Fast Car | Escapes #1

Chapter 29: Jenny

I'd read books where people stayed in the rundown motels to hide from people. It never really dawned on me how those places looked in reality, but then I'd never been in a place where I'd realistically ever stay in one of those places. They seemed like they were in a dreamworld that was untouchable by me. Like they didn't really exist. 

When I stumbled across the Forest Run Inn on the outskirts of Denver, those books all came back to mind. I hurriedly walked over and went up to the front desk. The man sitting there reading a newspaper seemed like a regular guy, not too creepy or anything that made me uneasy.  He looked up when he heard me get close and sat the paper aside. "Hourly or nightly?" he asked. 

Hourly? I hadn't thought of that as a possibility before that moment, so I was confused. Brayden did nightly, right? "Nightly," I said.

He nodded, clicked around on his computer, and reached behind himself for a key. An actual key, not a card. He tossed it onto the counter. "That'll be sixty for the night."

I reached into one of the outer pouches of my bag and pulled out a hundred. I handed the bill to him and he gave me my change. Mom's shopping money was coming in handy after all. I hadn't planned on using it this way, but I counted this as an emergency. 

The money had been tucked away in a small zippered compartment on the outside of my suitcase. Mom had given me some money when she'd taken me shopping and I saved as much as I could. When we got home, I had tucked it away in my suitcase and forgot it was there. Until I was cresting the hill into Denver, that was. When I got there and realized I would need to stay somewhere, I searched the bag and found the money I'd stashed. 

Key in hand, I walked out of the worn-out lobby and walked to room number nine. Hoping the number on the key was right, I put it in the lock and it turned. I walked into the room and felt around for the light switch. When I found and flipped it, the room was bathed in a soft glow. A small overhead light turned on. I made sure the door was locked behind me and took in the room. 

A full-sized bed occupied most of the space. It was covered by a worn, threadbare comforter that touched the floor. There was a dark green couch that seemed like it was crusted over. There was a desk under the wall-mounted TV, but I didn't see a chair for it anywhere. Further into the room, a closet with folding doors sat across from a door I assumed led to the bathroom. 

I left the suitcase near the door and walked to the bathroom, my bare feet slapping on the wooden floor, which felt greasy. The bathroom held all the usual things, but unlike the other places I'd been staying, the shower had a ring around the tub. Something that looked suspiciously like mold was growing in the corners. I pulled back the curtain a little, wondering if I ought to shower or not. That question was answered when I looked up at the showerhead and found a pair of panties hanging from it.

Nope.

The mirror was cracked in a few places, and splattered with fluids I probably didn't want to know about. I wandered back out into the main room. What had I gotten myself into? 

---

The sun was warm on my back, bordering on hot. It had been a few hours since I turned in the key to that God-forsaken motel. I'd barely slept the night before, worried about whether or not I was going to get a disease from sleeping on the bed. I'd stayed away from the couch since it seemed worse for wear. Also, I had a feeling that the chances of picking up something was much higher if I even so much as looked too hard at it.

Cars were zooming past me on the highway. My new shoes were hurting, and I knew I'd have blisters on my feet. Not to mention the cuts littering the soles of my feet from running through the woods. I didn't want to think about what kind of infection I was inevitably going to get after walking around in that motel room, either. I also needed a shower. Even after stripping the bed down to the fitted sheet and sleeping on that, I still felt so gross.