Page 34 of The Monster of Hotel No. 7
He still doesn’t move.
The humming coalesces with my pulse beating inside my brain.
Then he lunges again, jumping over the glass, and I know now is not the time for talking. Maybe there never will be such a time, with him.
Grief wells up inside of me as I think it, turning my back to him at the same moment, forcing myself to run away, even though I want to stay.
I shoot through the dark cutaway in the wall, and I hear him follow, his steps hushed and quick.
He knows this space better than I do. His legs are longer. And the brief glimpse I caught of his torso in the penthouse suite, I know he’s in good shape. I walk a lot and do some yoga here and there but I don’t know if that’s going to save me now.
I throw one hand out to sense upcoming obstacles, wishing I hadn’t dropped my fucking flashlight, and keep running in the frigid dark. My lungs expand and contract rapidly, my toes hitting the cement softly, heels popping back up quickly.
I don’t know where I’m going.
I don’t even want to run from him.
But he isn’t speaking, he’s trying to attack me, he wants me back on the bed.
He wishes for me to be the patient.
Him the doctor.
He needs the power.
He has to have the control.
I can’t talk to you this way,he said.
Because he needs to know I won’t run? Or hurt him? I feel like I’ve already proven the last one. But here I am, doing the first.
Then again, he left two years ago. He ran from me, too.
I keep going, pushing deeper into the darkness, and my shoulder bumps the wall. It’s like everything is narrowing around me and I can barely breathe here and there are no lights ahead and maybe this leads nowhere.
He’ll trap me here. I’ll die under Hotel No. 7.
The princess of Writhe, so stupid she ran with her murderer into the arms of her own death.
But as I continue onward, perspiration forming under my hairline, along the backs of my exposed thighs, I wonder if I would mind it so much. To have our story whispered in the same way only his was, before.
I want to live it, though. Even if we run away together and they talk about us, I want to live through it. I want toknow him.
I sense him growing closer, tearing apart my darkened fairytale thoughts.
His shadow drops over mine, even here in the dark.
A cry or whimper orsomethingleaves my lips, the moment before his hand slams down over my mouth.
His arm latches across my waist, jerking me forcefully into him. But we keep going, the way we had so much forward momentum. My fingers reach for his forearm, this time to pry him off, but he twists us so we pivot in the dark and I realize there is a small glow ahead.
We stumble forward into another room.
This one is far more primitive. Dirty floors, wires in the ceiling, the glow is from a macabre sort of nightlight pushed into an exposed outlet, a heavy black box beside it that looks both innocent and ominous at once.
And there’s a chair, like for a dentist.
Large and imposing with so many beige straps and silver buckles, I know I couldn’t fight my way out of it.
