The first few evenings he’d cleaned out an old office that stood apart from the rest of the bungalows. The front of the building was lined with dirty windows with a long counter separating the lobby area from the back storage and living quarters. A tiny, windowless bedroom and bath ran across part of the back. The living quarters were barely wide enough to fit a full bed, but it was bigger than his cell had been. Originally, in the ’50s, this place had been a motel, boasting that every cabin had a kitchen, bath and sun porch. Eventually, the sun porches had been enclosed to make living rooms, and the bungalows had been rented by the month. Oil field workers and seasonal farmhands had taken over the place, but the owner had never bothered repairing any of the buildings. Finally, he’d let them sell to pay his back taxes. Cap had told him the school board bought them in the ’90s, planning to offer discount housing to new teachers for the first two years in the county school system.
