The Evergreen Motel by Marc Layton

Author:Marc Layton [Layton, Marc]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-11-04T22:00:00+00:00

I let the memory play once, twice, three times in my head, before I slapped myself in the face, the only way I knew I could make the images stop. Sometimes, the memory repeated on a continuous loop in my head, like some deranged movie I couldn’t stop watching. Only that movie was my life.

I got shakily to my feet and tip-toed towards the shared wall of our two rooms. Cautiously, I leaned forward again, pressing my ear up against the dark wood paneling. I listened intently for any sign of human life. I couldn’t hear any blare of the television, no sound of footsteps. The room beside mine felt empty and still. I felt my body slowly start to relax.

And then a scream, shrill and terrified, radiated from the other side of the wall. As if someone had known precisely where I stood, and had placed their mouth, just so, on the other side.

I fell back from shock but recovered quickly, pointing the .38 at the wall where my face had been moments before. It took me four attempts to unlock the safety, my fingers were shaking so badly. I was absolutely certain that the scream I had just heard had not come from any television or radio.

I was also sure, just as I had been before, that it had been a female who screamed. Was it possible that Kyle had kidnapped someone, a random bystander, caught in the middle of our abhorrent game? He could use her to get me to comply. Kyle knew that I would willingly give myself up if it meant saving an innocent life. He was potentially capable of doing something like this.

Yet, why was it that I only heard her? He hadn’t yelled, hadn’t shouted any commands. I didn’t hear any struggling. It was nothing more than a disembodied voice in an otherwise empty room.

The thought should have terrified me. As it was, the only relief I could manage to feel was that whoever was deciding to torture me in this moment wasn’t Kyle. This was a new, unrelated problem.

Uncontrollable laugher began to bubble up from my gut as I sat down on the bed. What, exactly, was I saying? That I now had a ghost haunting me, in addition to a crazed former lover? I laughed even harder, feeling tears begin to form at the corners of my eyes. Somewhere along the course of my demented night, I had inadvertently become hysterical. There was no other reasonable explanation for my thoughts. My fears had begun to emerge as auditory manifestations, and I knew the only way to make them go away was to sleep. Both my body and my brain needed to recharge. To say my nerves were shot felt like an enormous understatement.

Inspiration struck me as I glanced around the room. With gritted teeth, I walked to the nearest dresser and began to push it along the sullied carpet. It protested slightly, but the empty drawers made it relatively easy to shift.

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