Hotel Hillsboro

When I left my husband, I didn’t have a plan.

When I scooped up my only two children and packed our entire life into the back of our tiresome Honda Civic, I didn’t know where to go. I only knew what way to drive—away. Away from that cramped two-bedroom apartment; away from those too-quiet, all-seeing streets; away from the drunken fool. 

Away.

And away I drove.

The rain fell in heavy droplets as our car strode through the dense, pine forests of the pacific north-west. Oregon’s weather was never kind. Never merciful. And today of all days, the plump clouds raged as they unleashed its fury upon the land. 

I glanced at Judith through the rearview mirror—the six year old mesmerized by the weeping weather. Jonas—just four years older than his sister—sat behind behind the driver’s seat. The children were rather quiet—worry dancing in the latter’s eyes.

I loosed a shallow breath as I looked back towards the mountain road. Perhaps I should’ve talked to them—explained to them the whys that even I hadn’t yet figured out. Perhaps I should’ve stayed for a little while longer. Perhaps I should’ve prepared both them and myself better. Should’ve planned better. Organized better—

A faint buzz vibrated in the pocket of my slightly damp jeans.

My hand fished for the phone as a bright screen shone his name alongside a red heart: David.

I switched off the phone in time to hiss under my breath “Asshole.”

My heart skipped a bit as the youngest let out an awful gasp followed by an amused cry “Mom just cursed! Jonas did you hear? Mom just cursed—”

“Shut up Jude.”

I shot Jonas a warning glance which he made to ignore, but a tiny bit of relief washed over me as Jude didn’t question my slip up any further. The ride was tense, uncertain. The only sound was faint pounding and tapping above.

There weren’t many inns or hostels in the area. There weren’t many tourists in the first place. But there was one place—only one in the heart of the region. One famed spot—a beloved one among those rare tourist seasons in the peaks of summer. Not an inn or a hostel. But a hotel. A five-star hotel nestled right below the summit of the now whitish mounts. An exquisite resort for those ready to take on Oregon’s mesmerizing hiking trails, nature, and beauty. 

Hotel Hillsboro was built somewhere in the seventies. There was nothing else I knew, apart from its sky-high ratings and prices. But for one night—a couple of nights, maybe—this could do it. 

I cringed silently as I pictured the soon-to-come expenses.

But this had to be done. I had to leave. We had to leave. And there was no way back.

There was no way back from away.

The hotel shone brightly amongst the whites and greens of the pines surrounding it. Hotel Hillsboro shone in hues of goldens and reds in a beautiful arch above its grandiose entrance. Its facade was made of similar, detailed arches and arcs all bending in swirls and swooshes over numerous tinted windows and balconies. Luxury. It screamed luxury and power and elegance. If Hotel Hillsboro wasn’t the incarnate definition of opulence, I didn’t know what was. 

I loosed a breath I didn’t realize I was holding.

I swiftly parked my car.

My clothes were drenched by the time me and the kids crossed the threshold of the main entrance. Frank Sinatra’s voice echoed from a vinyl nearby. I didn’t take any of our belongings—just the necessary for the night. As we made our way towards the reception—our steps muffled by a crimson carpet that stretched all the way across the foyer—it was an effort not to scowl. The kids were soaked—and would probably get sick. My phone was slick and my wallet a mushy mess. My hair clinging to my wet cheeks. And the uncertainty—it ate me alive. How long would we stay? Where would we stay later? With who? With which money? How—

“Welcome to Hotel Hillsboro. Do you have a reservation, Madam?”

I swept the hair from my face, motioning to Jonas to stand by his ecstatic sister, “No,” I cast a worrisome look towards the hallway the kids were already drifting off to, “we would like the cheapest room for three. One night.”

The refined, brunette young lady smiled as she followed the direction of my gaze, “Are you from around here?”

Her fingers danced over her keyboard.

I surveyed her working badge.

“Yes…No—” I shook my head, “Look it’s been a long day, and you are very kind but it’s way past their bedtime and—”

“Nine hundred and eighty-nine. Cash or card?”

Her words hit me like a rock.

“Are—is this the cheapest option?”

The brunette’s eyes shot up to meet mine. Her silence was my answer.

I patted my pockets for my leather wallet. Droplets of water slid off the pouch as I opened it to fumble through the slick banknotes.

I knew it wasn’t enough. The moment we walked past that grandiose archway; the moment we stepped onto the spotless, ruby carpet; the moment my eyes shot up to meet the massive, crystal chandelier dangling above our heads—even then I knew I wouldn’t have enough. My fingers walked through the notes, but it was useless fidgeting. I was buying time—I realized. Buying time while I sorted this out. How we would sleep in the car, or… 

Or—

A gentle hand covered mine—to stiffen its tremble. My eyes met the receptionist’s. And her umber eyes shone with… understanding. Compassion.

