Mimi and Salsa and Raquel go. Dad comes over, holding his head. "Migraine," he whispers. "Tell both Toms goodbye for me. I can't. I'm gonna go to bed."
"'Night," I say.
I don't know what else to do but tell them to get into the car. I drive them over to the Motel 6.
Tom B. looks at me in the mirror as I drive.
"We didn't have rings, Anita," he says, like he's just realizing it.
"You know, you're right. We'll have to get you rings tomorrow. We can go over to K-Mart and get rings." I try to smile.
They start kissing deep again in the backseat.
As soon as I pull into the Motel 6 lot, I tell them to break it up. I check us in. Our rooms are ready. It's doomed, I know, Tom and Tom. Or maybe Tom B. will escape and go and rescue Tom A. from the other group home. Maybe they'll walk across America and find themselves in paradise.
Tonight is paradise, isn't it? The Motel 6's rooms are beige with orange bedspreads. Yellow carpet. They march into their room, and Tom A., in his leisure suit, sits down and grins. Tom B. closes the door to the adjoining room, smiling.
I sit down on my bed and right then is when I see him, standing in the window. Out on the patio.
He starts tapping on the glass.
I can't help it. If he had a crack pipe I would let him stick it in my mouth, but instead I just let him into the room. He's shivering, he's jailhouse thin. He is in a long cowboy coat and jeans and a cowboy shirt. His eyes look hurt and happy and they seem to glow. My heart feels like all those shaved-headed freaks are marching over it. Love has to happen at the end of every night or you don't know yourself.
"I'm working," Archie tells me, standing in front of the TV.
I nod my head. "You are, huh?"
"Who the hell are they anyway?" Archie asks, and he comes over and sits down on the bed next to me. "Are they those retarded people you work with? Why'd you bring them here?"
"I just did," I say. "For the hell of it."
Archie laughs. It's wheezy and warm. I want to crawl into his laugh like an orphaned baby onto a luxury liner. Go across the ocean to Europe where some kind lady wants me.
"I love you so much," Archie says. "I should have told you and you could have helped me get off the stuff, but I was just ashamed. I'm sorry for what I did. I lied so much. I was sick, babe. It was like the drug took over, you know?"
I want to tell him to shut up. Want to kick his ass out. That's the next instinct, right after being overjoyed at seeing him, happy at being stalked. I remember when I first met him. It was at a bar in Hamilton, skanky redneck place me and a girlfriend used to go to shoot darts and get drunk. He was standing by the dartboard drinking and smoking, still in his work clothes, and I threw a dart and it almost got him. But he wasn't pissed.
"Cupid's arrow," he said.
Then Archie and me hear them. Screaming. Silly crazy sex music. There's bumps and thumps against the thin walls. There's laughter.
"Good God," says Archie.
But he isn't disgusted. He isn't even perturbed. He doesn't understand, but he's here with me, and that's next door.
"Are they having a good time or what?" he asks. He smells of cigarettes and beer and Brut and old pizza and sweat and love.
I guess I love him. I kiss him. That's all I can do.
escape and go and rescue Tom A. from the other group home. Maybe they'll walk across America and find themselves in paradise.
