[DYH] An Unexpected Guest....

Polly had started to doze lightly, despite her worry, when she heard the bell. She gasped and sat up straight. Thinking of another bell, she fumbled at the telephone receiver until she was awake enough to realize where the sound was coming from.

The lights were off. She couldn't see anyone there. But this was her hotel lobby. Her sanctuary. She could feel the alien presence at her desk; smell the cigarette smoke in her air. She stood up slowly from her chair, not bothering to switch the lights on. She walked to the desk, automatically moving past objects she knew were there, that hadn't been moved in thirty years.

Safely behind the desk she finally switched on the lamp. Squinting with her hand against her eyes against the sudden brightness, she said to the presence, "Can I help you?"

Polly pulled her hand away from her face. The lamp was bright, just bright enough to kill her night vision. Whoever was standing beyond her little circle of light remained unseen, as if his leather shoes stood empty and his cigarette floated alone in the air.

He had a voice like an old hacksaw. Harsh, rusty, and didn't care if it made you bleed. Polly could sense a whine or sneer coming from the stranger, as if he was mocking her. He was...bigger than her. Tough. Bad.

And she was old, alone, and in her dressing gown.

She could smell the smoke just as strong as if he had blown it into her face from an inch away, but she could still see his shoes standing at the edge of her light.

"We're full," she said sharply, choking on the smoke. "You're not the first person to come in out of the rain."

She suddenly wished she had left the telephone at the desk instead of pulling it over to the chair she'd been napping in.

Polly tensed as the man began moving. Every nerve was telling her to run. Don't think, just run. Still, she hesitated, wincing as she saw him rub out his cigarette on her precious carpet.

"Like I said, you're not the first person to come out of the rain." She spoke as harshly as she could, still following him with her eyes. "I've...already had to turn people away. Try the next town." She practically spat out the words, but she could still hear a tremor--

How did he know her name?

If he was from out of town, he wouldn't know her. If he was from in town, he wouldn't need a hotel room.

She stopped breathing for a second--one single second--and shut her eyes.

She'd done this a thousand times in dreams. Funny that she'd have to do it in life.

As suddenly as she could, she snapped off the light and ran.

Polly ran out of the lobby and turned down a corridor. She needed help, but where would she find it? Charlotte and David were gone. Was Tamika in? Could she even help me anyway? She seems so frail...I... Kaysen! Of course! She hesitated, some tiny, dark piece of her subconscious shying away from her supposed friend. She ran in the direction of his room...

...And ran straight into a bend in the hall. She couldn't stop in time, so she held both hands in front of her to take the impact. The way continued to the right, so she slid her hands along the wall and went with it.

She must have gotten turned around in her panic. She was surprised; she didn't think something like that would happen to her...but the alternative...

There was no alternative.

But she really didn't remember putting up that hideous, decaying wallpaper.

She was itching to turn her head. She couldn't tell where the man was, or even if he was following her at all. She might have heard footsteps, but she couldn't be sure. The days she could clearly distinguish footfalls were long past, and the sound she was hearing--or imagined she could hear--was much too slow for a running man. Like a metronome beat keeping time in the background.

She thought she could feel warm, moist air on the back of her neck, but she knew if she looked she would see two glowing eyes like cigarette ends looking back at her so she stayed focused on the path in front of her and what little she could see in the almost-absolute dark. Breathe

Then that low, awful voice spoke (so close, too close...). The smoke was choking her so badly she could barely gasp, "Why don't you tell me? Who are you (breathe) and why the hell are you chasing me?" Polly didn't resort to bad language often, but the word Hell was obviously an apt description here. She pushed a few stray hairs out of her face. Her fingertips were tingling, but that wasn't important right now. Was it? "Get out of my hotel. Get out, get out get out!"

She put her hands on her head. Listening, one would almost say that her breathing had turned from gasps to sobs.

Even as Polly fled, she realized there was no way she could outrun this man with his calm, inevitable tread. She sucked in some air to reply and started coughing. The more she tried to breathe, the more she coughed.

She realized that the hallway was starting to get lighter. Lighter...but hazier. And the walls were glowing? "What...what have you done?" she managed to choke out through her burning, overworked lungs. But she didn't have to ask: she could feel the heat, the embers along the walls making smoke and then little flames. She turned again, this time into a room, and smothered a few of the embers with her hands. But her hands were so small, and there was so much fire, now...

She looked around. There was a door. Double doors, in fact. She shut them quickly. There was no lock, but she pulled off the belt of her robe and tied it tightly around the knobs with her numb hands, gaining a few minutes before the fire enveloped both it and her. She rocked back and forth, moaning. The fire was racing down her corridors, burning, eating forty years of her life. "No...No, please, not my hotel. Don't do this. Have mercy..."

But there was no mercy to be had, was there?

Her hands drifted down from her face. Polly could see now. She was in a circular ballroom. That was strange. A polished, dark wood floor stretched in front of her. Pink flowers dripped down the wallpaper, contrasting with the garlands of live, white roses. She could see detailed shapes carved into the gilt and wood that ornamented the room. It was like something from another century. It was absolutely breathtaking. But so was the fire racing up two of the walls toward the large crystal chandelier.

