My mother was dead, and I had been driving in a cold dark night for what seemed like eternity.
The sign for a motel glowed neon in the dark as I drove into town. I pulled into the parking lot as the sky shrugged on the navy-blue night like a threadbare jacket. The motel parking lot was dark and deserted—it could have been abandoned, but for the lemon-yellow light glowing in one of the windows.
I parked, crossing the lot and stepping into the lobby. The door banged shut behind me. Standing on the threshold, I took off my earmuffs—it was a frigid night, and my car’s heating had broken two months ago.
The motel wasn’t a welcoming place. The carpet was faded and frayed, and the overhead lights were broken. This forced the clerk to resort to a sun-yellow desk lamp. Even she had something of the dead and discarded about her. Blue circles were smudged under her eyes and her thin hair was pulled into a fraying ponytail; I guessed she was fifty. I could see her skull beneath her skin, drawn in indigo shadows. A cigarette dangled from her lips.
I asked for a room. She stretched out a hand to hand me the key to Room 4 and asked, “What brings you to town?”
I fumbled the key as she handed it to me, and dropped it. I crouched to retrieve it and rose to answer, “Funeral.”
“Oh. I’m sorry. My husband died two months ago.” Those bruises under her eyes must have come from the kind of sleepless nights I was familiar with. She frowned and sighed and said as if to herself, “Sometimes I wonder how people keep living.”
“My mother thought it was God.”
“I don’t know about that. My husband is dead.” The clerk stubbed out her cigarette. “Good luck, anyway.”
I followed her directions to a slightly derelict room. Turning the key in the lock, I dropped my suitcase on the floor. I did not bother to turn on the light before I fell into bed.
I checked out that morning with a different clerk. I left. I went to my mother’s funeral, and I never saw the bruised-eyed clerk again. But sometimes I still dream about that old motel. And occasionally when I wake up I will remember how the motel sign glowed in the dark like a lighthouse, and how it was I and a stranger in an unremembered town had at our core the same deep corrupting fear: that there was no point, that they had died for no reason. I still don’t know the answer to her question, but there is a strange comfort in knowing I am not the only one asking it.
Mary Russell is an avid writer (and reader) of fiction, mostly fantasy but occasionally realistic. She was published as a winner of the 2021 “It’s All Write” regional contest at aadl.org. When she isn’t writing or being a high schooler, she enjoys reading, painting, and playing the violin.