Malibu Motel

by Chaunceton Bird

  “Aren’t we all.”

  Sam smiles, then looks forward, aware that maybe he came on too strong. We sit through the rest of the half-hour sermon, then file into the cafeteria. Sam stays next to me as we wait in line, then continues his bombardment.

  “Caish, genuinely though, religion is bullshit. Think about it. It’s all so obvious from the outside looking in. The preacher man commands the respect of a demigod, encourages capacity for illusion, then declares obedience and faith in illusion to be virtuous. And it’s his own virtue that he’s displaying by standing up in front of the crowd with his smugness and contentedness living the chaste life.” The line is long and Sam seems to be enjoying this, so I don’t interrupt, I just nod along. Now that we’re standing, I can get a look at Sam. He’s probably in his midforties, around 6’3,” and as thin as a pin. He has scraggly hair and beard, but doesn’t have the same look of senility that many of his peers so evidently display. He’s wearing dirty clothes and a black beanie. He twitches when he talks. His left leg looks like it is receiving random shocks of electricity while he talks, and it looks like an invisible string pulls his head to the left at random times. He blinks violently.

  “... the individual is encouraged to think of themselves as empowered, ordained, and destined for grand purpose,” Sam is saying, “this capitalizes on humans’ disposition to obedience and compliance. Humans harbor fear and dread of death. Religion has effectively relegated the fear to the subconscious. But it’s still there. A paralyzing fear of the end. Religion offers catharsis. It tells them that they’ll survive their own death. Not only that, it gets better after they die. ‘This life,’ as they call it, is the hard part. Religion absorbs the dread. Like a dry sponge of hope in a puddle of panic. Because of this, the religion is effective in proportion to the amount of complexity, certainty, and sincerity it can project. The more complex the dogma, the more convinced the sheep. Of course, this product comes with a price. Some religions ask for what you can spare, others ask for an absolute ten percent of patrons’ income and create social structures and status symbols out of the payment of tithes. Membership fees of tens of thousands of dollars that patrons can either pay, or be shamed by their flock and guilted by their imaginary god. But the price is much higher than money...”

  We are at the front of the line now. We hold out our trays and the people on the other side of the glass plop slop into the recessed plastic sections. The food doesn’t look horrible, all things considered. Some sort of meat, probably ham, with a scoop of mashed potatoes on top, slathered in gravy. Green beans, packaged peach slices, a roll, lettuce, an apple. There’s even a little chocolate brownie. At the end of the line we’re given a water bottle. I see an empty seat, but decide to find a place with two empty spots. I don’t want Sam to feel like I’m ditching him just because he’s crazy and has a twitch.

  “... the ideological trap of superstition binds the mind to unquestionable answers to questions that would otherwise provide a lifetime of growth and productivity.”

  I sit at an empty spot near the door. This place reminds me of my elementary school. The only thing that’s missing are those tiny cartons of milk. They would never give us enough milk. And they’d stamp my hand when I was behind on my lunch money. One stamp, two stamps, three stamps, and then they’d stamp my forehead so even if I forgot to tell my mom, she’d see that I was out of lunch money.

  Sam was still talking. “... entrenchment in religious thinking dulls capacity for critical thought. The religious, in an attempt to rid themselves of the anxieties associated with the certainty of death and mediocrity, cash in their critical thinking for conformity, complacency, and the bliss only ignorance can buy. Death is terrifying, but convincing oneself that death is avoidable ignores everything we know about the universe. We will not survive our death.” Sam bit into his roll.

  “Wow,” I say, “sounds like you’ve really given it some thought.”

  “I’m not done.”

  “Well, maybe for tonight? You’ve given me a lot to process.”

  “But you need to know. We all need to know. We need to rid the world of this pestilence. This cerebral virus.” Sam was devouring his food. His tick either stopped or was lost in the fury of his feasting. “Because, Caish, it is the hope of a god and heaven that is keeping all these people poor.”

  “You included?”

  “Huh?”

  “I said, you included? Is the hope of a god keeping you poor?”

  “Oh, me? No. People won’t hire me because I have Tourette’s. I take marijuana to calm my nerves, and employers don’t like that either. They don’t like the weed, and they don’t like my incessant blinking. So my purpose in life is to spread truth and light to those in the menacing shadow of religion.”

