Harbors of the Moon

Jimmy

Motel

Amy and Friends

– May I help you, sir?

The man is not pleased. He has a days growth of beard to go with his rumpled Ford ball cap and coke bottle glasses. Bob, the motel manager, also wears coke bottle glasses. The man is wearing black loafers with no socks, and the kind of outfit you put on without much thought. Later that evening, Bob will come inside the lobby wearing black loafers with no socks, and the kind of outfit you put on without much thought. These two have never met, but will over doughnuts and bitter coffee the next morning. The man has something in a paper towel.

– I’ve done about twenty crickets so far tonight. See? and he plops the paper towel down on the counter for the clerk to see. A mangled cricket, crushed upper thorax. She squints and apologizes profusely. This is not a good night for the pimple-face clerk. Or a good time of the month. Her pimples are flaring, and angry looking. Her wrinkled Howard Johnson smock has come out of her pants. Inexplicably, this motel chain also makes the clerks wear a loud tie.

Earlier in the night, the man had come down and told her: There aint but one fuckin towel in that whole goddamn room!

He was then wearing the greasy mechanic’s shirt from the car dealership where he works. He meets a lady friend here every Friday night. The clerk apologized profusely and went to the back to get him some towels, but there weren’t any. Bob’s wife Mabel, who usually does the washing, was sick with another migraine, and the chamber maids can’t be counted on for anything. Earlier in the day, Bob caught one sitting in one of the rooms talking on the phone. He used the same racial slur he would use later that night when he turned away a bus full of black band members.

– How can I make it right with you?

– Put me in another room.

– Yes sir. Here, take 217.

– Where the hell is 217?

– Upstairs.

– I know it’s upstairs, but where? He begins to flail his arms in resignation, as though he’s lost in a big city and someone has stolen his baggage. – I don’t wanna be runnin all over the goddamn place. I’m a workin man, seven dollars an hour. I got to get up and go to work in the mornin. I got bags to carry. He is very churlish. Nothing she’s going to say will mollify him. He grabs the key from her and storms out. She is itching for a smoke, one of her beloved Marlboros. The East Indians who own this motel told her to go out back when she smokes so the customers won’t see her standing around like a bum outside the front door. But out back she can’t see the customers. Bob ignores this request and leaves his cigarette on the ledge outside the front door when customers come inside. Bob is never around when she needs him. Bob can’t even work the register properly yet, and he’s been here two months. Small-scale administrative details, like turning in time cards, are not his strong suit. He sees himself as a PR man. The hospitality sector is his forte. Often he yells across the parking lot that he’s got fresh doughnuts inside. He told Amy he loves to turn around a motel on its knees. Customer service is at the top. Saturday he fired Amy for undisclosed reasons.

Bob And Mabel

Bob is the manager of a ramshackle Howard Johnson motel run by East Indians. He and his wife Mabel live in one of the rooms. Since they both chainsmoke, a visitor to the room is likely to think he’s in an incinerator, but he’s just in Bob- and-Mabel’s room. They have a Doberman that Bob walks at night patroling the grounds. He doesn’t trust the fat security guard to do a good job of ferreting out criminals. Mabel does the laundry and runs the maid service. She told the girls no phone calls from the room, and no dressing like hookers. Mabel has had five kids, three husbands before Bob. She’s too proud to go on welfare. Daily she reminds Bob that he can’t smoke in the lobby, and he takes it outside to bullshit with any guests that happen to pass by. The number one rule in the hospitality business is to bullshit with the customers. One of the guests asked him one day: Who was that robot at the desk? Bob got to the bottom of it. Bob got to the bottom of the security guard eating the doughnuts set out for the customers. Bob got to the bottom of the malfeasance regarding Amy and fired her Saturday.

Occasionally, Bob gets so caught up in the hospitality protocol that he waves a customer away, says pay it all when you leave. This insouciance infuriates the minimum wage girls who work there since he has threatened them with dismissal if they don’t promptly collect what’s due.

