and never been found.
Harlan wasn’t sure how stories of folk going missing or resorting to cannibalism would appeal to well-heeled travelers with a lot of disposable income, but then he wasn’t a journalist, and, anyway, the dumbness of people had long ago ceased to surprise him. So he and Paul and Ernie and a few others recycled all the old tales they could recall for the delight of Darina Flores, embellishing the details where required, or making them up entirely where necessary. Darina Flores dutifully noted them down, and bought rounds of drinks on her expense account, and flirted outrageously with men who could have been her grandfather, let alone her father, and as the night drew on, she gradually brought the conversation back to airplanes.
‘You think she might have a, you know, a thing for airplanes?’ Jackie Strauss, one of the town’s three resident Jews, had asked as he and Harlan stood side by side in the men’s room, making space in their bladders for more beer and, by extension, more time with the divine Darina Flores.
‘Why, you hiding an airplane that I don’t know about?’ asked Harlan.
‘I was thinking maybe I could borrow one, and offer to show her around.’
‘You could join the Mile High Club,’ said Harlan.
‘I got a fear of flying,’ said Jackie. ‘I was hoping we could just stay on the ground and do our business there.’
‘Jackie, how old are you?’
‘Seventy-two next birthday.’
‘You got a dicky heart. Any business you did with that woman would probably kill you.’
‘I know, but it’s how I’d like to go. If I survived, my wife would kill me anyway. Better I go in the arms of a woman like that than give my Lois the pleasure of beating me to death after.’
And so the men fed Darina Flores tales both real and fantastic, and she in turn fed their fantasies, and a pleasant night was had by all except Ernie Scollay, who wasn’t drinking at the time because he was on medication, and who had noticed that Darina Flores barely sipped at her vodka tonic, and her smile rose no further than her upper lip, never even coming close to those extraordinary eyes that grew darker as the night drew on, and she had long ago stopped writing and was now listening yet not listening, just as she was smiling yet not smiling, and drinking yet not drinking.
So Ernie tired of the game before the others, and he excused himself and left. He was walking to his truck when he saw April Schmitt, who owned the town’s other motel, the Vacationland Repose, standing outside the motel office, smoking a cigarette in a manner that could only be described as distracted. April didn’t smoke much, Ernie knew, this knowledge based upon the fact that he and April were content to share a bed when the mood struck them, each of them being generally inclined to solitude yet still requiring a little company on occasion. April only smoked when she was unhappy, and Ernie preferred April to be happy as that state of mind was more conducive to bed-sharing, and Darina Flores, falsely affable or not, had put him in the mood for some female company.
‘You okay, hon?’ he asked, laying a hand gently on the small of her back, the heel of it resting upon the swell of her still fine buttocks.
‘It’s nothing,’ she said.
‘You’re smoking. It’s never nothing when you’re smoking.’
‘There was a guy came asking for a room. I didn’t care for the look of him so I told him we were full up.’
She took a drag on the cigarette, then looked at it in disgust before throwing it to the ground, still only half smoked, and stamping it out. She wrapped her arms across herself and shivered, even though it was a warm evening. Tentatively, Ernie put an arm around her shoulders, and she leaned into him. She was shaking, and April wasn’t a woman who scared easily. Her fear drove any carnal thoughts from his mind. April was a frightened woman. Ernie loved her in his quiet way, and he did not wish her to be frightened.
‘He asked me why the “Vacancy” light was on if we were full,’ said April. ‘I said that I’d forgotten to turn it off, was all. I could see him looking at the lot. I mean, there are only four cars in it, so he knew that I was lying. He just smiled, the ugly piece of shit. He smiled,