If you're six foot tall and east coast bred
some lonely night we can get together
and I'm gonna tie your wrists with leather
and drill a tiny hole into your head
Andrew Bird, “Fake Palindromes”
Part 5; 020. Death
The hotel room reeked of cheap scotch and whorehouse sex.
The floorboards were fermenting.
Bedsheets, nightstand, and desk were pinstriped with slats of light, filtering through the second-story window from slumped streetlights with firefly mouths. Above Matthew as he sat on the bed choking the neck of a bottle of gin, little invisible moths of sleep fluttered in the air.
Matthew was growing a beard.
His clothes were soot-smeared and looked as if they had been caught in the gear shaft of an engine.
And all he could think about was the fact that he wouldn't be able to pay for another night at the hotel. All of his money – his dollar bill rags and moon-sized quarters – were hiding in the pockets of bootleggers down the street and tucked underneath sweat-stained mattresses of the whorehouse next door. His pockets were empty. His bank account was collecting dust.
He swilled the gin with his head bowed. It sloshed like rice oil and kisses in stomachs.
The dreams were the worst. With little scalpels they tore wounds in his brain, in his memory, and smeared them with salt. Over and over, every night, Lena was resurrected. Every night, he was delivered back to that moment. Back to the bills scattered on the floor like onion peels, back to his wife's head sprinkled with plaster, back to little paper boats. It didn't matter where he was, how drunk he was, who he was with. She was always there.
Godssakes, she was haunting him!
And secretly, he wanted her back.
He wanted the old life again.
Matthew leaned back and the bed creaked whispers that flirted with the moths busily tracing cursive flight paths in the air. He tried to push those thoughts out of his mind. Alcohol did that to him. It sent him into nostalgic tailspins that almost always ended up in heavier hangovers and an emptier billfold. It didn't do any good to dwell in the past, he reminded himself. You were too good for her. You've moved on to better and bigger things, Matt.
His consolations lost carbonation like old champagne.
He glanced around the room and sipped out of the bottle.
Bigger and better things.
Someone knocked on the door.
Swearing, Matthew glanced at his pocket watch as it dripped tics onto the floor and placed the bottle on the bedside table. Who the hell was bothering him at one in the morning? His legs seemed to hiss like iron lungs as he got to his feet and crossed the room. If it was the proprietor, he wasn't sure that he would be able to restrain himself from strangling the man then and there. His fingers twitched. The dim zebra-striped light seemed to paint handfuls of varicose veins all over the door.
Matthew rubbed his eyes and opened it.
“Yes?”
“Hello, darling.”
Matthew's mouth went cotton-dry.
It was Lena.
She stood tall and elegant and skeletal almost in the doorway, her face hollow and regal. She was smiling, but it was an insincere, political smile. Something she wore for dinner parties and church. Her hair glistened in the hallway light instead of being crop-dusted with bits of plaster and her eyes were placid. As serene as deep-sea coffins.
“How – ”
She planted a hand on his chest, pushed him into the room, and closed the door. The smile turned skylit. “No one is invisible these days, darling. It took some time and money, but really, you didn't use much imagination in establishing...your new life.”
“But – ”
“Don't talk, Matt. You were never good at it.”
“Lena, I'm sorry.” The words tumbled out of his mouth.
She was silent for a moment. Little spiral staircases of hair twisted down her face. And then she looked back up at him. “Really?”
He shook his head. “Absolutely.”
That automaton smile again. She reached up, touched his face, and drew a little closer to him. Her fingers were like snowflakes. And her dress rustled richly. It rustled like new dollar bills in fresh leather billfolds. He realized that her parents had probably started supporting her financially as soon as he had left. He realized that her skin felt like beer bottle glass and that her eyes glittered like expensive, imported scotch.
Bigger and better.
“Do you love me?”
He smiled. “More than ever, doll. Absence makes the heart grow stronger, right?”
Lena bit her lip. She whispered, “Hold me, Matt.”
As tenderly as he could, his hands cemented into cinderblocks by the gin, Matthew received her in a firm, violent embrace. He nestled his face in her hair. It smelled like Turkish baths and blossoming pear orchards.
It smelled like wheat germ and brew hops.
“Did you miss me, doll?”
A musical, lyrical laugh bubbled out of her mouth and he heard a gun cock by his ear.
“How about a kiss, doll?”
