Six blocks south there was a room. It smelled of cremated hamburger cause that's what burned there earlier and smells didn't have nowhere to go. Sounds? Well, there was the ticking of a clock, the wheezing of a busted cistern, the pings of dumb insects butting the light bulb outside, and fat Waldo's watery snoring.
It was some time after three and the quietest time the room ever had. The late drunks and ragers and sex maniacs in the rooms around was all unconscious at last. The wife slappers was slapping other men's wives in their dreams. The bratty kids was smiling sweet like they'd never made no one miserable.
It'd be another 200 minutes before the morning sounds woke up; the throat clearing and screaming, the slamming, crashing, rocking and rolling, motors roaring, glasses smashing, Crispies snap, crackle and popping, coffee bubbling, and miserable babies warbling. Course, that was all other folks' business, but in a stack of apartments thin as cardboard you minded other peoples' business like it or not.
Waldo was busy dreaming about Mexico again.
He's dancing on a sombrero. His old fat legs are going at it like bee wings. You can't hardly see 'em. There ain't no music far as he can hear but he sure is making a mess of that old sombrero. It don't seem odd to him he'd be dancing on it. Hell, it's Mexico. They all dance on their hats in Mexico, right? Least that’s what he thought.
But then the dream camera pulls back and all around him is this circle of mean looking Mexican hombres with black moustaches under their noses The more he dances, the more he mashes up that sorry sombrero, and fluffs of material start settling on them black mo's. The Mexicans sure don't like that, and one by one they draw these razor knives and …and that was when Waldo pulled the dream emergency cord and bailed out before it was too late.
He was back in his room swimming in sweat. Why did all his Mexico dreams end up like that? He wiped his shiny black face with the pillow. It was still early but there wasn't no way he was going back into that there dream alone. No way. He couldn't work it out. All his awake Mexico dreams was so happy, but his sleeping ones was blacker'n midnight. It didn't figure.
He walked slowly across to the bathroom. He stood himself under the water rose and turned the tap on. Water come out. It's true. That wasn't such a normal thing in Waldo's place. It only happened if you got in there early enough. The brownish water washed away the sweat and the nightmare, and left him feeling as good as he was likely to feel all day.
But he didn't care about nothing. He wouldn't have to put up with all the crap much longer. Two more months and Mexico wouldn't be a dream no more. Two more months.