Incredulous. You have come here to while away the week in a plastic room with exposed beams, incinerator-green carpet. Ice machine just down the hall. While away the hours beside the kidney-shaped swimming pool encircled by a neon circus ring flashing the highway. Incredible, really, you here on the Fabulous Strip. Incognito. Damifino how you came to lie. To lie here in the plastic chair in your white bikini. The one with pink bows tied at the hips. To lie, slick and oiled, under the desert heat at the Desert Isle Motel—lie, away from the hoi polloi, whiling away the days. Indolent. Luscious. Drinking an inky cocktail with lime. You watch the flow of people: inglorious gigolos and the brittle heiresses they beguile, high-rollers from Seville, dentists from Iowa City, Louisville. Peroxide women click by on stilettos, headed for fine dining and to while away the evening at a dinner show, their conversation unintelligible. Are you into it? Do you feel it? Are you getting your Vegas on? Damifino, you whisper as you slip back inside your deluxe refrigerated unit at the Desert Isle.

Bio: Lynn Pattison