Rike a Virgin

Walking into the Perry Iowa Best Western Motel after day one at the pig processing plant, we became acutely aware of our stench and general filthiness.  We could see and hear people reacting.  Some were fighting the urge to vomit.  Others were simply blinking their eyes in obvious discomfort.  Actually, I was kind of surprised that there was any reaction at all.  I knew we smelled like Iowa, but I had figured Iowans would be used to it.  I guess the workers at the Best Western were from out of state. 

Soon enough, it would all be over.  We’d check in and get cleaned up before dinner (supper in Iowa). 

The Company had booked our rooms ahead of time.  We agreed to all get washed up and meet in the hallway 30 minutes hence to go get some dinner.  Dean said he would just order room service and let us two lovebirds have a nice romantic dinner (supper) to ourselves.    That was fine with Boomer and me.  If I haven’t mentioned it, I hated Dean.  Not as bad as I hated Beth, but pretty bad.  Beth was my manager at Wendy’s when I worked there in High School.  I was not fond of her.  She was greasy.

 

It had never felt so good to get clean.  I scrubbed myself into absolute squeekiness, turning the shower water as hot as my sunburned arms and neck could possibly stand.  I shaved my face to “3 day” length, cologned, and put on my best Don Johnson kit.  I was ready for whatever nightlife Perry Iowa could provide.  “Look out Iowa foxes, here comes the Cube!”  I winked, clicked my tongue and pointed my index finger in a shooting motion toward the steamed up mirror of the room.

Boomer met me in the hall dressed in his normal lumberjack attire and we started to walk toward the front desk when Boomer noticed Dean’s door was not quite closed.  We wanted to quietly slip by, but then we smelled it.  The odor coming from the slightly cracked open door was hideous.  It was hard to believe we’d smelled like that all day.  I was relieved to be horrified by the stench as it was evidence of no long term damage to my sense of smell.  There was something else though.  Mixed in with the horrible pig smell was a faint hint of alcohol.  A stale odor with a putrid sweetness of some sort of whisky.

 

“Let’s just go,” I said to Boomer who was approaching Dean’s door to listen in. 

Boomer said, “Hang on, you hear that?”

I leaned toward the opening and heard a rapid clicking sound.  My imagination told me it was the cylinder of a revolver being spun as in a game of Russian Roulette.  I looked at Boomer who pushed the door open.  The full force of the poop and liquor smell hit my Old Spice full on.  The Old Spice didn’t have a prayer.  The room was completely dark.  The clicking of the gun cylinder was the only sound. 

“You boys need something?” came the craggy old voice of our fearless leader. 

“Just checking to make sure you don’t want to join us for din – uh supper,” Boomer said.

Looking into the room I still couldn’t see anything.  Then I saw the orange glow in the corner of the room of Dean’s cigarette as he took a drag.  It partially lit up his weathered old face as he said, “No, I won’t be needing any supper where I’m going.”

Boomer and I didn’t know what to say.  It seemed like something was seriously bothering Dean.  Was he planning on killing himself?  Just to be safe I said, “Ok then.  See you tomorrow!”  and tried to get the hell out of there as Boomer switched on the light just inside the door.

Looking into the room, we saw Dean sitting in the corner, halfway through a bottle of Jim Beam.  He was looking at a small black gun he held in his hand.  He really was thinking about killing himself.  “Turn the damn light out, morons!” Dean yelled waving the gun around, but pointing it low so it wouldn’t have hit us if it went off.  Boomer complied and I turned to go.  “That is frickin’ crazy,” I said as we got out of earshot of Dean’s door.  “Boomer?  Oh shit.  C’mon I’m hungry,” I said to no one in particular as I realized Boomer had gone into Dean’s room.

“I’ll, uh, just be down at the lounge, then!”  I yelled back into the room.  I wanted no part of whatever was going on.

“Well that was interesting,” Boomer said as he sat next to me at the lounge bar, “You want a light,” he said, sliding his Zippo to me.  Now I was really confused.  Robert Duvall had deftly relieved us of Burt Rasson’s lighter earlier that day.  We knew we’d see it again (we had a little knowledge of the future) but we had no idea it would be so soon.

“Where did you …” I began, but Boomer interrupted.  He insisted we find a place to get some grub.

Turns out there were 2 places to eat dinner near Perry Iowa and one of them was the diner attached to the Best Western.  We just decided to eat there since the desk clerk told us there was a smokin’ hot pop/jazz band playing in the lounge later on.  They had been tearing up the Midwestern Motel lounge scene for a couple of years now.  They had packed the house for the last 3 nights, so if we were looking for action, the Best Western Motel lounge in Perry Iowa was the place to be.

Boomer and I both agreed that that was one of the most ridiculous sentences ever strung together but figured we might as well give the band a chance.  They were called “Hiromi, Takashi and Starr”

At dinner, Boomer told me how he got the lighter back.  He had gone in to make sure Dean was ok.  He wasn’t.  He was actually crazy.  He had tried to convince Boomer that he was Robert Duvall from the future and that today when he saw himself nab the lighter from Boomer’s pocket, he realized he was done.  He was calling it quits. 

“He doesn’t look or sound anything like Robert Duvall.  Even an old Robert Duvall,” I said, “That’s not him.  It’s just crazy old Dean.”

“Look closer at the lighter,” Boomer said.  Oh this wasn’t Boomer’s “Elvis’ Birthday Lighter” named “Burt”.  It said “Mike” on the side and the date stamped on the bottom was “Dec 30, 2362”. Otherwise it looked just like it. 

Boomer told me that Dean insisted he was Duvall, but the time machine he was using was a December one, so there was usually considerable bodily harm to anyone who dared to use it.  He had travelled many times with faulty lighters and the once handsome, charming man had become the hideous creature we knew only as “Dean”.  He had never been able to obtain a lighter earlier than August in the past.  Now that he had the Elvis, his mission was at an end.

“… Then he put a bullet in his head,” Boomer finished.

“Interesting,” I said, cutting into my delicious T-bone, “So does that mean …”

“Yeah, we get tomorrow off,” Boomer confirmed.  This was good news.  If the band was as good as the clerk seemed to think, we were in for a treat.

Note:  The band really was Japanese and they really did do these songs.

The Best Western Clerk had a different idea of “Packed house” than we did.  There were maybe 20 people in there.  Plenty of places to sit.  Boomer and I chose a big round Table right next to the stage.  Actually, the sound wasn’t bad.  The music was of a relatively high quality.  The only problem was the lead singer had a heavy Japanese accent. I also don’t think she actually knew the real words to the songs.  Her first song was Madonna’s “Borderline” But when she sang it, it sounded like this:

“Border-rhine, fears rike I trying to ruse my mind …”etc.

Granted, it’s probably better than the actual lyrics, but Boomer and I enjoyed it enough to sing along. 

Next, and probably because Ringo Starr was the drummer, they did “Help!”  By the Beatles.  Which went like this:  “Herp me if you can I fearing down.  I do appreciate you been around.”

But seriously, even though we were laughing at them and they were a Top 40 band playing on a Tuesday at a Best Western in Perry Iowa, they were pretty good despite the heavy accent.  I got the feeling that they might have noticed our laughing hysterically at them, since we were sitting about 4 feet from them, so I decided to go tell them what I thought of their act.  

After the show, I went up to Takashi, the guitarist and told him I really enjoyed the show.  “Yeah, pretty good,” is all he said as he bowed his head in defeat and walked sadly away, sniffing quietly to himself.