“Of course” Bransen replied, “Whatever you think, Dave.”

The rest of Bransen’s concerns, paranoid thoughts, and fears were left unsaid, and Dave had his own concerns as they got closer to New York. He stayed awake for the next hour, keeping an eye on the signs, and making sure that the driver wasn’t going to pass out or anything. He suspected that something was bothering the man, but in their situation, he wasn’t exactly surprised by such. When they pulled up to a dirty-looking motel, Dave heard his companion mutter a rather depressing thoughts. Dave regarded him for a moment before exiting the car, before giving a small nod. “Perhaps.” He said, certainly looking too thoughtful regarding Bransen’s suggestion. Dave opened the door, and then turned back to Bransen, realizing that his words might not have come across with good intentions. “Not literally… just… you might have something there…” He trailed off as he got out. “I’ll take care of the room, if you want to grab our stuff.” He suggested. 

As he mentioned to Bransen, he wasn’t literally considering killing himself, or encouraging Bransen to do the same. Instead, he was thinking about faking their deaths. It was difficult, but if it could throw off Hawtholders’ trail for a little while, it would buy them some time. An old friend came to mind, a girl named Cindy. A former goth chick, Cindy never really got over her fascination with the deal. As far as Dave knew, she still wore way too much black eye-liner, and destroyed her naturally blonde hair by dying it [i]as black as my soul[/i] she used to say. She was always weird, but she had helped him out a few times, and she had a boss who purchased drugs from some of his associates. He never noticed when things seemed to be misplaced. Hell, Dave remembered Cindy telling him that she was sure her boss was doing some shit on the black market with some of the John Does that came in. It was a flickering thought, but one that Dave could certainly put some more time into. Unfortunately, it would mean that they needed to spend more time in New York. Perhaps he needed to run more details by Bransen—and that was [i]if[/i] Cindy was still around/in this business/willing to help/in possession of decent John Doe’s to use.

Taking a bit of the trash out of the car with him, Dave made his way to the office. There wasn’t anyone in the office, naturally, and Dave thought about just going through the office until he found keys to a room, but the last thing he wanted was the cops pounding down the door first thing in the morning and arresting them because they had stolen a room. He hit the stupid bell a few times until a man stumbled out of one of the back rooms. As the door opened, “Africa” by Toto was heard, slowly drowning until it was muffled when the door shut. He reeked of marijuana, was eating a churro, and his eyes were extremely bloodshot. “I need a room for the night.” Dave said. 

“Sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus under the Serengeti, my brutha.” He said, grinning from ear to ear. 

“Okay…” Dave said slowly, wishing momentarily that they had just parked and slept in the car somewhere. He did not have the patience to deal with this shit. “Do you have any with two beds?” He asked.

“Mhmmm…. If you like the company of rats.” He said, still grinning.

“Do you…have any rooms that don’t have rats?” Dave said, his fingers closing around the counter until his knuckles began to turn white. 

“Yeaaaaaa….. MAN!” He said, and Dave began to realize that this guy had no idea what the hell he was even asking. 

“How much is a room?” Dave asked, changing the subject.

“How much…how much difference in the world can one person’s life make?” He asked, his eyes widening. He turned his head a bit, in awe, and noticed the churro in his hand. He slowly took another bite, and turned towards his guest as the man spoke again.

“That is a good question. So I pose this—How much difference in the world is the cost of one more room going to make?” He asked, feeding into this man’s obviously drug-induced state. “I mean…it isn’t like the money disappears. It’s still there. It just goes from me to you to the drawer… It doesn’t make any difference at all, really.” As Dave spoke, the man behind the counter began to nod, completely agreeing with the bullshit that Dave was spouting. Dave continued, going on about the dollar was just a symbol, a picture, and any picture, worth a thousand words, could have more value than that unchanging dollar. “How about this? I will draw you a picture—something unique and separate from the monotony and bullshit of pennies and dimes, and then you can just give me the key.” He said. “Then I can give it back tomorrow, and there will be balance.” He suggested. It was difficult for Dave to act so laid-back regarding things, but he knew how to speak to someone on drugs, and he knew how to use them to get what he wanted. A minute later, Dave exited the office, room key in hand. He had no idea if it was a two-bedroom with rats, a one-bedroom, or what, and he didn’t much care. The churro-eating night clerk went back to the room playing Toto, cradling his doodle of a dinosaur like it was worth a million dollars. 

Dave caught up with Bransen, and made his way to the room. Fortunately, the key had been labeled. “I have good news and bad news.” He said as he put the key in the door. “The bad news is that this room might have rats… The good news is that it was free.” He said, grinning as he opened the door to the motel room.

It actually…wasn’t nearly as bad as Dave had been expecting. He didn’t see any rodents scurrying away, or poop on the floor. Some parts of the room had a bit of dust on them, but it wasn’t disgusting by any means. “You know,” Dave said, turning on the lights as he walked in. “I think we should invest in some sleeping bags.” He said lightly. Dave had roughed it quite a few times, but since they were consistently staying in shitty dives, it might be nice to have a somewhat clean area in which they could sleep and feel like not everything was dirty and disgusting. Dave used the restroom, just washing up briefly before he sat on the edge of the bed, checking his own bandage. It wasn’t bad, but he wasn’t going to let it breathe for the night here. “How’s your foot?” He asked after putting a clean bandage on his own wound.