teentown (an oneiric read-along)

oneiric composition forty-two:

	The motel property was peppered with mid-aged odds & ends sitting on sundown tailgates or ambling across the parking lot towards the neighboring c-store, bumming butts or cough-laughing with doorway leaners. As I parked, one smiled & waved, then went into a room. 

The motel itself was freckled with random paint-patches of off-tint beige as if impulsive blots of just-enough to cover something up while running out of time.

In the lobby, the desk clerk, a teenager garbed in 1980’s 40-year-old IT tech, was plugged between a computer, a cell & a tablet. He pulled his buds, asked for my ID & said he’d be right back, disappearing through a wooden sliding door. He returned a few seconds later followed by another teen, this one slippered in full soccer uniform knee-high socks, who tapped on the computer keyboard without speaking, then went back & slid the door closed. 

	Across the street from the motel, a restaurant advertised itself as a catfish/chicken place. 

The interior was decorated with deer taxidermy & a deep-diver’s suit suspended by the helmet, hanging in a corner, limp like it was floating, dead. A teenaged boy with part of a green tat peeking from the edge of his logoed T-shirt sleeve asked for my order. Behind him were two teen girls leaning on a counter & scrolling on their phones. He gave me a small stand with a laminated number card to put on my table, then turned & walked over towards the girls. 

Beer was ordered at a pass-through manned by a larger teen.

There were two dining rooms. The first was half full, quiet & with a large fish tank against a wall & an elderly waitress slowly attending. It was silent except for tableware clicking & chewing sounds. The second room had an adjoining bar, chatty smacking families & five TVs of various sports. I opted for the noise. 

The teenager who brought my order glanced around the dining room like he was lost & walked off without saying anything. 

I looked down at the plastic plate of strangely small catfish fillets & a malformed biscuit, only partially developed, lukewarm.

The teens behind the register shushed themselves after a quick burst of laughter. The beer teen leaned to look out from the pass-through. 

	Back at the motel parking lot. Nightfall. Overlit. The eighties-teen slipped a backpack strap off a shoulder & climbed into an idling minivan. The rest of the property appeared lifeless, but in my room, the shadows of footsteps occasionally broke in below high-water curtains as they passed, sometimes with a cough.

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