9. Graham #2
The soreness in his lower back had started during the freight haul, and every bend toward the traps sharpened it, but the machine in front of him still needed clearing.
“My back is fine,” Graham said. “Point out the next trap. I can hold the pace.”
Wade rested a hand on the adjacent machine. “The machines just need to breathe, man. No one cares how fast you clear them. It’s not a playoff game.”
Graham looked at the clogged trap, then at the scraper in his hands.
For years, every effort had needed a scoreboard. Faster shift. Bigger contract. Another trophy proving the suffering had purchased something worth displaying.
Nobody here was watching.
The work still mattered.
He set the scraper beneath the next strip of cement and pushed until it broke loose.
“The games don’t matter anymore,” Graham said. “I just need to prove I won’t quit.”
By the time Mac sent him off the property, evening had swallowed the last of the sun.
Graham climbed into the Aston without putting the jacket back on.
The folded divorce petition still rested on the passenger seat beside the jacket, and the Rolex remained on the console where he had left it.
His shirt had dried in patches beneath the shop dust, then dampened again during the walk across the lot.
He drove until the boot shop disappeared behind the trees.
The first motel with a vacancy sign sat beside the highway between a bait shop and a closed tire garage.
Half its letters had burned out, leaving a weak red glow against the front windows.
Pickup trucks filled most of the parking spaces.
Graham pulled the Aston into the last open spot and stepped into the lobby.
A wave of mildew and old cigarette smoke hit him at the door.
A man behind a plexiglass counter looked up from a paperback. He took in Graham’s ruined shirt and dirt-streaked trousers, then looked through the window toward the car.
“You tracking that mess in here?”
“Probably.” Graham glanced at the marks his shoes had left near the entrance. “I’ll clean up anything I leave behind.”
“Car yours?”
“Yes.”
The manager looked toward the Aston again. “Doesn’t match the shirt.”
“It’s been a long day.”
“That so?”
Graham took out his wallet. “You have a room?”
The manager shut the paperback and pulled the ledger closer. “Ground floor is all I’ve got. Single bed. AC rattles like it’s trying to escape the wall, and I’m not calling maintenance tonight. Front office locks at ten.”
“Does the door lock?”
The man raised an eyebrow. “It locks. That’s about the luxury package.”
Graham almost laughed.
The card between his fingers could put him in a beach house before midnight.
Private pool. Clean sheets. Air conditioning powerful enough to make him forget Georgia was still cooking outside.
Somebody could deliver dinner while he sat under a hot shower and let tomorrow become somebody else’s problem.
That had been his answer for years.
Make enough money and nothing had to stay uncomfortable.
Riley had been living with the reality of it while he congratulated himself for providing.
Graham stared through the front window at the Aston. Even coated in road dust, it looked absurd beside the work trucks.
The manager tapped his pen against the ledger. “You taking it or not?”
Graham slid the card beneath the plexiglass. “I’ll take it. Ring me up for the rest of the month, please.”
The pen stopped.
“You said month?”
“Rest of it.”
The manager picked up the card and studied Graham again. “Most people in that car don’t book extended stays here.”
“I’m not here for the car.”
The manager ran the card, and the payment terminal chirped from beneath the counter. He handed the card back with a metal room key attached to a faded plastic tag.
“Loud parties get you thrown out,” he said. “Fancy car doesn’t change that. Break the quiet rules and I keep the deposit.”
“There won’t be any parties.”
“No visitors making trouble either.”
Graham slipped the card into his wallet. Tomorrow morning meant Copper Shank again. More freight, more dust, more orders from men who had no reason to care what his name meant anywhere else.
The prospect brought more relief than the thought of any resort.
“I’m only here to sleep,” Graham said. “I’ve got an early shift.”
The exterior walkway wrapped around the motel toward a communal washroom at the back of the building. Graham followed the painted arrows, towel tucked under his arm and room key in hand. Every step pulled at muscles that had never been asked to do that kind of work.
Inside, cinderblock walls trapped the smell of bleach and damp concrete.
Three shower stalls stood along one side, divided by thin metal partitions and curtains that had lost most of their color.
Graham set the key and towel on a dry shelf, stripped off his ruined clothes, and shoved them under the bench.
He stepped into the first stall and turned the handle.
The shower coughed twice before a thin stream spilled from the head. Graham adjusted it farther toward hot.
Nothing changed.
“Come on.”
He tried once more, then gave up and stepped under the cold spray.
The water stung across his shoulders and dragged gray ribbons of shop dust toward the drain.
Graham scrubbed rubber residue from his forearms, then worked soap through the grime along his neck.
The pressure barely managed more than a steady trickle, and the cold water did absolutely nothing to loosen his stiff muscles.
Someone shifted in the next stall.
An older man stood beneath the neighboring shower, scrubbing his neck with a plain white bar of soap. Lines from years outdoors marked his face, and his faded dock company work shirt hung from a peg on the opposite wall.
“Don’t waste your time with the handle,” the man said. “Hot side’s decoration.”
Graham wiped water from his face. “How long has it been out?”
“Long enough management stopped pretending they’re fixing it.”