Carla tried to pull the curtains shut, but they didn't quite meet in the middle. She looked out the sliver of window at the parking lot in the failing light. It was her first night alone.
She'd been planning to leave Bill since December. It was in the shower Christmas morning that she realized that, more than anything in the world, she wanted to end her marriage.
It wasn't that Bill was so bad. He wasn't. He was a decent man with not much to say and little he liked to do. He was a plumber. He liked to drink light beer, never too much, and watch sports on TV. He was a good-enough husband. But 17 years of cooking, cleaning and tidying their childless home had worn Carla down. She couldn't imagine what it would feel like to be excited about anything, anymore.
It was August now, and after scrimping and saving and borrowing, Carla had enough money pulled together for a deposit and two months' rent on an apartment in Albuquerque, 100 miles away.
Her first night, however, was in a Motel 6 just off the highway. She wondered what Bill would think and do when he came home to an empty house, and her note. She'd left him a meatloaf in the fridge, with instructions on baking it. The cleanup, she frowned, he would have to sort out on his own.
A car pulled up outside, the headlights piercing the thin fabric of her curtains. A man's voice, a woman giggling. They're drunk, Carla thought. And then: they're here to screw.
It wasn't a charitable thought, but it was hers and she kept it, holding it loosely. She imagined the couple -- him in his stiff Wranglers, her in a nylon taffeta skirt that clung to her hips, and fake pearls. Maybe she was his secretary. Maybe they'd been thinking about doing this for years, and this was their first night together. Maybe it was romantic love, and they were both so scared they needed to drink too much and act silly.
Carla froze. There were so may possibilities -- for her, for the mystery couple. So much that could happen, so much she didn't know.
So this is what it's like, she thought, to be alive. And one by one, tears began to slip down her cheeks.
Coming up: the bit about the Yellow Chip. :-)