Bob likes the drama of taking his oversize flashlight and knocking on the door of a room with excessive noise. His chest swells and his voice cracks when he addresses any kind of disturbance. The desk clerks get a story of the brawl that almost took place. Mabel tries to calm him with coffee. Back in his room, he sleeps sitting up in his tattered barcalounger on the qui vive. He don’t give no second chances. Last noise call he went on, there was a bunch of Vietnamese, must have been at least ten, chattering like monkeys. That’s why he don’t like to rent to Vietnamese, you think there’s only three, at the desk, see, and ten more show up in the room. They hide, and slip into the rooms like lizards, real sneaky.

Tonight he turned away a bus full of black band members. He tells the girls he won’t rent to a bunch of niggers in the middle of the night. Anyone rents to a bunch of niggers in the night will be summarily dismissed. He won’t rent to drunk Indians, there was one that couldn’t sign his name and pissed in the foyer. He won’t rent to whores, or the girls from the titty bar down the street. He won’t rent to shape-up crews, or the roofers on the construction project next door. He won’t rent to walkovers, they’s the kind that get in and take a shower, then say they don’t wan’t the room afterall. He won’t rent to bums. He won’t rent to queers. He found shit-laden rubbers and sheets in one of the rooms where they stayed. The black chambermaids came to him screaming about it. They won’t go near the room now. They threw some rubbers in the ice machine too. The desk clerks are supposed to know whether someone inquiring about a room is queer. Under no circumstances are desk clerks to rent to a bunch of teenage boys trying to find a room to fuck a drunk girl. Shit hit the fan the last time this happened. He doesn’t elaborate about this particular situation. One of the girls thinks it’s because he’s jealous. She also thinks he likes her. She claims he stares down her blouse when he’s talking to her and she notices a hard-on in the crotch of his tight Banlon pants. There’s an ambiguous list of all these undesirables he rattles off from time to time, with the reasons, until the clerks eyes glaze over.

Bob prides himself on salesmanship. He likes to negotiate the price of the room with people who initially bawk at the quoted price. He likes to tell stories about working for Sears in personnel. He can tell all about a person after thirty seconds. He worked for Ramada Inn for a year, but he don’t like unnanounced inspections. He likes to tell his desk girls how Eastern Indians want somethin for nothin. He’s told some customers this as well. He emphasizes to the desk girls that plus tax don’t goddamn mean including tax, will you goddamn get it right and don’t leave no dead bugs on the office floor people will think the rooms is dirty and no friends comin up to visit sittin around watching t.v. what do you think this is? Anyone who rents to a bag- lady will be fired on the spot, like Amy. They had to fumigate and disinfect the room. And it’ll come out of your paycheck.

Bob leaves the office bathroom door open slightly when he shits. The girls find this a topic of much discussion. Jesus! it stinks and it’s so gross they can see in there, he grunts and farts like a maniac and they can’t tell who he’s talking to his glasses are so thick, his eyes are all over the place, as well as the time sheets that he’s late in turning in, and the new girl the one with huge tits and skimpy outfits is getting paid fifteen cents an hour more, this aint right they mentioned this to him and he said you ought to be glad you have a job. Another issue fomenting near insurrection among the ladies is the greeting so long that both they and the customer get lost. Who dreamed that up? Bob listens in. Cumulative violations of Bob directives will flat get you fired, like Amy.

One day as Mabel walks by outside to the convenience store to buy aspirin for her migraines, Bob says to the new girl: Mabel is not a pretty woman, in fact she’s downright ugly, but she’d go with me to the North Pole to live in an igloo if that’s what I wanted. She’ll do anything for me. Bob- and- Mabel.

Bless me, foeda, and Mary contrary

(rooms 108,109,110)

Bless me, foeda, and his family have checked into room 108 after a long road trip in the Winnebago he uses for free from the car dealership he manages. Bless me, foeda, is the manager on the Winnebago road trip as he is at work and as he is at home. Last week twelve-year old Christie came to mama and asked could she wear a bra, she’s startin to sprout. Mama said she’d have to asked daddy. Big squashed-potato nose Sicilian daddy told her she’s too young. Girls in this family don’t start this young callin attention to their privates. Christie cried and said she’s got points. Mama told her shut up. – Bless me, foeda, daddy said at the head of table, tonight, fo I hayuh seened. The others cross themselves and are vicariously emptied of their sins. Christie is still sniffling. Daddy serves the gumbo.

