching and throwing back each wave. A repetitious motion.

I turned in the bed and reached for a the pack of cigarettes lying on the night stand. “Hum, God.”

I flicked an ash in to the cup, I had made into an ashtray. I thought about the other time I was at this motel. I got up and walked around the bed towards the window in back of it. I stood looking out as I opened it to let some air in. I pulled the pulleys and reached my hand towards the slider. I slowly pulled and tugged the glass aside. Warm air bathed my face, I turned so that my hair felt the rays of warmth as well. I pulled more mentholated air from my cigarette and stared at the flower beds surrounding the little courtyard.