Deadfall Hotel

by Steve Rasnic Tem

  I was not completely honest with Richard Carter concerning the nature of, and potential dangers regarding, his employment at the Deadfall Hotel. I have some regrets about this, but I cannot honestly say I did the wrong thing.

  We cannot escape our fears. Ultimately we must deal with them. We are but momentary blips of consciousness on the sea of time – we have but a limited span to do those things we are willing to do, to say those things we are willing to say. Our greatest challenge may be to face the sadness that knowledge entails. I’m afraid it is a test most of us will fail.

  – from the diary of Jacob Ascher,

  proprietor, Deadfall Hotel, 1969-2000

  SPRING WAS A time of pests: small animals nesting in the rooms, insects prowling over the walls and chewing into hand-carved woodwork and flocked wallpaper. Except for their occasional forays into the realm of human anxiety (a peripheral glimpse of a few silverfish might effectively highlight the mood of one of the hotel’s more paranoid guests), most of these tenants remained hidden until their deaths, when their bodies might be discovered behind furniture or in hollow sarcophagi eaten out of the decaying structure as part of the creatures’ final, instinctive meals. It was a time of grass that grew too quickly to mow, and in nooks and crannies too out of the way to trim. And it was a time of blood. Richard’s daughter was becoming a woman.

  Richard had largely gotten over the initial panic. A call to a local doctor whose name Jacob had supplied, a call to a distant cousin, female, whom he hadn’t seen in years, and Richard was reassured that although this was earlier than the average, it wasn’t that unusual. And certainly it appeared to be the only sign of womanhood in his child, much to his relief. He thought the early and sudden maturities of so many children saddening, and occult in their implications. It pleased him that there still remained so much of the little girl in Serena’s dress and fantasies. Even now he could hear her in the great side yard, debating loudly with the squirrels concerning some new infraction, perhaps their appetite for doll blankets or their continued abuse of the trees.

  Serena had her own theories about the fantastic jumble of deadfall accumulating densely around the grove – she said it was the squirrels, gnawing and hacking and fighting in the trees. She claimed to have seen a squirrel with front teeth some three inches long, and marked by body-length running sores. “A real fighter of a squirrel, Daddy,” she had said. His little girl still, at least for the time being.

  This was not something he’d ever anticipated going through without his wife. Abby used to complain that Richard did his best to keep Serena a child, that he’d keep her from maturing forever if he could. The tickling and the crazy stories, the mad play – his way of parenting had always made her uncomfortable – she said it was too ‘out of control’ for her. He realized, now, there had been some truth in what she’d said, but he had no idea how he was supposed to draw the line, how to encourage her to make the most of her childhood, and then to encourage her growth and maturity when the time came. How was he supposed to know when it was the right time?

  He didn’t think that Abby had ever fully appreciated that once Serena’s childhood was gone, it was gone forever.

  “The past is our world, Richard.” She’d been half-asleep when she’d said that, at the end of a long evening of arguments over Serena, what was best for Serena, what they should and should not say to Serena. It had been an odd, tired thing to say, and he would wonder, particularly after her death, if perhaps she’d had more she could have said, more words that would have made him understand, as she had seemed to understand.

  “When we breathe, we breathe memory,” Jacob said.

  Richard started. He’d been daydreaming again. He nodded assent, although he had no idea what the context of this statement had been. But he didn’t want Jacob to know he wasn’t paying attention to everything he said.

  They were stationed at one of the rounded corners made by the lakeside wall of the hotel as it traveled over the harder rock of the cliff. Here the foundation was so old it was sometimes difficult to tell where it left off and the bedrock began. Some of the masonry was obviously in trouble, heavily pocked and missing stones. Jacob was waist-deep in a cavity, blue coveralls turning white with rock dust.

  “See anything?” Richard couldn’t; the old man made an efficient plug.

  “Oh, quite a few things, actually.”

