Murder (Or Justice) at The Lincoln Motel

“Fuck.”

There’s dry blood stained down the front of his shirt. Little to indicate whether it’s his own or someone else’s, but it doesn’t feel like he’s bleeding. Every muscle in his body burns in protest as he forces himself out of the vehicle. The leather doesn’t make a suitable bed, but at least he’s in his own driveway this time.

Relief flows through him when he finds the front door unlocked. Makes a whole racket on the way inside, door slamming open to hit the plaster of the wall. Shoes are kicked off and left haphazardly away from the mat. Could be worse. Bennett’s been known to leave them on his feet.

“Iris,” he’s calling as he takes the stairs two at a time up toward the bedroom. He's counting on her being home. Counting on her counting on him coming in just like this.

It’s always like this with him.

Always with the blood and brutalities and the lapses in memory and the—where the fuck’s his wedding ring got off to now? A hand fishes into his right pocket, the same crossing over to dig into the left. Nothing turns up.

He finds her standing at the bathroom vanity with the door open. Grin spreads across his lips at the sight. Always does, regardless of the mess. Regardless of their state of conflict. It’s only when his hands come up to grasp her face and drag her over for a kiss on the side of her temple that he sees the contrast: angelic blonde against the grit and grime he’s covered in.

Visage falls to a shimmer on the countertop. The wedding band he’s looking for. Bennett reaches for it quickly, snatches it up as though there’s a possibility she hasn’t yet seen it. For all he knows, it’s been sitting there for a week’s worth of nights. “Bloody thing keeps trying to run away from me,” he tells her.

She’s asks if he’s the one that’s bleeding.

He comes home and he long ago lost the cognisance to come up with cohesive lies. The one he knows best is ‘i don’t remember’; it owns a particularly well-loved space in his mouth. Beyond that, most of the time, Bennett just tells the truth.

I killed him.

I lost track of the days—no less than a week after disappearing from her line of sight.

He’s slipping his wedding band back onto his finger. Tries the middle one first only to find it stops at the knuckle. Adjusts. Slides it right to the base of the digit it belongs on.

“Don’t think so,” is the truth he chooses today. He won’t know for sure until the shirt’s off, which he starts making quick work of right there in the safety of the doorframe.

The thing is this: he doesn’t know how to get blood out of his own clothing. So like peace offerings bargained for the right to through death, he passes his marred garments over to Iris and begs her not to ask the questions he doesn’t have the answers to. The violence comes easily. It flows from his fingertips and drags his hands through the motions without a hint of hesitation. There’s never direction to it, never a sense of purpose. Brutality is a means to an end. Memory rarely holds onto it.

Senseless, is what a judge might call it.

Oftentimes that’s the whole of what Bennett is: senseless. A short-circuit mind and a tongue that betrays him.

Bennett steps into the view of himself in the mirror. Dissociation hits. He squints at the man squinting back at him. Pauses. Waits for another question that never comes. Waits for the stranger to ask what the fuck he’s looking at. It’s not in the body or the age – it’s in the eyes. Open palms begin an exploration, a rapid scouring for open wounds. He finds bruises, tender flesh where there should be none. No geyser of blood.

Taps spin on so he can wash his hands. He smells like gasoline and brandy. He smells like overworn cologne. All of that, and it’s the dull lighting in the bathroom that doesn’t sit right with him. Faded peridot flickers up toward the bulb. “Changed that last week, I thought. Put one of the energy savers in,” yet that’s not what it is now. The bulb boasts butter yellow staining and a promise to drain their electricity fund.

Too many of his memories are mere blueprints: outlines on a page with the contents of each room missing. Bennett doesn’t remember who all this blood burst from.

“It’s dry,” she says of the blood.

And he shrugs, “just hope I got the job done.”

The violence comes too easily. Remnants of his singular capacity for destruction always evidenced in these ways: rust and maroon and whispers of discomfort when he moves too quickly. But Bennett hasn’t come to terms with it all. Hasn’t accepted that he’s the one skilled in these acts of annihilation. Doesn’t like that this is what he’s become. Didn’t mean for it to be this way.

“I need to shower,” he says. An invitation he doesn’t expect her to accept. Bennett struggles with intimacy when it doesn’t come hand in hand with vehemence. Struggles to sit with himself and especially with her in these fleeting moments of quiet. “Don’t leave, okay?” and it sounds like a plea from the mouth of a frightened child. Genuine concern underlining the words. Bennett steps backward, reaches for the shower dial without looking. Doesn’t want to chance looking away from her sooner than he has to. The pipes rumble to life, start spitting water into the base of the bathtub. The house creaks with upset.

There’s a possibility he gets out of the shower and she’s nothing but a ghost.

There’s a possibility he steps under the water and loses the next three days.

She’s out of sight in a matter of seconds and he’s ignoring all the dread to step behind the shower curtain. Bennett can wash the blood off of his hands but the reality is that they’re never really clean. He could step out of his own skin and even his soul would be filthy with the fallout of his actions. He tries to do the job quickly but there are things that just don’t make sense, little actions he has to stumble over as his mind jumps through hoops toward reconciliation.