“Look, ma’am,” she loosed a sigh glancing towards the now arguing children, “we are off-season now, so there aren’t many guests. How about… We’ll lent you a room that surely won’t be occupied. A… let me see,” she swam in her computer then, “Hillsboro’s Sweet Suite. One night only. No charges.”

I gaped at her in disbelief. Glanced at my children. Glanced back. Shook my head.

“What?”

“Take it or leave it. Hotel Hillsboro never leaves its guests on the doorstep.”

It was something in her voice—a genuine, soothing plea to stay—that snapped me back from my stupor.

“But—”

“Ma’am,” she held a hand in front of me. “Name?”

“Janice Thompson,” I breathed.

I couldn’t believe my ears. My eyes. Not as she asked for my documentation—which I gave with numb fingers. Not as she gave me two card keys for the suite—one for me and one for the eldest. Not as she engaged in small talk about the awful winters in Oregon and how unlucky we were on this night. Not as she motioned to the hallway on my right, where the children were still arguing.

“Down the hallway and to the left. There you’ll see the main area where all the elevators are. Also, since we are off-season, there is no room service or luggage service. Although I… suppose you won’t be needing that. Cafeteria is closed but if the kids are hungry the main hall has some vitrines with Hillsboro’s artisanal lemon verbena chocolates…”

Our conversation was a blur, mostly because I had to silence David’s call not once but twice. As I mumbled my farewell and gratitude and called after the children, a small weight fell off my shoulders.

As we turned left, another wider hall greeted us—it’s walls covered in reds and goldens. 

I walked first, the kids pacing behind me. When suddenly Judith cried out, “Mom that’s not fair!”

I turned on my heel to see Jonas on the other side of the hallway practically inhaling those chocolates. I made to call after him but it was too late. The boy licked his fingers in delight.

Jude didn’t linger to start a tantrum, and the only remedy I found to muffle those screeching cries was to give her Jonas’s room card. That seemed to do the trick.

The hallway was deadly silent. The woman said they were off-season, yet the deserted expanse of walls and doors and elegant armchairs felt…off. Not a single soul drifted about. Not even a worker. A glimpse of light shone at the end of the endless corridor. 

That must be the great hall.

I hurried my pace.

“Come on, kids.”

It took us a good ten minutes. My legs ached, and I certainly hadn’t thought the hotel was that big. Whines sound behind me.

“Mom, I don’t feel so good.”

I looked over my shoulder to peek at Jonas, “Well perhaps you shouldn’t have eaten all that chocolate.”

But as we finally reached it’s end, my blood froze in my veins. It was a dead end. The light I’d seen was a mere painting of the great hall. The light flickered, and my head shot to my left—another corridor, smaller. Perhaps the long road was taking its toll on me.

I would’ve lied if I said that by the twenty minute mark of endless searching my heart didn’t thunder in constant warning signs.

The next corridor was as long as the previous, yet narrower. And each ended with that…painting. 

Sweat drifted off my brow and I cursed the receptionist. Judith didn’t have the strength to echo my words.

Panic didn’t set in yet, but I felt it creeping in. I felt it closing in like the walls with each turn. It was when I would feel the silky walls at the spread of my hands when I noticed there were no more turns. The painting in front of me was adult sized—wall to wall. And there was no turn, no hallway. A complete, dead end. I breathed heavily now. Out of exhaustion, I reminded myself. Of fatigue.

I turned on my heels.

I felt it then. How the hair on my arms rose as I witnessed the hallway was…

Gone. 

Instead was the great hall—a sea of sitting areas with different halls pouring into it from all kinds of directions and—

A figure.

A woman with a mop in her hands, her silky black hair still.

Help. Finally.

I rushed to her and swift footsteps seemed to follow me. Lights flickered in response.

“Hey—excuse me, hey—could you help us find—”

But as my hand went to tap the woman’s shoulder it froze.

The textured figure fell to the ground with a silent thump.

A mannequin.

She was a mannequin.

Chills crept up my spine.

“Mom,” a male whine from somewhere far.

I didn’t know how to breathe.

“Mom…”

“Kids I—I think our stay is over.”

Jude tugged on my sleeve.

I turned. And that was when I finally felt it. The panic. True horror like no other. Jonas was yards away, kneeling on the floor with his back to us. It was his whining I realized.

“I don’t—feel too good,” he moaned, and yet—and yet his hands brushed the carpet in continuous motions. He was munching on something. On chocolates—lemon verbena chocolates that he shoved in his mouth with every cry.

Everything in my body halted me in place. Everything screamed run because…

Because—

Something was wrong with Jonas.

The dim lights flickered yet again.

And in the half darkness… everything—everything was wrong with Jonas. His figure was blackish, covered in reeking, inkish substance. As he stood on all fours picking out the chocolates from the floor, his… knees bent the wrong way, his fingers were too long, his voice too high pitched, retorted.

