Re: Gotham: Penny & Jake & Clem
[Jake wanted to talk even less about the hotel than he did about his father and that was right on up there, with the fumbling on the point in the backseat of his truck with the girl he'd called his half the last year of high school, and the paints that smelled thickily in the little room in back. Thinking about how he wound up here came with it thoughts of men and women with flesh like melted candle-wax, who groaned and shuffled with fetid breath and a reach that splattered like ripe fruit over the windscreen.
Jake went a little green at the edges, yellowed some at the corners of the mouth and dodged the question right away.] I like this place fine. [Shuttered: the look of lively wakefulness closed right the hell off, doors slamming. He held onto his coffee like he was scared to put it on down, and he leaned toward the door, away from the counter with a look toward the bathroom like Clem was saving grace, sweet and low and straight on from church.]