First, he knows his bottle of shampoo should be near to full. Can clearly recall beckoning to Iris when he’d last been in the shower, asking her to grab it from the closet when the last one ran empty, sputtering out nothing into his open palm. It’s nearly down to empty again, when he would’ve sworn that was only a few days prior.

Second, he turns his back to the stream of scorching hot water and suddenly he isn’t in his own shower at all. It’s a different bathroom entirely, one belonging in a seedy motel on the opposite side of town. Salmon-coloured tiling and mildew marking up the corners. more chlorine in the water and the scent of it is suffocating. Bennett closes his eyes and tries to wish the scene away. If this is where he is, Iris isn’t within reach at all. If this is where he is, there’s a dead body bleeding wet into the motel mattress just outside the bathroom door. There’s a rat threatening to crawl out of the walls and start chewing at the victim’s limp, lifeless legs.

Bennett needs a reprieve from the danger and the disconnect.

Eyes squeeze tighter shut only to open to the same hideous pink. “Fuck,” he speaks into the void. Tears threaten, prick at the corners of his vision. He’s tired of this. Tired of what it means to be trapped inside his own head.

It’s only when he flings the shower curtain back open and reaches for a towel that he finds he’s back in their home. It’s midday already. Somehow. His wedding ring is back on the counter where he found it earlier, and though he doesn’t remember taking it off all he does is reach for it again. Slips it back onto the same middle finger. Hits the knuckle. Adjusts. Finds the place it belongs.

Downstairs, his wife asks about where he’d been the previous night.

“Was... at a motel, I think. Best I can figure, anyway,” and there’s something about a little girl tied up in the memory of the motel. Something to suggest she’d been quite literally tied up in the motel at one point, too. But she isn’t there any longer. That much Bennett is almost sure of. “Can see the sign in my head, burned in there,” bright and neon.

The kettle clicks when he picks it up to pour steaming water into two cups with tea bags she placed. The kettle clicks and Bennett’s mind subverts back to the very motel he’d admitted to being in. It’s the sound of a door. The sound of it closing behind the rightful occupant when his body had still boasted life. Bennett was waiting in the shadows within, heartbeat racing wildly in his chest.

There’s something about the motel. Something about the room and the body and the blood and the scene of the crime.

“Think I have to go back. Don’t think I cleaned up well enough,” he moves to hand her the hot mug, his own hands unaffected by the scorching dishware. “Come with?” she shouldn’t.

Fingers tap restlessly against the polished kitchen counter. A rhythm that might be comforting if it weren’t so erratic.

Gaze raises to the ceiling. Footsteps can be heard upstairs. Upstairs in their home or upstairs in his head. It’s her gentle, light movements across the floor. Clearly distinguishable from his own heavier footfalls. Head tilts to the side and Bennett blinks, refocuses on the woman before him. Expects her to be someone else, expects her to have disappeared right before his very eyes. But she’s there.

She’s still there, right?

“Gotta... retrace my steps," he’d like to retrace them further back than the motel.

Back to a time when he was less familiar with the scent of blood.

Bennett knows more of it is coming. Knows the motel he’s aiming for won’t be a clean scene. Doesn’t particularly want Iris to bear witness to the mess he’s made but he thinks he might have a reasonable explanation. On the tip of his tongue, in the tightest corner of his mind, is the name of a child aged thirteen. Her father’s face blasted across the evening news, begging they bring his little girl back home. A name delivered to Bennett’s own inbox and a plea that he use whatever means necessary.

(Even dead bodies need safe keeping.)

Bennett reaches for his mug, brings it close enough to see over the rim and reaches right into the hot liquid, fingertips dancing around the teabag until they find the right place to pick it up from. He pulls it out and it reminds him of the way a freshly dead body struggles to keep form. Rigor mortis would do the dripping, aromatic nylon well. He takes the teabag to the trash can, foot pedal popping the lid open to reveal the remnants of a recent meal scraped off of plates. Thai food, it looks like, but it’s been a week since they got takeout.

Right?

He forgets to go back for the steeped tea. Stands with one hand against the wall in a lean, head turning back toward her with eyes squeezed to a close. “The Lincoln?” it’s inadvertently a question until he continues, “there a motel called that?”

A vague thought about check-in time would inspire a glance down toward his watch if he ever wore one, but anytime he does all it serves as is a discomfort. Heavy on his wrist and taking up too much space in his head. There’s always been a struggle around schedule, difficulty keeping it and difficulty associating it with importance.

He’s heard a thing or two about how time is just a human construct.

Distracted by thoughts attempting to unravel just what the scene they’re seeking out might look like, Bennett’s foot falls heavy a few more times on the pedal of the garbage can. It opens to reveal a clean, empty bag. It opens to reveal discarded eggshells and a half slice of toast. It opens to reveal the teabag and the Thai scraps.

He isn’t looking, doesn’t even process the slips in time.

Sudden movements drag him toward the little hooks their keys hang on, and he tosses them across the room for her to catch before he’s taken a second to make proper eye contact. “You drive,” and he’s forgotten about his tea entirely now, unsteady on one foot while he pulls on a pair of shoes.