Son #1 has accompanied the family on the Winnebago road trip. The road trip is designed to mollify first born Shuga doughta over her recent cancelled engagement, but this is a different story. Son #1 followed daddy into the car business. He sits proudly up front riding shotgun and trading war stories with daddy. He brags he got an extra hundred dollars out of an old lady, wore her down in the heat. Daddy relishes this, tells him dats de way to do it, boy. My boy, dis my boy!

Son #2 cannot accompany the family on the Winnebago road trip because his wife is pregnant again. Son #2 is mildy cretinous and hunchbacked and married too early for daddy though daddy said not a word since he knows what it’s like to burn and marry early to quench the fire. Daddy thinks #2 son married beneath himself, but this is another story. #2 married a girl from the lunchroom at daddy’s company and she’s growing big-bellied again. In private, Daddy shakes his head: AGIN? Dat aint no way to manage a famly, dat foe shuh! Mama agrees, and manages a mild rebuke as well. Big-bellied girl milks her tits poolside for all to see: My ol’ titties is so sore! Mama is horrified, her face red as a beet. – That girl is coarse! she says to daddy. Daddy tells her to come upstairs, it’s time for bed. Mama does as she’s directed and submits to another merciless onslaught, like ten seconds in a breeding stall with an Angus bull. Other merciless encounters have produced five dull Catholic drones with replicas on their minds.

First born Shuga doughta is still quite upset over her recent breakup. Her fiance told his friends in confidence that blowjobs and banana bread aren’t enough to offset that old man of hers. – Motherfucker’ll buy you a pack of gum, show you how to chew it. That old bastard was all up into everything. Wadn’t a day go by he didn’t bust in someone’s conversation and throw his two cents around. Called me fireball behind my back, like it’s a big joke. Said I wadn’t no go getta, I oughta work at the car dealership. Said he don’t want no doughta of his workin, that fuckin cajun accent, shit! Wanted me to borrow from him to buy a house. Fuck that! Can you imagine that old guinea bastard on a day-to-day basis? His friends could not. He believes he’ll pass.

First born Shuga doughta is crestfallen. Locks herself in her room, and mama brings her gumbo and iced tea. Mama tells Shuga doughta she’ll pay for her to see the weight- loss doctor. Maybe some more of dem pills. Mama thinks Shuga doughta’s chunkiness blew the whole thing. Shuga doughta’s fiance hadn’t mentioned the weight issue. Daddy don’t like dem pills cause dey make Shuga nasty. Mama says it’s better than chunky. A man don’t want no chunky woman. Daddy isn’t listening.

Daddy thinks niggers run dis place. Dat woman at da desk blowed it all over him and everthin else. Smell like she bin drinkin whiskey and smokin all night long. Dat shit don’t cut it. She had da whiskey in a dixie cup she stick behind da counter. Dere a paper plate overflow in with butts. Half-eatin somethin on da counter and bugs everwhere. She don’t pay no mind to nothin, not even da roaches crawlin on da counter. She work for him, she gone. Mama asks daddy if he seen that man outside, with the big flashlight. Looks like he got on boxer shorts. He look crazy. Daddy says everone here look crazy. Dis his place, he fire everone. He don’t like dis place. Aint even got nowhere to eat. Daddy thinks at least dey have a Sambos. Dis his place, he have one. Look out dere at dat U-Haul parked all crooked, like a bunch of niggers on the move! Mama says she think that man outside with the flashlight is on the move, too, somethin he done wrong. She don’t like this place either. Daddy isn’t listening.

