The receptionist slides on her glasses, turns around and looks at the wall of room keys. She plucks one from a line of hooks labeled "Second Floor".
"Here you go, deary. Enjoy your stay. Try not to make too much noise. Okay?", she says with a wink and a smile.
The man rolls his eyes at her remark and grabs the girl's wrist. They walk to the nearest elevator which has a piece of paper taped to the doors that read "Out of Order."
"Of course it is.", he says as he looks around for the stairs. "Come on. There has to be some way to get up there just in case bull shit like this happens."
He continues to search up and down the ghost town of a motel. It looked like it had not been cleaned in forever. Much less stayed in. They cautiously walked down the hallway. Keeping their eyes open for the staircase. The hallway seemed to get less and less illuminated, but there was still enough light for them to see. And also enough light to cast eerie and creepy shadows on the walls. Walk through the dimly lit hallway felt almost like a haunted Halloween house. Always in anticipation of something popping out of the darkness to scare him. Except, this felt way more real.
At the end of the hall, there was a hanging sign with a flickering light above it. It said "Second Floor This Way" with an arrow pointing towards the flight of stairs
"Finally.", the man says as they start climbing their way up. Getting closer and closer to their destination. The second floor is surprisingly cleaner than the first. Even though it still gave the man chills walking to their door. He looks down at the door key. It says the number "217". He looks at a door about three rooms down from where the stairs were that was labeled with the same number.
"Well, that must be it.", he says as they start to walk towards their room.
As he hesitantly reached for the doorknob, he felt a shiver slowly travel up his spin as if it was warning him of something on the other side. Even the girl with a little shaken by the tension of the moment. The man could feel her grip tighten on his arm as he began to gradually open the door. They finally take a look inside. And there was nothing there. It's just a dirty motel room. The man sighed with relief and walked into the room.
"At least it's not a complete mess.", he says as he examines the room.
As he does so, he notices that there is only one queen size bed.
"Oh crap! I don't want to share a bed with this girl! She's a total stranger!" he starting to panic a bit trying to think of something to fix this problem.
He looks over at the girl. She is still acting like a clueless child, looking around and checking everything out like it was her first being in a cheap motel. He sighs and thinks to himself, Well, what's the worst she can to do to me? He turns around and takes a look at the bed. The fairly large queen size bed was covered with two sets of sheets. One is a bit thicker than the one under it. Then over those was a huge comforter that draped over all of the sides of the bed. From just looking at it, it seemed to pretty clean and well kept. But when the man reached down to feel the comforter, it told a different story. What he felt consisted of dirt, dust and a damp, moist substance that didn't really need any more investigation. He picks up his hand and cringed at it before wiping it on his pant leg. He grabbed the comforter with two fingers and flings it off the bed and kicks it into the corner of the room next to the bedside table.
After quickly wiping his hands on his pants, he looks back at the girl as she's in the bathroom playing with the water fossett. He sighs and pulls his cell phone out of his left front pants pocket. He looks down at it and sees that he has missed five calls from his manager. He gasps and looks back at the girl.
"I've got to make a call. Okay?"
She looks at him and cocks her head looking unsure of what he meant, but he makes the call with no other explanation for telling her it. He looks back at his phone, goes to his missed calls and selects "Redial" next to his manager's number. He then puts it to his ear and listens to it ring. He finally hears another voice at the other end of the line.
"Hey, Jim. It's David. Yeah yeah. I know it's been 3 days since I've been in the office, but I'm on- I mean was on a case but- Yeah I lost it. So I was on my way back, but I had a bit of a um situation. It- It's complicated. But I promise I'll make it back in time before the- Wait. What do you mean don't bother?! Hello? Jim? Damn it!", he curses as he roughly presses the hang up button on his phone and then shoves it back into his left pant pocket.
David opened the door to the motel room and walked back in to see the girl lying on the bed still and motionless. He was startled to be this and dashed over to her side to see if anything was wrong. She was just asleep. She was actually completely passed out. He shook her a bit to see if she would wake up, but she didn't. She just laid there on her back with head halfway on a pillow. Her face had a peaceful expression, that told David she was done with this hectic day of confusion. David took the covers and pulled them over her body. He laid down on the other side of the bed, still fully clothed. He just laid there with his hands crossed underneath his head looking up at the ceiling. Wondering what the next day might bring.