He grabs at the car door handle. A hand lands on the dash. Fingers tap erratically. Bennett flips the visor down, catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror and immediately puts it back up. Settles into the seat. Clasps his seatbelt in place. Lifts a hand toward the radio only to drop it. Knows he won’t be able to think straight if the station keeps telling him the weather and the time and how Jack Johnson sang the last song.

“Ah... make a right out of the drive,” he tells her. There’s uncertainty in his tone. Head lands against headrest and eyes fall to a close in an attempt to foster familiarity. A sign he remembers passing or a neighbour’s house that rings true to the memory. But these streets are seemingly always changing. the houses go from brick to siding and then there’s a corner store where he thought there was a duplex.

Vivid green hues pop open of a sudden, a hand reaching across the console in search of Iris'. “You know, I think it might be down by the pier. The one that used to have that fish market. Right off the freeway, you remember?” It’s been years since the market was up and running.

Pulling back, Bennett pops open the glove compartment. There’s a half-used packet of tissues he doesn’t remember opening. A plastic takeout fork and a dried wet nap cuddled up in the corner next to a condom – still in the wrapper – that he can’t imagine having had any reason to have bought.

There’s a gun, too.

One of his only companions when he’s out on the job. He picks it up now to drop the magazine into an open palm. Two bullets missing. “Fuck,” he says. Replaces the magazine. “Fuck,” not that it matters. Just means there’s less of a chance he wants the blonde driving his car now to see the fallout.

A split-second pads the space between the first time he drops the magazine into his hand and the second—just to double check that he hadn’t miscounted or misperceived the number of bullets missing from his possession.

Sometimes things change right before his eyes and he knows it. Usually it’s minute details: street signs and speed limits, the colour of his favourite sweatshirt, the font dictating the month at the top of their calendar. Sometimes it’s bigger things, more abrasive and with greater consequence.

Two bullets remain nowhere to be seen. “Fuck,” completes the holy trinity of curses.

These consequences seem determined to stick.

It isn’t long before Iris is pulling his car into the parking lot of a motel that he’s relieved to see is, in actuality, The Lincoln. Gaze narrows toward the strip of doors, each of them identical except for scratches in paint and numbers in rusting silver above peepholes. “Try twelve,” he tells her.

Before they’ve even come to a full stop he’s pushing open the passenger side door, unbuckling his seatbelt and preparing to head inside. Bennett stops short, rests his gun against the dashboard and shifts toward his wife. “Think you should wait here, love,” head tilts to the side, tilts toward the door of room number twelve, “just give me a second to...” make sure it’s safe, at the very least. Make sure he isn’t walking her into a wide-open trap, “just give me a minute.”

The heavy motel door offers a rasp of warning before Bennett walks in with his eyes closed, pistol drawn but elbows ready to collapse. He’s uncommitted to his own safety. Has witnessed triggers pulled from behind barrels aimed right at his head and woken up the next morning without a hint of consequence.

Quiet assaults his ears. Quiet except for the sound of a dripping faucet and the soft click of the door as it falls to a close behind him. Bennett peels his eyes open with apprehension. His sense of smell isn’t the greatest, damaged somewhere along the lines and it’s probably for the best. Metallic air weighs heavy throughout the room. Tangible dampness.

A can of cola spilt across the dresser leaves a sticky puddle, ants wading through the mess. Discarded dirty clothes decorate the floor in two clear varieties: a grown man’s, not a single new purchase made since the late nineties; and a little girl’s, bubble-gum pinks with bubble-lettered sayings.

THE FUTURE IS BRIGHT!

TOTALLY AMAZING SISTER!

The mattress is more rust than white, blood soaked from the body that lays face-up and dried, crusting the sheets. Two bullet holes aren’t the only stations of assault: scratches made with child-sized fingernails scrape down his sides. A mouthful of small teeth leave a vicious indent at the man’s neck. Motel property in the form of a lamp lies on the bed next to him, destroyed in Bennett’s quick reach to smash the lightbulb clear into the side of the monster’s head.

Knees and open palms land on shag carpet, a look under the bed revealing only darkness. No little girl left in his wake. He moves to the bathroom next. Checks behind the door. Checks in the molding shower. Checks beneath the sink, in the small cavity of the bathroom cupboard.

Nothing.

Nodding to himself, the motion is interrupted by Iris' knocking and a concerned tone through the door. “Yeah, alright,” he’s saying as he crosses the room again. Opens the door and reaches for her arm to drag her within. “I think the girl’s alive,” he tells her immediately. As if she should know exactly what he’s talking about. “I think I got her out.” In a way, he’s right. “Let’s go,” before he blinks and the little girl reappears in the room in pieces.

There was a time when the uncertainty frightened him. When knowing there was so much he didn’t know left him with unending unease. Now it’s normal. It’s what Bennett has come to expect. His memory isn’t one fluid account, a novel pieced together with clear settings and themes. It’s disjointed poetry: all stanzas out of place and forced rhymes.

For a fleeting second, he thinks he can feel the weight of a small girl over his shoulder. For the briefest of breaths, he thinks he might know why he slept in the car last night.

The girl is in his trunk.