Twists and Turns

Hotel Dumort

"You can't just throw me out like that!" I screamed, tears leaving hot, wet trails down my cheeks. "it's Christmas!" It felt like my entire world had just tumbled down and become a pile of mess. My mom was dead, my dad ran away before I was even born and I had been in my aunt's care since I was just about a year old. Now I was 18 years old, living in East Harlem.

"Then get a job!" My aunt said, with her sickly, slimy smile across her lips. I drew a shaky breath, before I looked down. I had tried to get a job for over a year, and still couldn't find any. My aunt didn't seem to care though. She just waved her hand in my direction, before she turned her obese body around and wobbled away down the Corridor. I feel down to my knees, still looking at her, hoping she'd turn around and tell me she was sorry and that I could stay. But she didn't. She never backed down on her words.

An hour later I found myself walking down the streets of East Harlem, between homeless people, trying to keep warmth by walking or standing by fires light up in the backstreets. Even though an elderly man offered me space beside him and a couple of others, I withdrew from them. I didn't trust anyone, so I kept on walking down the street until I came to an old hotel.

"Hotel Dumort" I read out to myself, before I tried to get in by the front door. I couldn't. I sighed, running a hand through my black hair. There had to be a way to get in. I couldn't stay outside for forever; I would die of cold. I walked to the side street and found a set of fire stairs. Smiling pleased to myself, I started to climb up the stairs. The metal was stinging cold under my skin, and made me cringe a bit when I put my hand down to the rails.

Well up the stairs, and coldness starting to get to the base of my bones, I opened a door that was an emergency exit, or had been. Maybe it had been an service entrance back in the day. I didn't know. It was there, I could get in, sheltered from the cold. Although it was cold inside. It didn't really matter. I was inside, and I could find somewhere to keep warm. There had to be blankets, as my aunt had told this had been a hotel from the 50's.

I suddenly found myself in the middle of something that seemed like the dining room, or the restaurant of the hotel. It was filled with tons of dust, shattered glasses, dining plates. It seemed like it had been left in a hurry.Like no one had taken the time to clean out from the hotel. I threw my backpack by the door frame. So I could explore my new hideout.

As I studied the vintage style of the room, I felt as someone was watching me. I turned,expecting to see someone, but I didn't. Nothing. No footprints in the dust, no sign of life. It had to be something that I was just feeling out of exhaustion. I turned and walked down the corridor, trying to find somewhere to sleep. A bedroom or some blankets.

After giving up looking for something to wrap around myself, I decided to take out a few extra clothes to put on. But I swear I had left my backpack in the restaurant. It wasn't there now. It simply was just gone. There was no footprint in the dust, nothing. Just a slightly cleaner spot where my backpack had been. I shook my head in frustration, before I took a few of the tablecloths with me.

- - . - -

It couldn't be more than midnight when I was woken up by a pair of hold hands gripping my lower jaw. My eyes shot open, and stared into a pair of black,bottomless eyes. They held so much cold and hate that for a moment, I thought I was looking into the eyes of the Grim Reaper. "What are you doing here?" the person hissed.