The Love Hotel

Bradley nodded when she said this, seeming to approve of the fact that she had not really done anything all day. She mentioned that she didn’t clean because everything was already spotless, because she couldn’t really see anything the needed to be cleaned. Bradley simply nodded again as if he had expected her to say this and did not see anything odd whatsoever with the fact that he had hired a housekeeper to clean up a house that clearly did not need to be cleaned in any way whatsoever.

They talked for a bit and then Rochelle left. And so it went, for the next few Saturdays Rochelle kept coming in to Bradley’s home. Occasionally she would clean, in fact she went out of her way to try and do something because she did not want to feel like she was simply taking his money and not doing any work for it. She began to wonder if Bradley had only given her this job because he felt like she needed the money. She sincerely hoped that this was not the case. She sincerely hoped that he was not trying to give her a handout of some kind because she really didn’t want anything like that. She wanted to work for every single thing she had. She wanted to work hard and make it so that everything she got from now on was acquired through hard work and dedication and was not simply given to her by a man.

And so she worked, doing whatever she could in a house that never seemed to require any work at all. In her personal life, things improved dramatically. After receiving her first paycheck from Bradley, she got herself an apartment in Manhattan. It was a tiny apartment but it was something and it was hers and no one else’s and that was really important to her. She knew that everything that was happening was good because for the first time in a very long time she was truly happy. She was happy to the point that absolutely nothing could get her down anymore.

She bought a little furniture for her place. Nothing fancy, just a bed and a sofa and some chairs. She was saving up for a TV but she made do with her laptop for the time being and everything was fine. And throughout all of it she figured that everything that was happening was happening for a reason. She worked at Bradley’s and nothing odd happened at all. Nothing happened that was worth mentioning to anybody. Life went on as if it had been preordained to get this good for her. And then, one day, something odd happened.

It was a standard day at Bradley’s house all things considered. Rochelle was really glad that she had something to actually do today because Bradley had asked her to cook something for dinner. However, while she was cooking she heard something from upstairs. It sounded like a wail. She froze as soon as she heard it. What could that possibly be? It sounded so eerie that her hair stood on end, and she could not breathe for a moment. She started to feel like she was going crazy.

She cautiously headed up the stairs. She went all the way up to the top floor and saw that the door was locked. It was a single door that started as soon as the stairs ended. The entire floor was locked. Rochelle didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know what was going on. This was such an odd thing to experience, such an odd thing to see right before your very eyes. She pressed her ear to the door and couldn’t help but feel like she was spying. But she had to. She had to do this. This was the only way that she could find out what was going on. She had heard something, something very creepy indeed, and she couldn’t help but feel like it was her responsibility to know what was on  the other side of the door if she was going to be handling things in this house every single Saturday.

She tried looking through the peephole and saw something that terrified her. It looked like the ghost of an old woman. It was a figure that was moving slowly and was shuffling along as if it was having a lot of difficult moving. She couldn’t help but feel utterly terrified. She saw the figure raise its head, toss it backwards and let out another bone chilling wail.

Rochelle ran downstairs. What the hell was that? She had no idea what was going on. She decided to call Bradley immediately and tell him that if he did not tell her what was behind that door she was not going to work for him anymore. She couldn’t, not while she felt so utterly terrified. She kept looking behind her, fearful that there was someone there, fearful that she was acting like a crazy person. Had she seen what she had seen? Had she really seen something that was as terrifying as what she had thought or had she imagined all of it? She was starting to think that she was going crazy and this really scared her. She couldn’t feel this way, not right now. Not when everything was starting to go well for her.

She called Bradley and said, “Bradley, I need you to come home right this instant.”

“Why?” asked Bradley, his voice cautious and wary. “What happened?”

“There’s a woman behind the door at the top floor of your home! It… she looked like a ghost, Bradley, a damn ghost! Just what exactly is going on here, can you tell me that? Am I going crazy? Am I seeing things?”

Bradley sighed and said, “Alright. I will come home. I will be there in about thirty minutes. Just stay in the living room while you wait for me. Don’t worry, I promise you that you are completely and utterly safe in my home. Just turn the TV on and watch something for a little while, it’ll all be okay.”

Rochelle cut the call, ran into the living room and turned the TV on. She turned it on at a volume that was as loud as possible. She didn’t want any silence at all. She wanted the whole house to be flooded with sound so that she would not have to deal with another wail if the woman behind the door emitted something like it again.

As soon as Bradley came in, Rochelle rushed to him and said, “Bradley. What the hell is going on?”

“I told you not to go to the top floor,” said Bradley in a resigned voice. “It wasn’t time. Not yet.”

“I heard a wailing sound!” said Rochelle, “The woman that is behind that door is wailing Bradley, what did you expect me to do? Seriously? Just think about that for a moment, what did you honestly expect me to do in that situation Bradley Charles?”

“She was making noise?” said Bradley. He looked confused. He then sighed and said, come with me. “I’m sorry that this happened. It really wasn’t supposed to happen at all.”

He lead her up to the room that was at the top floor of his home. He unlocked the door and there stood the woman that Rochelle had seen. She was not all that scary right now. On the contrary, she was rather kind looking. It had been the distortion of the keyhole that had made her look scary.

Her hair was white and wild and she looked older than she was supposed to be. She looked like she had seen a lot of difficult times in her life. She looked like she was tortured by things that no one else could possibly imagine.

“Rochelle,” said Bradley turning towards her with a grave expression on his face. “I would like you to meet my mother, Isabella Charles.”

Rochelle just stared. She had no idea what to say. She had no idea how to feel.