Brave the Storm

It was supposed to be just a pit stop on the way

until the storm warning came out on the radio,

so Sally and Ernest stopped at the one motel

that blinked alive from the highway exit.

The rain dashed against their windshield, pattering,

as the two exchanged a glance that held more meaning

than a stray conversation in the shadows might have had.

He pulled in, lips taut, while she let out a sigh

before lighting up a cigarette before they went in.

The cherry light at the end of her fingertips

was the same hue as the "VACANCY" sign

burning in the dredge of rainwater and night.

Ernest tapped the bell on the front desk, ching-ching,

while Sally frowned at the yellowed walls and brown carpet

as her nostrils flared at the smells of mildew and sweat.

A man with a sloppy toupee came behind the counter

and grinned a smile with chipped teeth that Sally saw

were the same shade as the walls behind her.

But the couple was tired, not wanting to drive through

another night where they said nothing while a storm

brewed outside the car and within its choked confines,

all while the radio did all the talking for them.

The man chatted with Ernest about the storm—

"good thing for business, you know how it is,"

while Ernest smiled, thin-lipped, as Sally's frown deepened—

and then handed over a rusty key etched with the number 11.

"Just the night," Ernest said before laying down the cash,

peeling each twenty-dollar bill away like it was precious,

and Sally just shook her leg in impatience, her eyes trailing

from the motel owner to the walls and to the discolored key.

By the time Ernest and Sally left the office, they did not look

at each other, what was unsaid lying heavy between them.

The motel room was just as displeasing to Sally,

the walls spackled from an era long before her birth,

and she retreated to the bathroom for a hot shower

rather than watch her husband sigh as he noted

the television did not have cable—just eight stations.

The water did nothing to cleanse her mood, however,

and she toweled dry her wet curls as she stared into

a mirror broken at the edges, reflecting her sad eyes.

The sound of thunder rumbled, deepening with each beat,

and she imagined a lion pacing back and forth outside,

waiting for prey to come out and into its jaws.

Ernest was asleep by the time she got out of the bathroom—

though why did that surprise her? He slept through anything—

and it was only when she sat on the edge of the bed

that she allowed the first tears to fall as she clutched

her aching stomach that told her something was wrong.

The rain had always given her aches and pains all over,

but this was different, somehow—dangerous, creeping,

like that lion in her head, stalking and waiting for weakness.

By the time Sally fell into a deep sleep, she had strange dreams—

a toddler walking with a group of red balloons flying high,

a man with a lion's head and dressed in a tan suit,

a flood that washed away the house she shared with Ernest.

Restlessly, she moved back and forth, back and forth,

until she awoke to the light of predawn spilling through

the gap in the heavy curtains that looked twenty years old.

But the one thing that wasn't there was Ernest.

Sally took a shuddering breath before closing her eyes.

She knew the old beater he drove would be gone too.

Being abandoned, left behind, kicked to the curb—

at least it was easier than being killed in her sleep.

She had seen the warning signs in Ernest's eyes—

the deadness that didn't match his smiling lips—

and for once she was glad he had decided without her,

because maybe, just maybe, it had spared her life.

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