Little Hidden Darknesses
Eleven:

No matter how much I pushed, pulled, tugged and wiggled, I couldn’t get the trolley back into the utility closet. I removed a broom and chucked it inside, followed by several dusty rags that might’ve been blocking the sides. It still stuck. The damn thing wouldn’t just go in.

“Come on already,” I whined, alas to no use. How the heck did Alejandro get it out in the first place?

I took a moment to steady my breath and air out my collar. My lower back ached from hunching over old Henry’s crummy toilet, and my hair hung in dangles across the sides of my face. One such dangle tickled at my right nostril. I blew at it, but it wouldn’t unstick.

Oh, to hell with this whole situation.

I gave the trolley one final kick with the bottom of my trainer, and it scraped through the door into the closet. The sound sent chills down my back, relieving my itchy skin to some degree. At least my first day on the job was over. My first day as a motel maid.

How thrilling.

Actually, it proved less dismal than I thought. After I had changed old Henry’s linen, vacuumed his carpet and scrubbed his bathroom clean of five types of fungi, he had returned from fixing the electricity to tip me five pounds. Not much, but enough for dinner.

I shut the utility closet – again with several forceful bangs – and dusted off my hands. They reeked of cleaning products, even though I had worn a pair of rubber gloves. It shouldn’t have surprised me, considering everything about the trolley seemed outdated.

The broom was cracked, its bristles frayed, and the sponges had greyish mould all over them. While several cleaning supplies no longer sported labels, I at least identified the bleach.

Thank you mum for making me do chores all those years.

I waited for the corners of my mouth to turn up at the thought of her, but nothing happened. Not even a tickle of warmth in my chest.

It all came down to the room, of course, with all my mum’s twenty-year-old belongings. It baffled me how no one had stumbled upon it sooner. How no one had noticed the key was missing, or the fact that she never checked out. Like they simply forgot about her.

Much like the rest of town.

When I had asked, Alejandro told me the motel had been in his dad’s family for generations. Only his grandparents were dead now, along with his dad – the only three people who could’ve told us anything. Who could’ve told us why they never cleaned the room. And about the note, about the guy who might or might not have read it.

Right now, my chances of replaceing him seemed slim at best. Especially when no one knew anything.

With a sigh lodged in my throat, I padded across the deck to the vending machine next to reception. The sky, which had been gloomy all day, now flourished with pinks and oranges. It felt unreal to think only a day had passed since my arrival here in Creepytown. With everything that had happened – getting kicked out by the Vinsants, hitting my head, my clash with Freya and discovering my mum’s room – it felt like a week had passed.

“A long, terrible week,” I droned to myself.

The vending machine’s soft hum drowned out my thoughts, worries, and replaced them with memories. Memories of a hospital waiting room and the smell of saline and coffee. Of returning to the bedside of an old woman wearing your mum’s name around her wrist.

With a lump in my throat, I removed a handful of coins from my pocket. My eyes scanned the limited selection of brands. For the first time since that morning, my stomach rumbled. Hunger washed over me, the most normal sensation I had experienced in a while.

But the Perez Motel wasn’t cheap. 50p for a chocolate bar. 60p for a can of orange soda. Well, when in Rome.

I bought the chocolate first, followed by the drink. They dropped into the slot without hassle, and I took them out with a single swoop. Surprisingly, the soda wasn’t even cold.

In fact, the can quickly absorbed my body heat.

I nonetheless popped it in the front pocket of my dress and set off toward my room, ready to rip off this wretched uniform. Just thinking about the lace made me itch, but I withheld myself from scratching. My neck already felt raw from having done so throughout the day.

Didn’t they ever wash these things? I mean, we just went to the laundromat this morning.

In an attempt to distract myself, I peeled the wrapper off the chocolate bar and popped it in my mouth. At first I tasted nothing, but then a strange bitterness reached the back of my throat, followed a waxy sensation on my tongue. Every inch of my face contorted.

I gagged and spat out the chocolate, right onto the tar of the parking lot. It resembled bird poo, a greyish splotch of old chocolate and spit. The worst thing I had ever tasted.