  “And what do you think God thinks of that?”

  “Ha! See? You’re caught in the shadow! You are assuming the premise that there’s a god.”

  “Of course there’s a god,” I say.

  “Have you been listening to anything I’ve been saying?”

  We went on like this for all of dinner, and into the evening. He followed me to my bunk and took the bed next to mine. Propped up on his shoulder, he explained again to me how the more complex the preacher can make the religion’s doctrine, the more likely the religion is to survive. If the only piece of dogma was that an all-powerful magic being exists, it would fall like Santa. The illusion of complexity encourages the masses to consider such complex rule and dogma structures as beyond the ability of a human to conceive. Further, the more stilts of doctrine used to prop up the religion, the more likely the religion will be to withstand the rising tide of external scrutiny. All the while, Sam is twitching like a jumping bean.

  At some point in Sam’s anti-homily I drift off. I wake up in the night with my foot burning in pain. Hopelessness is sitting on my foot at the foot of my bed. Bigger, darker, with more tentacles and a deeper voice. Its beak clicks as it speaks.

  “Settling in alright?” it asks.

  I don’t answer. I close my eyes but I know it’s there. Waiting. It can’t kill me when there are other people around. The room is dark, but there are nightlights around the edges of the room. The room was filled with wheezing slumbering poor people. All unable to function in society. And then there’s me, a millionaire in their ranks. Like a spy from the upper class to see what the masses are up to.

  “Ha! A spy from the upper class?” Hopelessness screeches. “You are one of them, Caish. You always have been. You were an imposter among the rich. A fluke. This is who you are. Stop denying it. The plot is thinning. You are fucking worthless, Caish.” Its tentacles tighten. “Ah, feels good doesn’t it? The truth, that is. You are worth less than the clothes you are wearing. Truth, truth, truth. Speaking of which, ol’ Sam here seems to be on to something. Death being the end and all. Won’t that be nice? The peaceful darkness of death snuffing out your worthless existence.”

  I don’t have my phone or headphones anymore, so I have nothing to drown out Hopelessness. I look around the room. Looking for anything that could help. The darkness was drowning me. One of Hopelessness’s tentacles slides across my face. “Shhhhh,” it whispers. Its beak, dripping blood, is less than an inch from my ear. “The only way out is death. We both know it.”

  I’m shaking, sweating, and can’t take a deep breath. I’m leaking tears. The darkness fills my lungs.

  “Scared?” Sam asks. He’s propped up on an elbow looking over at me.

  “Yeah.”

  “First night in a shelter?”

  “Um. Yeah.”

  “Hey, it’s alright. It’s alright.” He sits up, then kneels next to my bed. He finds my hand and takes it. Holds it with both of his grizzled, sticky hands. “You’re safe. Everything is going to be alright.”

  “How is everything going to be alright? Look at me. I have nothing. I am nothing.” Embarrassingly, I can’t stop the sobs. I keep them quiet, but I’m overcome with the terror that this is who I am now.
This is how the rest of my existence will be. But, with Sam patting my shoulder, I feel marginally better. At least Hopelessness has returned to Hell for the time being.

  “Let’s go for a walk, you up for that?” Sam stands up and helps me to my feet. We were both sleeping in our clothes, so we just slip on our shoes and shuffle out of the sleeping quarters. “We can’t leave the shelter, but we can walk its halls.”

  We walk from one dark hallway to the next. Two graveyard shift volunteers eye us as we walk past their counter. Sam could knife me and leave me for dead in any one of the dark corners, but I trust he won’t. Something about him tells me he’s not a murderer. Godless, sure, but probably not a killer. There’s a gentleness about him.

  “So, how’d you end up here?” Sam asks.

  “That’s a long story.”

  “Plenty of hours left in the night.”

  “It’s a sad story.”

  “Most are. But we gotta find a way to smile about it. Surely there’s something we can laugh about. Let’s hear it.”

  “I wouldn’t even know where to start.”

  “How about at the beginning? Where were you born?”

