Two pale hands reached out to the darkness, each finger outstretched.
“Um… Hello?” the girl called out.
Traveller laid on his back. His hands remained outstretched in front of him. He studied them closely.
“What are you doing?”
“Someone told me that you can tell if you’re dreaming by counting your fingers. When you dream, the number usually isn’t ten.” He squinted, counting carefully. Ten. He lowered his hands.
His vision had adjusted to the darkness. The girl was wearing a black sweater-vest over her white collared shirt, which was completely buttoned-up now. While she only had one black eye, both eyes had dark, sagging eyelids. The left side of her bottom lip also seemed to be in the early stages of healing a cut, which explained the red stain on her left collar.
She spoke shyly. “I just need a place to stay tonight.”
Traveller rolled back over to his side, turned towards the wall. “I don’t get involved.”
It took a moment of shocked confusion for her to speak. “Are you serious?”
Nothing.
She crossed her arms. “I guess I’ll just go then. Into the wilderness. In the middle of the night. All alone.”
Nothing.
She extended her arms stiffly to her sides. “I’m going!”
Nothing.
She turned and stormed toward the door. “When they find me on the side of the road being torn apart by wild animals, just remember you could have stopped it!” She opened the door. One foot stepped out…
“I said I don’t get involved.” His words immediately froze her, one foot still in the room. He was still facing the wall. “Stopping you from staying here would be getting involved.”
She looked down and smiled nervously.
She closed the door behind her as she walked back into the room.
Mouth tightly shut, she edged her way towards the bed. She lay carefully, sticking entirely to the right side of the bed.
The two of them laid back-to-back.
Traveller remained still. “Did you pick the lock to get in here?”
Embarrassed for a moment, she eventually answered. “Yeah.”
“Why do you know how to pick locks?”
“I like to look up a lot of random stuff in my spare time.”
Traveller chuckled silently through his nose.
“My name’s Rose, by the way.”
Silence.
“What’s yours?”
“Does it matter?”
“What am I supposed to call you?”
He shrugged.
“Fine. Whatever.”
Traveller sat behind the wheel.
The engine roared.
Wind blew through his hair.
The city buildings outside the windows remained static.
A woman sat next to him.
Her shoulder-length hair was golden.
An embroidered patch of a purple flower was stitched to the heart of her distressed denim jacket.
She smiled calmly as she looked him in the eyes.
A man stood outside the passenger’s window, surrounded by an endless, thick cloud of smoke.
Traveller couldn’t see his face behind the roof of the car, but the man was wearing a tailored suit and a long trench coat—all black.
Her calm face contorted into one of dread.
Fireworks.
The interior of the car had gone red.
Traveller held out his hands and studied them.
All eight of his fingers were covered in blood.
Traveller awoke to the sound of a loud, repetitive banging. Dim blue sunlight shone through the blinds. Rose was already awake, holding the blanket up to her chin.
She had the same look of dread Traveller saw in his dream.
The knocking continued.
Switchblade in hand, Traveller flung his body over hers, landing on his feet next to the bed.
Standing in front of the banging door, Traveller flicked the blade open. He hung his arm loosely by his side and rested the flat end of the blade upright, hidden along his palm and wrist.
Traveller turned the doorknob, but before he could pull the door back, it jolted an inch towards him, stopped only by the chain-lock. It was the tough guy who had been manhandling Rose yesterday.
He was wearing more than last time. Above his wifebeater and—hopefully—his boxers, he was wearing a red tracksuit. The track jacket was partially unzipped, revealing his chest hair and some of the wifebeater. His shark-like eyes scanned throughout the slight opening the door provided. “Where is she?”
Traveller looked him in the eyes and tilted his head, calmly feigning confusion.
The tough guy became annoyed. “Don’t dick me around, Sunburn. I’m not dumb. You saw me rough her up a bit yesterday and now I wake up and she’s gone. Just hand her back over and I won’t have to smash your fuckin’ face in.”
“Who?”
The tough guy studied Traveller’s eyes.
A manic smile grew on his face, showing each of his uneven, yellowing teeth. He raised his finger, flippantly waving with a laugh as he calmly backed away.
Traveller continued to watch as the man turned and walked the rest of the distance to his own room with his hands in his pockets. He continued laughing the entire way, even after he entered his room.
Traveller shut the door. The lock stiffly clicked shut.
He turned towards the rest of the room. He couldn’t see Rose, but the bed had been pushed a few inches away from the wall.
He sat on the side of the bed. He held the knife in front of him, examining it curiously. He hadn’t put any thought into opening it or jumping out of the bed; it was all completely reflexive.
“He’s gone,” he said without looking up.
