Chapter 4: The Viewing
I'm still thinking about sneaking up for a peek into the window when movement on the stairs below distracts me. It is growing dark now, and the parking lot lights are doing more work than the last little bits of sunlight. I see the sheen on the female passenger's dark hair, first. She's coming up the staircase. She's on her phone, too, talking softly. Too softly to hear. She's slender, and she makes no noise as she walks down the walkway towards our window.
At first I think that she won't notice. She doesn't seem to. But her head swivels, suddenly, at the last minute, like she's been caught on a fishing line. Her feet keep moving, though, and she disappears around the corner. A few seconds later she is back, her phone in her pocket, and she approaches the window in the dark, looking around in the night for other people who might see her. She doesn't see anyone watching her as she sneaks up to the open window.
It's hard to read her expression at this distance. It might be amusement. You never know, with other women. There was one woman, at a Motel 6, who watched through the window with her boyfriend in silent interest; I remember her, and another who knocked on the glass while her boyfriend waved and made a scene, until hotel security arrived and made sure we closed the blinds. Some people can't stand other women hogging the attention. They can make trouble, or make a scene. It's like their version of upstaging.
This woman doesn't upstage, at least not in the moment. She looks in--then around at the walkway, then down at the parking lot, where I am watching from the car--and then back in, where Cathy is doing whatever she is doing, and presumably doing it naked.
Then she leaves. She disappears, back around the corner, where the athletes have gone, to deliver whatever message the coach wanted delivered. I assume she's with the coach. His girlfriend, maybe, or probably his wife. Probably, I guess, they are part of a college team traveling to an event, or training for something. I don't really know. But when I tell the story in the future, I decide, this is a college team and coach. It's close enough.
Maybe she's his coaching assistant, and she has her own room, or she's sharing a room with the coach. She's probably not sharing a room with the three athletes, either way. Or maybe she is. Maybe they're smoking and drinking and having sweaty group sex at that very moment, I think. Probably not. But maybe. Maybe right now is the moment to slip up to the room and peek in.
Maybe Cathy will notice me and unlock the door.
But then the walkway is filled with people. The woman returns first, followed by the guys, all three of them. It's a little parade. Only the coach is missing. They’re all laughing about something. They amble as a group to our window, where they stop and cluster along the railing like they belong there. Like it's their room.
I crack my car window an inch. The humid night air rushes in, carrying the distant grind of a semi on the highway, and the dull chorus of crickets. Underneath that, I hear them. Their voices are a murmur of low conversation, punctuated by sudden, sharp barks of laughter. I can’t make out a single word.
There's no way Cathy can't hear them.
The tallest one points a thumb toward the glass, saying something that makes the woman shake her head and grin. They are all looking in, their bodies angled toward the spectacle of my wife. Every once in awhile someone casts a backward glance toward the parking lot, like they remember they're in public, but they have confidence in their numbers. Nobody is watching.
One of the guys, the one who’d carried all the bags, pulls his phone from the pocket of his sweatpants. He doesn’t try to hide it. He simply raises it, screen glowing against his face, and holds it steady toward the window. The woman beside him nods, then digs in her own pocket. Her phone comes up, a smaller, sleeker silhouette. I don't if they're filming or talking pictures, but they hold the phones steady.
My breath catches in my throat.
Are they documenting this to report her? Will those images appear on some forum, or get texted to a dozen friends with a crude caption? Maybe they’ll just keep them, a private trophy from a road trip. The different possibilities twist a dozen different feelings into a dizzy, nauseated knot.
I text her. 'Everything okay?'
There's no answer.
They linger for several minute, a little committee of spectators. The woman puts away her phone first. Eventually so does the other guy. Then, as if on some silent agreement, they turn and continue toward the stairs, their laughter fading as the two photographers descend to the room below, and the other two return to room above.
The walkway is empty again, just the rectangle of our window glowing against the stucco
I text her again. Just a question mark. '?'
No answer.
I wait five minutes. Ten.
My hand is still in my pants. I am squeezing my cock a little. I have half a boner now. I'm kneading myself like dough. Slowly. For all I know, this could take all night. She's not responding. She might really mean to leave me out here awhile.
From down below, one of the athletes emerges from the coach's room and starts climbing the stairs. He's alone. He looks around as he ambles down the walkway. He pauses for a little bit by the yellow window and the blue flickering lights. He's not the one who had his phone out before, but he gets his phone out now. He doesn't take long. Probably he's just snapping a couple of photos for himself. He changes angles a couple of times at the window, lifting his arm up high and shifting his feet. Then he's gone, back to his room and his friends.
I can't take this.
I have to see.