God almighty.

My pupils expanded with the purest adrenaline as I snatched up Jude and ran in the opposite direction. Ran without goal or objective. But as the weight in my arms was too light, I realized I wasn’t holding Jude. 

But a children sized mannequin. 

I dropped the doll in horror and a scream broke out from my lips as Jude, mere yards away from me stepped into a sleek elevator with a stand of chocolates in it.

“No!,” I bellowed as her fingers caressed the glass covering them.

“No,” I cried again as I rushed to the elevator and banged on its already closed doors. My fingers didn’t leave the call button.

I didn’t dare look back at the howling, dysphoric figure on the floor shoving the confections in his mouth. I glared at it only once—when the elevator doors opened once again; when I stepped in and pressed the only button there—level 1; when I hit close over and over again as that… thing—Jonas looked back toward me and crawled with such swiftness, dragging its stretchy, ebony limbs—

I wept as I smashed against the elevator’s back wall and heard a thump hit the now closed doors. I wept as I slid down into a poodle of scarlet liquid. 

I lifted my stained hands in a gut wrenching realization.

Judith.

I sat there as I felt the floor drifting away from me.

Down, down, down.

My eyes laid flat on my hands, and I didn’t even notice we were supposed to go up, up, up.

And then Frank Sinatra sang again.

“And now—the end in near…”

I lifted my head from my hands.

“And so I face—”

The light flickered.

“The final curtain.”

The elevator stopped with a shuddering thump—and so did the music.

And as its doors opened—as I witnessed a short corridor with only one door at its end—a single tear covered in Judith’s blood slid down my cheek.

Hotel Hillsboro Sweet Suite.

I didn’t know how I mustered the strength to crawl out of the elevator, which then closed its doors on me. No call button on the wall.

I didn’t remember how my knees scraped against the softness of the bloody carpet.

And I certainly had no memory of how my eyes caught a glimpse of a glass cloche with dainty sweets—right there on the carpet.

My nails clanked against the glass.

The lemon verbena clouded my senses and coated my tongue in endless waves of pleasure. The chocolate melted in my mouth—sweet and pasty.

For a moment, I forgot who I was. Where I was. Why I was here. Until a buzz vibrated on my side.

I halted my chewing. 

My phone smeared red onto the screen as David lit up on it. There was no signal—I had tried to call 911. And yet…

And yet David’s call went through.

It wasn’t myself who accepted the call and brought it up to my right ear.

It wasn’t myself, who—

“David?”

Silence.

Utter silence.

And then—

The door to the Sweet Suite opened up ever so slightly to reveal a delicate little figure peering through the slit.

“Mommy?”

Judith stood with the key card in her hand, peering at me sprawled on the floor with chocolate smeared together with the blood on my fingers.

And then Frank Sinatra’s aged recording sounded through the call.

“Regrets…”

I looked at my daughter.

“…I’ve had a few.”

Then at the empty plate and glass cloche.

“But then again—”

Hunger like no other coursed through me.

“Too few to mention.”

No—no, no, no, no—Judith was alive.

“I did…”

I turned around.

“…what I had to do.”

And crept back to the elevator.

“And saw it through—”

I banged—pleaded to the walls to let me in.

“Without exemption.”

Before it took over me.

“I planned…”

Before I’d lose my senses.

“…each charted course.”

Before I’d launch myself upon my own daughter.

“Each careful step—” 

“Mommy..?”

“along the byway.”

A sob broke from my mouth.

“And more—much more than this.”

The light flickered.

“I did it—”

I couldn’t hear anymore. Not as darkness washed over me and the corridor. Not as my legs dragged themselves to Judith. Not as the song reach its crescendo. Not as whatever that thing was inside me and Jonas took over. Not as high-pitched screams filled Hotel Hillsboro’s Sweet Suite. Not as that ink coursing through my veins now coursed through another’s. 

Not as Hotel Hillsboro consumed me whole.

And as all sounds finally quieted, there was only the quiet thumping of raindrops on a tinted window.

* * *

The man didn’t have time for this.

A phone in one hand and wallet in another he stepped into the hotel’s foyer, drying his polished moccasins on his way in. His business suite was drenched and he cursed at the man on the other line of the work meeting.

“Welcome to Hotel Hillsboro. Do you have a reservation, Sir?”

The man nodded in response as he barked at the phone.

“I already told you how to do it, Steve.”

The receptionist smiled.

“Sir, since we are off-season and we don’t have many guests I’d like to offer you a room upgrade—”

The man waved her off in acceptance. Whatever she was about to say—it wasn’t important. He had other things to deal with at the moment. Other clients to call, portfolios to manage, orders to place…

The receptionist didn’t engage in further conversation, not as she silently handed him a golden key card and purred, “Enjoy your stay at Hotel Hillsboro’s Sweet Suite.”