  I tell Sam everything. Once I start I can’t stop. My upbringing, my adolescence, my lottery win, the failed marriage, my life as a millionaire, the theft of my money by Jamie Fucking Lowell, and the bad luck that has plagued me ever since. Sam nods along, asks questions, and encourages me to give greater detail. Our conversation lasts into the morning and through breakfast. Sam keeps twitching and blinking, but watches me with sincerity.

  “I can understand why things seem dire, coming from where you’ve come from,” Sam says, “but, you’re in Los Angeles. The land of the endless summer and boundless opportunity. And now that you don’t have anything to worry about, you can finally live free. Do you want to sleep on the beach? Do it, it’s yours. You don’t answer to anybody and you have nothing but yourself to lose. So, live freely.”

  Sam shows me the ropes of living on the street. Shelters are fine, sure, but the real living happens on the streets. On the urine-soaked sidewalks. Under the pigeon-filled viaducts. In the jungle of Los Angeles.

  Shelters all have curfews, and many of them have lines so long that there’s not hope of getting in unless you stand there for hours in advance. They fill up, then close their doors. We have no choice but to live off the land. We are the nomads of the metropolis.

  Provisions are easy to come by. There are all sorts of giveaways in the city. Charitable organizations that transfer perfectly good stuff from the rich to the poor. Clothing, bags, tents, sleeping bags, tarps, tools, shoes, and everything else you need to live out here. Food is easy. Soup kitchens are all over the place. You just walk in and take whatever you want. Some places send you on your way with bags full of expired groceries that haven’t yet turned. Sleep is easy once you get used to the ultra-firm support of asphalt and concrete. Always sleep with everything you have in a bag that you use as a pillow. And loop your arm through one of the straps. Anything else goes with you in the sleeping bag.

  The essentials, however, are tougher to come by. Alcohol and cigarettes are never given out at soup kitchens or shelters. Neither are opioids. For those, you need money.

  For all his preaching against money, Sam knew how to get it. Step one: get a stray dog. They’re all over LA, and they’re happy to live with you for a few scraps of food. Step two: wear your worst clothes, pack the good stuff away in your bag. Step three: skip the cardboard sign and hold out a cup. That’s how they do it in Europe and they see much greater success. Step four: be injured. Limp, hunch, cough, and act sore. The fifth and final step is to put them all together in a place where the lower- and middle-class people shop. The upper class won’t give you the shit from their toilet, so don’t waste your time at The Grove or anywhere near Beverly Hills. Go to a Walmart. Shoppers there usually believe in a god and karma and are more likely to use cash when they shop. You’re there to collect the spare change. The dog will do that for you. People are much more likely to give a dog money than a human. Starving humans are repugnant, starving dogs are in need of care and affection.

  A day of work can bring in anywhere from twenty to a hundred dollars. Variables will impact your take; rain helps, another nomad anywhere in sight hurts.

  Cash flow worldwide is down, so Sam and some others set up bank accounts and bought card readers. Now, if anybody says, “Sorry, I don’t carry cash,” Sam says “No problem, I take credit and debit.” I bring in enough to buy a phone and card reader, but I can’t set up a bank account to link it to. Banks want all sorts of information to open an account, and my social security number has debt painted all over it. So I only accept cash. It’s best I stay off grid until I make enough to pay off the debt collectors (I’m sure they’re looking for me).

  Fentanyl is hard to find, but there’s plenty of heroin to go around. And heroin can still make me float. Heroin can banish Hopelessness and help me feel like money used to make me feel. I don’t make enough to use daily, but alcohol and other prescriptions get me through the time between hits.

  Life isn’t so bad on the streets. Plenty of time to reflect. Sam is fascinated by my life as a millionaire. He often asks about the details. What was it like to smell the exhaust of a Lamborghini? What did the inside of a private jet sound like? How heavy is one million dollars in cash? This evening’s conversation is no different. We’re eating Kipper Snacks in Pershing Square and Sam asks me how I got so lucky. That’s how he words it: “How did you get so lucky?” As if it was something that could have simply been got.

  “I earned it,” I respond. “Plain and simple. Hard work. Determination. Grit. Cunning. The same way all rich people make their money.”

  “And how did you lose it?”