She looked around for a window, but there weren't any. In fact, she had a strange notion that she was at the exact center of the hotel, but she didn't know why.

She realized that the smoking man could have easily made his way into the room in the few seconds she'd been gawking. She whirled around, wondering what she would face...

((This post took a weird turn. Sorry about that. For some reason, the ballroom popped into my head when Polly first started running and I couldn't get it out without writing it in here. Did not know it was going to be on fire, though.))

What...?

Polly stood stunned, watching the burning spectacle unfold before her tortured eyes. Even when the Smoking Man made himself known by the foot of the stairs, she couldn't stop staring as the oblivious dancers slowly and rhythmically turn to ash.

"Stop this," she said quietly into the air. "Stop this now. If you can. What do you want from me?" Her voice started to rise. "Have I hurt you? Did I offend you when I turned you away? Is it something else I've done?" As she spoke, she turned and wiped the tears off her face, unknowingly leaving a smear of blood from her damaged hands. "I'm eighty years old. You're going to have to be more specific!" By now she was shouting. "How many mistakes do you think I've made over the years? How many regrets do you think I have? Don't you think I would tell you anything, absolutely anything I know if it would keep you from murdering a room full of people?"

A thought stopped her. "Suppose there's someone out in the rain," he'd said. "Someone dangerous. Could you really live with yourself a second time?" She stepped towards him carefully over the little piles of ashes, charred flesh and cloth. She suddenly noticed that her ratty bathrobe was now a gauzy ball gown. Her face was intense. Any trace of panic or despair had gone, leaving a deep but sympathetic sadness. "Do you think I regret not going outside that night? That I could have saved my husband, my sister? Sometimes I do, too. But then I see my children's faces. They looked so angelic back then... I couldn't have left them. I kept them safe. Do you know how important that was? Do you know how much they meant--mean--to me?

"I'm living on borrowed time, you say? Of course I am. Honey, I'm eighty years old. Every day I wake up in the morning is a day stolen from the grim reaper. Every day is precious to me. Especially when I think about everyone I've left behind; all the family and friends I've buried."

She fell silent, wondering if that was the answer he was looking for, or if he was going to eat her alive. But she had a dark little feeling that there was something more...something else she couldn't remember...

Polly was captured completely by those eyes. She knew them, didn't she? It felt like they punched a hole in her stomach. She could see figures around them, closing in. They all looked familiar. They were figures from her childhood, weren't they? But...wrong. Twisted. They moved like puppets, and she was shocked by a feeling of anger focused on her from all directions.

But they were townsfolk?

But they had no eyes, no teeth...

But that was her childhood neighbor over there to the left, she'd know him anywhere...

But they moved like their bones didn't fit together; she could hear the sickening noise they were making...

But she went to school with that person.

That long dead person.

That somehow wasn't in Heaven, as she had always told herself he must be.

That was what hurt the most, somehow. All these good, good people, reduced to mindlessness and hatred. Was this what had happened to everyone? Was this the 'better' place where the dead had spent the last fifty years? Her husband, her sister, her friends, neighbors, aquaintances, all. reduced. to. this. She covered her mouth with her hands and fell to the floor, wailing.

"IIIII SSEEEE YYOOOUUUUU"

"PLLEEEAAASSE KIIIIIIIILLLLL MEEEEEEE"

The tortured moans of the innocent damned struck at her as she lay sobbing in a heap on the ground. They plucked at her hair, tore at her clothing, but she barely noticed. She bled. Oh, she bled.

A long time later, she slowly lifted her head and looked at the Man. Her eyes were haunted and her words came in a slow, thick monotone. "I put my children to bed. My husband went out for a walk. He never came back.

"There was a fog that night. It wasn't a normal fog. It was thick, oily, and...purple. I could smell it. I told myself I couldn't, but I could. It smelled like cinnamon candy and my husband's breath. I was reading. I heard screams. I looked up. There was a man. He was wearing a red raincoat." She blinked. "Was it you?" she added in a whisper after a second. "He had an axe. He was chopping people up. Like wood. I got the shotgun out of the closet. My sister was there, too. She was a nurse. I thought she was trying to help people. She wasn't trying to help people. She was covered in blood before he took her.

"He grabbed her by the arm. She grabbed him by the face and kissed him. Hard. I remember her fingernails gouging his cheeks. He pushed her down. He ripped her dress down the middle and..." Polly's mouth formed words, but no sound came out. "...in the street. Right in the street. I saw him raise his axe after. I aimed the gun at the window, but my hands kept slipping. And then he cut her head off. Then her legs. Then her arms and her breasts. And then he kissed her again. And then he...

"I couldn't watch any more. I wanted to join them. I was afraid of dying. I threw up on the floor. I ran up the stairs. I peeked in the room at my babies, but they were fine. I knew I couldn't let that happen to my babies. I stood there all night. I didn't sleep, I didn't sleep. I stood there with the gun. I waited for someone to force the door or break the window. And when she did, I shot her with both barrels. Then I went downstairs and shut the door again. No one touched my children. I cleaned up the blood in the morning. I never knew her name. I never stopped having nightmares." Polly stopped as suddenly as she started and slowly rested her head on the floor. She had been crying so long her tears had started form a puddle; mingling with her blood in places and forming swirling patterns on the dark wood.