  The man’s obvious tease irritated. Richard had stopped pushing for the details of Jacob’s knowledge some weeks ago. The man distributed information only as it suited him, only when he decided it was actually required.

  “Got it!”

  Suddenly the blue coveralls were backing out, Jacob’s shoulders scrubbing frantically against the crumbling stone. He moved fast enough to startle Richard again, who was accustomed to only patient and leisurely movements from the man. He scrambled out of his way.

  Jacob came out of the hole with scraped moss and roots sliming his shoulders, powder and cobwebs and dark brown bugs in his silver-gray hair. Something long and many-legged danced around a blue shoulder, then dropped into tall grass and disappeared. Jacob’s shoulders did their own dance beneath the coveralls. Then he turned around.

  He held out something all black fur and squeal, with ridged, membranous ears and a snout like a rotted apricot. No tail. Richard stepped back farther. The creature’s small mouth had suddenly filled with teeth about three inches long.

  “Jesus! What is it?”

  Jacob had already stuffed the little furred terror into a steel mesh bag, whose sides now warped furiously with the creature’s struggles. Richard no longer wondered at the purpose for such an unusual container.

  “I find one of these beasties every now and then. A long time ago, years before I came here, one of the guests left several of them behind. They’ve been living and breeding somewhere inside the hotel since then. I will tell you more about their history and proclivities at some future date when I have more time.”

  Richard filed that bit of information away, knowing Jacob never would have the time. A few weeks earlier, he’d observed Jacob removing yard after yard of a slick, grayish, rope-like fungus from around the foundation stones on the north side. The fungus had been remarkably tenacious – at one point a large chunk of stone had come away with the growth – and Jacob had worn heavy gloves. But the old man had neglected as yet to fill Richard in on its nature or origins, or whether any cautionary measures were in order for the future. It had become quite apparent that they had very different ideas about training. He was being trained, wasn’t he? But for what?

  “I imagine Serena will be interested in boys pretty soon.”

  Richard laughed. “Oh, I doubt that.”

  “She’ll be eleven years old in a few days. And girls, of course, mature faster than boys.”

  “She’ll only be eleven, Jacob. She’s a little girl still.”

  “A girl in ways. A woman in ways. ‘That is how the young ladies grow,’ is the way my mother used to put it. My mother arrived at her fourteenth birthday mere weeks before my birth. You have talked to her in some detail about her period, I imagine.”

  Richard nodded hesitantly, then said, “I thought I would wait a few weeks.”

  Jacob looked at Richard over the pipe he’d brought out for lighting. “Or shall I ask Enid to talk to the girl? I am sure I can persuade her.”

  Richard found it hard to imagine that sour looking woman talking to Serena about such a personal thing. But she was the only woman on the premises, as far as he could determine. “I don’t know; that might be best.”

  “A single father – it can be a difficult thing.” Jacob gestured vaguely.

  Richard nodded.

  “I’ll speak to her,” Jacob said. “She does well with children, despite the impression she gives.”

  “Thank you, I appreciate that.”

  “And I’ll ask her about a party. An eleven-year-old should have a birthday party.” He walked away, the steel mesh sack bouncing under its own power
along his shoulder.

  Richard examined the hole in the foundation where Jacob had removed the furry pest. The darkness within the animal’s tunneling varied in gradation, in texture, in smell. When that darkness began to move, Richard backed away. He wondered how long it would take him to become a competent caretaker of such a place.

  Serena was still chattering amiably with the squirrels, who appeared strangely drawn to her the past few weeks. There seemed to be a faint, coppery scent in the air. From a distance, his blonde daughter looked older than she was. More like Abby every day. He hadn’t really noticed until they’d come here. Maybe it hadn’t even happened until they’d come here. But it was disorienting. At night he would dream of Abby – the exact curve of her face, the way her hair hung over her ear, how her hand fitted on top of his. He would wake up crying, and wonder if there would come a time when the crying would stop, and he could not decide if that would be a good thing or not. And then in the morning he would see his daughter, and see that same curve of face in her, that same drape of hair, and Serena’s hand on top of his would feel so like Abby’s he did not know how he could bear it. The shadows by the hotel wall became too cool for him; he walked away from their grip and out into the sun.