  “I didn’t lose my money, it was stolen from me. Remember?”

  Sam smiles, twitches, and drops a piece of smoked herring from his fingers into his mouth. “So whose fault is it that you’re rotting away on the streets instead of snorting lines of coke off of models in your Malibu mansion?”

  I pause and look at Sam to see if he’s serious. Usually he’s not mean, but he can have bouts. He gets embarrassed when his Tourettes get bad and takes it out on others. Maybe this was one of those times. I don’t take offense and give Sam an honest answer: “We’ve talked about this. Jamie T. Lowell. The government. The Marquez family. Bad luck. But, there—oh, and God.”

  “A god took your money?”

  “Well, Jamie and the IRS took most my money, the Marquez family sort of finished me off with that whole lawsuit I told you about. In Pismo. But God is definitely givin’ me a trial.”

  “A trial?” Sam asks. Blinking violently.

  “You know, a tough time to humble me. A test of faith. What doesn’t kill me only—”

  “Yeah. Got it.”

  “Anyway. I know I’ll rise above this someday and come out stronger. Richer. I’ll work at the lottery harder than I did the first time. Did you know that people who win the lottery once are more likely to win a second or third time? There’s this guy in Florida that—”

  “Yeah, won a lot?”

  “Yeah like four times.”

  “Why don’t you just get a job, Caish? You don’t have Tourettes, you’re sane, you’re attractive. Why are you living in the streets?”

  “Because jobs pay you nothing and are for people who don’t know how to make real money. I mean really, Sam, $10 an hour? We make that. And plus, what if Steve Jobs would’ve just gotten a job? I can’t limit myself.”

  “But you’re broke. And you could be making honest money in a McDonalds or something.”

  “Only ‘cause I’m down on my luck. I didn’t do anything to deserve this.”

  “Maybe by doing nothing you earned this.”

  I take a bite of my Kipper Snack and look Sam in the eyes. “I’m tellin’ you, just watch, I’m gonna win again.”

  “But what if you don’t? I mean, what if, and just hear me out o
n this, what if your chances of winning the lottery are, say, one in five hundred million? Then what do you do?”

  “Are you sayin’ you don’t think I can do it?”

  “I’m saying it’s not in your control.” Sam’s arm twitches so hard his Kipper Snack dumps into the grass.

  “Oh, shit, here, have mine,” I offer.

  “No thanks, I was done with it anyway,” Sam says. “Caish, I care for you. I do. But you gotta stop thinking of yourself as a millionaire with magic abilities when it comes to lotto tickets. No, let me finish. You aren’t ever going to win again. Know that. You won’t. Now, think about what you need to do to survive knowing that.”

  Sam was like a father to me these past couple months, but now I see that he is just another hater. He doesn’t hate me, he hates that I’m a rich person in hobo’s clothing. He’s trying to break me down to build up his own self-esteem. This is the end of the adventures of Sam and Caish.

  Sam gives me some speech about helping others and leaves me to go find others he can help. If it weren’t for my stray, Bosco, I would be completely alone. Nobody knows me. Nobody knows what I’d been through, or how much I was worth. To the people of Los Angeles I’m a roach, only worse because I take up more space. Even to my fellow roaches, I’m nobody.

  For all its bright sides, even Los Angeles can be Hell. Demon ridden. Los Demonios.

  Even if Sam is right, and money and I just aren’t meant to be, I have to fight it. When your lover has cancer you don’t just abandon them, you try everything. When they run out on you, you chase them. Let them know you care. I’ll never give up on money.

  More fervently than ever, I pray. As I stand, crouch, hunch, and sit on corners I pray for the Lord to soften the hearts of these my fellow Californians. When I curl up in my sleeping bag under my tarp on 5th street, I pray that the Lord will watch over me as I sleep. “Let me not be the object in a Good Samaritan parable.” But above all, I pray not that the Lord will help me get through the day, but that God will grant me the life back that He took from me. I don’t want merely to survive, I want my house in Malibu back. I pray not for loose change, but for real wealth. And I’ve heard the stories about us needing to put the work in, and only then will God help us out, so, I buy at least one lottery ticket every day. Every day I give God an opportunity to answer my prayers and reward my faith.