After a moment of rolling my tongue around in my mouth, I reached for the can of soda and opened it. The top clicked, though no whoosh of carbonisation followed. I brought the can to my lips and drank, yet immediately spat it out. This time, my mouth was filled with sour. Sour and a hint of metal.

I scowled and cursed under my breath, my arm pressed to my lips. What the hell was going on?

But then I saw it: the expiration date.

7 November 2000.

Again, about twenty years ago.

For the second time today, I couldn’t help but feel speechless. I could still move, though and ran over to the nearest bin where I chucked the can inside so hard, it rang off the metal.

The chocolate shortly followed, though it didn’t make nearly enough noise to feed my rage. My absolute confusion. Wasn’t anything around here normal? Heck, I’d even settle for new.

I gagged again and spat whatever remained in my mouth into the bin. Yet another brown splotch.

Blop.

“What a charming sight,” said a voice behind me.

Alejandro.

My eyes rolled to the back of my head as I rose and turned – without wiping my mouth. “Good quality stuff you’ve got in the vending machine there. Worth every damn penny.”

Alejandro’s smile vanished. He wore an ironed dress shirt and trousers, complete with his hair fluffed and shined. I suddenly felt filthy and wiped across my mouth. It didn’t help.

“Is something wrong with the stuff you bought?” he asked as if he didn’t expect it at all.

I tried not to sound too rude as I said, “Yea, expired. About twenty years ago, just so you know.”

“Twenty years ago?” Alejandro stepped around me and glanced into the bin. I could tell he had shaved, could smell it as well. Pine and mint, and a hint of his own, natural musk.

My breath thinned and I felt as though I might choke, but then he stepped back and scratched his head. “Boy, that’s strange. I bought a chocolate bar the other day and it was fine.”

“Well, everything I seem to touch around here has something weird to it.” My voice sounded too groggy for my liking, so I forced it to go higher. “So, why are you dressed up like that?”

Alejandro’s cheeks flushed crimson. “Oh,” he said, his upper lip shiny all of a sudden. He wiped it with the back of his sleeve. “I was actually coming over to invite you to dinner.”

“Dinner? Really?”

“Yes. My mother made enchiladas, and since Día de los Muertos is coming up, we’re setting up an altar for my father. I thought you might want to make one for your mother. You know, to get some peace.” A pause. “If you want to, that is. I don’t want to –”

“No,” I interrupted him.

“No?” he asked with droopy brows. “As in, you don’t want to join us?”

I laughed. “No, I mean no as in, you’re not prying. Or pushing. Or whatever you wanted to say.”

“I wanted to say I don’t want to inconvenience you.” Alejandro took a step toward me, the deck groaning under him. The setting sun fell across his face, lighting up his hazel eyes. While they stared right into mine, the gesture didn’t make me at all uncomfortable.

That was, until I realised he had just seen me spit into a bin. “Yea, I’d love to join you. I just need to change real quick, if you don’t mind? This uniform is driving my skin crazy.”

Alejandro swallowed and his Adam’s apple bounced in his throat. “Sure,” he said as he stepped back, “just don’t take too long. We’ve got to be done eating before the fog rolls in.”

“Alejandro,” I said, “you know I don’t care about the fog.”

“I know.” He started to reverse, clapping his hands together. “But my mother doesn’t know that. And unless you want her to fire you for sorcery, you better pretend to be normal.”

I smiled as he said that, then turned around and strode to my room. Suddenly I didn’t care about the itching, or the fact that my mouth still tasted as though I just drank dishwashing liquid. All I cared about was his last words. You better pretend to be normal. All my life, I had never felt anything less than normal. Ever since I arrived here, though …

Was Alejandro right? Was I the freak, the weirdo?

No.

I wasn’t the problem here.

The problem was the fog. The fog, the Vinsants, the motel, the town, the room, and the vending machine. The problem was the fact that something around here didn’t add up.

Perhaps old Bill was right, and the island really was cursed.

Cursed or not, though, I intended to replace out the truth, even if that meant I had to scrub toilets for a year. Two years, even. Eira Vinsant never backed away from a challenge.

Especially when there were enchiladas involved.