Rose’s eyes rose from the small space behind the bed. “What happened to not getting involved?” She was on her knees now, looking up at him with shock.
Traveller remained fixated on the blade.
She sighed and leaned her head on the sheets. “I’m not firm enough when it comes to these things. If he talked to me, he’d probably convince me to go back to him somehow.” She buried her face in her crossed arms. “I need to get out of here.”
Traveller shut his eyes and leaned his head forward solemnly. “Alright.”
“Alright?”
He closed the blade with calm determination and placed it on the night table. “I’ll get you out of here, but you’re on your own after that.”
It wasn’t until late in the afternoon that the room’s phone rang. Rose had been laying back on the bed, bored, but when Traveller lifted the receiver to his ears, she perked her head up.
“Yeah?” he spoke. Then, after a short moment, he spoke again, maintaining his deadpan cadence. “Alright. Great. Call me a cab.” He hung up and walked to the door.
Rose stood and followed. “Where are you going?”
“Car’s ready. Let’s go.”
She stopped. “No.”
“What?”
“You go. I’ll wait here.”
“On your own?”
“It’s safer if I hide. What if he sees me while we’re stuck waiting for a cab?”
“And what if he comes in here while you’re alone?”
Rose thought for a moment.
Her eyes perked up towards the closed switchblade on the night table.
Traveller nodded. “Be back soon.” He walked outside and shut the door behind him.
She watched his foggy silhouette walk across the semi-transparent curtains towards the front lobby.
An illustration of a hook had been stitched onto the mechanic’s jumpsuit. “You know this is an old car, right? You shouldn’t be pushing the engine so hard.”
Traveller nodded.
The mechanic was on the other end of the counter, flipping through files. “You sure you don’t want us to take a crack at all the mud along the skirt?”
“Been there too long to clean off now.”
He shrugged. “You’re staying at The Pearly Motel, right?”
“Yeah.” Traveller tapped his finger impatiently on the counter.
“You talk to Ron?”
“Ron?”
“Friend of mine staying there. You might’ve seen one of our trucks parked there?”
The tapping stopped.
The mechanic reached into his breast pocket and pulled out the keys to Traveller’s Cadillac. He placed the keys on the counter and returned to the file.
“Ron works here?” Traveller asked.
“Yessir.”
“If he works in town, then what’s he doing staying at a motel?”
“He’s there with his girlfriend.” The mechanic smirked. “Just don’t tell his fiancé.” He pulled a paper out of folder and placed it flat in front of Traveller. “Now, about the bill…”
The lonely quiet of the room made Rose feel uneasy. She had flopped back onto the bed and quickly grew bored of looking up at the chipped ceiling. The silence was only broken by her own thoughts.
She was ashamed to admit it, but Ron’s temper had undoubtedly been part of what drew her to him in the first place. Back when Rose was still in the ninth grade, she had been threatened by a bully with a knife on her way home. Ron’s tow truck happened to drive by just in time to witness it. After the bully left, Ron left the tow truck to console Rose. They spoke for a bit, then he told her that she wouldn’t have to worry about the bully anymore and left. The next morning, Rose anxiously walked to school when she noticed Ron’s tow truck parked down the road. Ron and two other men with similar builds had been standing on the sidewalk, blocking the bully’s path; all three of them wore the same uniform and were armed with baseball bats. Ron told the bully that if she didn’t want to end up at the bottom of the lake, she’d leave Rose alone. Just in case that warning wasn’t enough, they beat her anyways. Rose was horrified as she watched it happen, but when the bully showed up to school a few days later, lumpy face covered in dark bruises, she couldn’t help but feel an illogically exhilarating connection to the older man who had helped her. The bully stayed clear of Rose after that.
Her gaze turned towards the switchblade on the night table. She reached towards it with a slow hesitation.
Still on her back, she held it out, surprised by its weight.
Her right hand curiously pinched at the side of the blade and slowly inched it out.
She examined the open blade with a nervous novelty. Now she was the one holding the knife…
She shut the blade.
Rose reached over to place it back on the table, but just as her grip was about to release, she saw a foggy red silhouette standing on the other end of the curtains. The silhouette’s hands were raised, both cupped around its eyes, attempting to peer into the room.
Her eyes shot open.
The silhouette walked out of view. A moment later the doorknob began to shake. Then, the entire door shook with a loud, stomp. Then another. Then another. By the fourth kick, Ron’s sneakers had forced the door open.
Hidden behind the shut bathroom door, Rose stood with her back against the tiled wall. Her eyes were shut. She quietly mumbled to herself as her clasped hands held the open knife in front of her like a praying nun. She didn’t need to count her fingers to know that this nightmare was a reality.
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