I was driving to meet my aunt for thanksgiving. Ever since her husband died she'd been alone out in a tiny town in the middle of podunk and nowhere and I was fortunate enough to live closest to her. It was still a nine hour drive but nobody else was willing to go.
Seems to me that no matter when you plan to leave, no matter what the weather forecast says before you go, as soon as you're comfortably far away from all civilisation the heavens open and the road becomes lost in the downpour.
My phone showed a motel about three miles down a turning so small I nearly drove past it. Like I expected, the car park was empty save for a single beaten up jeep and all the lights were off except for a single window with a flashing neon sign that read "Vacant Rooms".
The reception desk was manned by a pale couple - real pallid, sickly-looking people who could have been extras on a zombie movie with minimal effort. The woman introduced them as Mr and Mrs Howardson, smiling as me through a thick wave of hair that covered half her face. Her husband didn't make a sound save for his oddly wheezy breathing.
I was their only guest for the night which was always the plot of some cheesy gore show but I still managed to smile and be courteous when Mr Howardson lead me to a room that was less than 5 feet from their office. The whole place was empty and I still got to be creepily close to them.
Seems they lived there too, on the other end of the property, and boy were they having one hell of a go at each other. Curse words streaming left, right and centre for two whole hours before someone fired two shots, barely a second apart.
I debated calling the cops but my phone wasn't even switching on. I barely slept, wondering if there was a survivor and if they were angry enough to shoot a potential witness. I was out of there the second the sun was up, glad that I'd paid in cash the previous night, and hightailed it to my aunt's place.
When I told her what happened she looked confused and said the motel had never been finished. The owner and his wife had run out of money and out of excuses to tell the contractors. One thing led to another and they got into an argument and guns were drawn and they'd both been found shot the next morning when the workers showed up - him in the throat and her in the eye.
The motel was left to rot after that, their kids refused to touch it. Vandals set fire to it a few months later and after it was put out it was fenced up and it remained burnt and broken ever since. There were rumours of the restless couple firing at cars that drove by but nobody'd gone back there since the fire so nobody really knew what the place looked like anymore.
The rest of thanksgiving passed uneventfully as did the drive back until I got to the turning for the motel and took it. I had to know it was real and that I hadn't spent the night hallucinating my way around a damp, burnt wreckage or worse - hallucinating my way around a damp, burnt wreckage with ghosts in it.
Seems to me that no matter when you plan to leave, no matter what the weather forecast says before you go, as soon as you're comfortably far away from all civilisation the heavens open and the road becomes lost in the downpour.
My phone showed a motel about three miles down a turning so small I nearly drove past it. Like I expected, the car park was empty save for a single beaten up jeep and all the lights were off except for a single window with a flashing neon sign that read "Vacant Rooms".
The reception desk was manned by a pale couple - real pallid, sickly-looking people who could have been extras on a zombie movie with minimal effort. The woman introduced them as Mr and Mrs Howardson, smiling as me through a thick wave of hair that covered half her face. Her husband didn't make a sound save for his oddly wheezy breathing.
I was their only guest for the night which was always the plot of some cheesy gore show but I still managed to smile and be courteous when Mr Howardson lead me to a room that was less than 5 feet from their office. The whole place was empty and I still got to be creepily close to them.
Seems they lived there too, on the other end of the property, and boy were they having one hell of a go at each other. Curse words streaming left, right and centre for two whole hours before someone fired two shots, barely a second apart.
I debated calling the cops but my phone wasn't even switching on. I barely slept, wondering if there was a survivor and if they were angry enough to shoot a potential witness. I was out of there the second the sun was up, glad that I'd paid in cash the previous night, and hightailed it to my aunt's place.
When I told her what happened she looked confused and said the motel had never been finished. The owner and his wife had run out of money and out of excuses to tell the contractors. One thing led to another and they got into an argument and guns were drawn and they'd both been found shot the next morning when the workers showed up - him in the throat and her in the eye.
The motel was left to rot after that, their kids refused to touch it. Vandals set fire to it a few months later and after it was put out it was fenced up and it remained burnt and broken ever since. There were rumours of the restless couple firing at cars that drove by but nobody'd gone back there since the fire so nobody really knew what the place looked like anymore.
The rest of thanksgiving passed uneventfully as did the drive back until I got to the turning for the motel and took it. I had to know it was real and that I hadn't spent the night hallucinating my way around a damp, burnt wreckage or worse - hallucinating my way around a damp, burnt wreckage with ghosts in it.
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