  Dinner was lasagna that night. Serena had made it all by herself. Enid had been coaching her intermittently for several weeks – more often than not, Serena didn’t appear to enjoy those sessions much, but she was never late. Tonight they were alone, dining by candlelight. He wished Abby could have seen her – how grownup she looked. Then he felt a chill, perhaps because of where they were, and the importance of the evening, and found himself thinking that perhaps Abby did see her, that she had been watching them the whole time. The few guests in the hotel kept largely to themselves and took meals in their rooms. Jacob was off attending to his own mysterious affairs.

  “I’m kind of glad Jacob isn’t here tonight,” Serena said. “Is that a bad thing to say?” She cut her lasagna expertly, holding the next portion daintily speared on her fork.

  “Of course not. I thought maybe you’d be disappointed,” Richard said. “He should have been here for your first try at lasagna.” He stuffed his mouth with a huge portion, strands of it hanging off his chin, dripping onto his shirt. “Mmm, and isn’t it delicious!”

  Serena laughed. “Where’s your manners, Daddy?” She took a careful bite. “Sometimes it’s nice to have dinner with just the two of us. Makes it kind of special. Besides, Jacob’s weird sometimes.”

  “Well, I can’t argue with that. But we couldn’t do much without him around.”

  “Daddy?”

  “Mmm.” Richard’s mouth was full again.

  “I know what’d be good for my birthday.”

  “A new car, I suppose.”

  “Not this year. I thought maybe a razor. For my legs.”

  Richard looked at her. He was aware that his face must be showing surprise, but he’d actually been expecting this. “Are you sure?”

  “Daddy! I’ve got hair.”

  “I know, but it’s not that much.”

  “It’s embarrassing.”

  Richard knew she’d been wearing knee-high socks, and tights, even on very warm days. He’d asked her if she wasn’t burning up. Now that he thought about it, she hadn’t shown her bare legs in months. “I understand, sweetie. I’ll see what I can do.”

  Serena smiled broadly, then returned, with serious concentration, to her meal. She straightened in her chair and raised her chin. In the candlelight, she appeared suddenly to have aged a decade. Richard took a deep breath and tried to finish his meal.

  That night Serena was too excited to sleep, feeling all grown up because of the cooking, and the razor, and he did let her stay up a couple of hours past her bedtime. She’d wanted to listen to a comedy show on the radio with him. They’d discovered upon arrival, much to her distress, that there were no televisions here (“Can you imagine our residents watching television?” was the way Jacob had explained it to him), but he had managed to get her interested in the variety of programming available on the radio. For himself, Richard had little tolerance for anything meant to be ‘funny’ so soon after Abby’s death, but he felt he couldn’t refuse Serena’s request for his company. And it was easier with radio, if he heard anything he could not deal with, to make himself not hear. Serena had tried to be very grownup about the show, laughing loudly just slightly after the jokes were delivered, or when she saw that he was somewhat amused, and furrowing her brow in concentrated study of the parts of the broadcast outside her immediate experience, which was roughly half of it.

  He’d been touched by all this, of course, but it also frightened him. He felt in over his head. He was relieved when she finally asked him to read a fairytale for bedtime and tuck her in.

  Abby would have known what to do, what to say. She wouldn’t have needed Jacob to prod her into doing the right thing.

  Richard liked the nights best. This had been a huge surprise – when he had first arrived, the thought of spending the hours of darkness within those chaotic walls had brought an uneasy sensation he hadn’t felt since childhood. The first few mornings, he’d awakened with the covers pulled up over his head.