– What we gonna do bout Shuga? he asks. She my first born doughta. Aint right she not married. Mama says that assistant principal at de school, he be a good choice. Kids gotta be raised Catholic. She thinks he likes Shuga doughta. Daddy says he don’t know him. Mama says dat de one dey had over for dinner. Daddy don’t remember. Mama say she’ll have him over agin. Daddy isn’t listerning. Mama says there’s only one towel in dis whole room. Daddy says he goin get de manager. Dis his place, he fire em, all of em. Daddy puts on black loafers and the kind of outfit you throws on without much thought. Mama tells him not to go out like that, he looks a sight. He’s not listening. The lady at the desk is still coughing violently when he registers his complaint.

Christie and Shuga doughta are in room 109. They share a room at home, too. Neither wanted to come on this trip. Christie is still sniffling over the bra thing. She starting to fill out nicely. It’s way past time. Boys at school have called her jiggles. She’ll ask daddy again real soon about the bra. Shuga doughta is still crying as well. Her dreams of soiled diapers have evaporated. By years end, she and the assistant principal at the Catholic school are married. There is something wrong with the kid.

Mary quite contrary and lover-boy Jim have checked into room #110 on their way to Kansas. While her old boyfriend Bobby was out of town getting some help for his medical problems, she decided she would go with the old sissy hound dog in Kansas who’s been sniffing around in the wings for four years now on antidepressants and a trust fund. Only problem with him is he’s a very effeminate homosexual and wants what he can’t have and is used to getting it, since mommie gave him everything he wanted (except the right hormones), including a prescription for Wellbutrin and a BMW that keeps breaking. Mary decided it would be a good time to vamoose before Bobby expects her to pay back the money she borrowed to fix the nose she broke in the wreck when the rear view mirror flew off and hit her smack in the schnauze.

Bobby wasn’t ambitious enough for her. Jim wasn’t her only alternative. She could have gone with the bodybuilder with the orange tan she met dancing. He sells supplements in a multi-level marketing scheme. A clothes buyer with sideburns and Paco Rabanne asked her to come to Dallas with him; he’ll take care of her. She could go with the car dealer she did some public relations work for. He came on to her while she was out clubbing. He’s not very married, at least with the way he acts.

Her friends try to imagine her with a philandering car dealer. She likes to be the coquette in the pair. And she doesn’t like Philistines. Better she goes with the clothes buyer, they think, with her sensibilities, assuming he’ll follow through on the drunk promises. She values her friends’ opinions. They told her there’s no future with the fag. She likes a lot of fucking. Deep inside, they know it will not work out for her with any of her dangling would-be suitors. It will soon become transparent to them that what she wants above all else is to be taken care of like a Madam Onassis, and won’t be the whore in bed they visualized in the club. Their drunken promises will fade to unreturned phone calls.

Mary meets a lot of men out dancing. The same club, the same men. She gets numbers while the fag from Kansas sits there and cries and amiable Bobby thinks she’s out with her girlfriends. Jim thinks only a ring can stop this madness, and so it does. When Bobby comes back from Dallas, she’s gone, along with most of the furniture and other belongings she had let her brother pick through.

Mary contrary and Jimbo are wandering about the room, trying to find something redeemable about the place. Mary is petulant, Jimbo is whining. He doesn’t like it. His allergies, and this musty place, and there’s only one towel in the whole room. Mary takes her Centrum and tries to ignore his histrionics. – Take a Xanax, she snaps. You and your allergies, phooh! Where the hell else we gonna stay at this hour with a U-Haul? Jim starts to cry. Tonight there will be no sex. Jim has a hard-on, but he just can’t make the rest of it work. Sniping turns into a little thrown Chinese take-out. A year of marriage produces a daughter and a divorce. Mary is once again dancing. Same club, same men.

Lonnie and Amy’s Replacement

Lonnie says his poverty is what gives him special insight. He didn’t use this term exactly, he said it lets him see things other people don’t, or won’t, and he looks at you sidelong to see your reaction. Goes on to say that the world viewed from the eyes of a have, just not the same as the world through the eyes of a have-not. I wish he would look people straight in the eye when he’s philosophizing, makes me think he’s another kind of four-flusher.

What he doesn’t mention and may not know is that a have would philosophize looking you square in the eye. If you rolled your eyes or sneered, he would