  But after a time, the night had become a comfort to him. After dark, the vast sprawl of the hotel began to disappear slowly into the shadows, the lights dimming by means of an apparently complex system of timers, the various wings and rooms falling asleep one by one until only the suite of rooms he and Serena occupied, and the front lobby, were awake and part of the real world. Then he seldom ventured into the other parts of the hotel, save for a few well-lit corridors where the current guests resided (unless they specified that their section of the complex be kept dark). To walk in those dark, sleeping halls would have felt too much like sleepwalking, or like stepping into someone else’s dream. With the darkness limiting his world, he could imagine that he still lived in a small house somewhere, with nothing to bother him outside his few, comfortable rooms.

  Abby had always said she liked a “small life in a small house.” She would never have been happy living in the hotel.

  So why did he feel her now? In their island of light, floating amidst the darkness, it was difficult to ignore the thought. Intense grief made you both a believer and a skeptic. You believed you would see her again, when you least expected it, coming around some corner, or the one face you recognized in an anonymous crowd. You would not permit yourself to believe that death was the end. You were skeptical that she could have died in the first place, for how could such a terrible thing have happened to you?

  One night, Richard had come up behind Jacob as he was closing the door to an out-of-the-way room. Jacob spoke into the darkness of the room before completely closing the door, just the one short sentence, and Richard could swear it had been, “There now, Abby, you rest now.”

  He considered the possibility of Serena having some sort of encounter with her dead mother. She would have told him if something like that had occurred. He trusted it wouldn’t happen, couldn’t happen. He wouldn’t know what to say.

  One night Richard was sitting in a huge overstuffed chair off to the side of the lobby, the floor lamp by the chair illuminating his lap, the book, and a little of the floor beyond his feet. He’d been thinking about his married life, and the last time he’d made love to Abby. That thin smile of hers, as omnipresent as it was, had a different cast to it during their lovemaking. The fact that it had always suggested pain to him seemed to have added significance when linked to her passion. He did not know if he’d ever feel such sexual desire again, but he cherished the memory.

  When he dreamed of sex, it was as if he were haunted by the ghost of his own lust. He’d wake up in the morning drenched, twisted up in his bedclothes, with no clear memory of the dream, and that forgetting seemed to increase its power over him.

  A small antique lamp affixed to the wall near the top of the grand staircase illuminated the landing. Most of the steps remained in darkness
. He’d have to do something about that. Someone would try to come down those stairs in the middle of the night and break their neck.

  And as he thought that, someone paused on the landing.

  “Serena, it’s way past bedtime.”

  There was no answer. The figure wavered, then bent forward as if to whisper something from that long distance.

  “Serena?”

  Then the figure was falling.

  “Serena!”

  Richard jumped out of his chair and bounded up the stairs. When he reached the landing, no one was there.

  That night his dreams were so sharp-edged, his nerves so raw, that each transition of scene was like a raw scrape across the surface of the brain. Something with teeth had broken into the suite of rooms he shared with his daughter, something with a high-pitched squeal, sharp smell, rough edges. But he could not see it. He held his daughter close to him, her flannel pajamas sweet-smelling against his face, and saw nothing as the creature’s wail rose and her soft pajamas filled with red. He could do nothing, even as the pajamas he embraced so fiercely began to empty, until finally all he was holding were rags.

  Serena came into his room later that night, sobbing from a terrible dream. He should have asked her for details. Abby would have. He should have encouraged her to talk about it, talked it through with her. But he was afraid to hear what she might say. He hushed her, told her it was just a bad dream, and held her close as she cried herself to sleep.

  THE NEXT AFTERNOON, a new guest arrived at the Deadfall. It was unusually hot that day, especially for spring. The hydraulics in the front door had malfunctioned, requiring focused effort by both Richard and Jacob together to open it. Jacob had been struggling over the repair all morning, uncharacteristically garbed in T-shirt and yellow-and-green Bermuda shorts. Serena overcame her embarrassment over her hairy legs and came out of her room shortly after noon in a bathing suit. Seeing Jacob in shorts, she fell apart into giggles, hiding behind the front desk until she could control herself.