Hydra

by Matt Wesolowski

  Back in the salon, it’s getting late, the rain is still falling outside, the darkness now swallowing the day. I am wondering to myself, as you are by now, what any of this has to do with what happened in 2014. I was hoping Angel could shed some light on the Arla Macleod that she knew. I was hoping that seeing Arla in her formative years might give us some insight into why she killed her family.

  There have been hints. Angel has suggested that Arla’s parents were strict, which is something we already knew, but there seems to be nothing extreme – that Angel knew about at least. To be honest I feel like I’ve learned more about Angel than Arla from this conversation. This is fine, but it wasn’t what I set out to do here. As for this Anthony character, it feels like we’re moving even further away from what I first intended to discover.

  I decide to push Angel a little harder about Arla instead. There’s a chance she might clam up, pull down her own shutters, but I have to do it.

  —I know you know what happened back in 2014 to Arla and her family.

  —Everyone knows that shit, man. It’s the past now. God rest them.

  —What are your thoughts? People were angry when she was sentenced. People thought Arla got away with leniency, that her mental illness was perhaps an act.

  —People can think what they want. I’ve said nothing like that.

  —Was there anything else that happened? Anything at all you can remember that might help us understand Arla a bit more? I get that you had feelings for her back then. It makes sense. And you couldn’t have predicted what she was going to do, no one could. But looking back, were there any signs?

  —Man, I’ve carried this round for years, yeah – so many years I’ve carried this, like a monkey on my back, you know? And I just never knew how or where I could tell it. Would the police even care? Would they even listen?

  Then you came along.

  —And you reached out to me.

  —OK, look, I said that you had to edit this so I wouldn’t look bad. What I’m about to tell you, it’s bad, yeah. I mean it’s not just bad, it’s horrible, man. I’ve tried to stop it consuming me for all these years. I’ve held it off making me feel like shit every single day of my life. But the fact is I was young. I was stupid. I like to think I was streetwise and that, but no, man. I had been through a lot by then, but I wasn’t anything. I was just a stupid little girl.

  Fuck, man. Like I say, I’ve not talked about this shit before. Maybe if I do … it’ll … maybe it’ll do me some good?

  —OK, Angel, take your time.

  —This boy, this Anthony, he’s just following us around – Chat-chat-chat. What’s your name? Have you got brothers and sisters? Where did you get that wristband from? Are you into this and that band? All that. And I’m all, like, OK, let’s lose the douche bag, yeah? I’m trying to say it to Arla with my eyes.

  So, we’re just walking through the hotel and I can just hear his breathing, this wheezing behind us wherever we go, you know? It’s just relentless, man.

  —And how was Arla dealing with all this attention?

  —Well, that was the thing. Anthony was, like, barely even asking me anything; it was all about Arla: where she was from, what she was into, all that. I mean, I think she kind of liked the attention. She was all over it. I was like, What about me, man? I’ve just been giving everything these last two days and now this boy comes along and I’m nothing again.

  But that was then. Now when I look at it I think, if that was me, suddenly being the centre of two different people’s worlds … man, I’d have loved it, you know?

  So I don’t blame her now. But back then, man I was mad!

  —It makes sense, Angel. It really does.

  —The thing was, I could tell that Arla had never really had this sort of attention from boys before, you know? Cos she was just letting him ask all these questions, letting him get all interested. And you can’t do that with boys, not if you know what you’re doing. And she was talking about bands and all those ‘games’ off the internet with him. Cos, like I said, Arla was into all that too.

  —Did that make any difference to what was happening?

  —You know, I don’t think she even knew what she was doing, yeah, but she had him in the palm of her hand, twisted round her little finger.

  —Wow.

  —Yeah. And that’s where I should have stepped in; that’s where I should have had a word with her – should have talked about it or something instead of doing what I did.

  —Which was?

  —I just thought fuck this, you know? I was so angry with that fucking wheezing fat kid. Why wasn’t he interested in me? Why wasn’t she interested in me anymore? That’s why I did it. Just to show her. Just to show Arla that she’d miss me.

  —What did you do?

  —I just sacked her off for a bit man, like a big baby, like a princess – just took off on my own for a bit, you know? Just to see if she needed me.

  Angel tells me she avoided Arla altogether for a couple of days. She spent a morning in her hotel room feigning a headache, apparently over-egging the pudding so much that her carers became a little concerned. It was this that drove Angel away from the grounds of the hotel and a little further afield.

  —So I just started walking and didn’t stop. I was pissed off. I was trying to forget both of them, and got further and further away until I was in the local village or something. Streets I didn’t recognise. I didn’t care. I could just get lost and no one would give a shit.

  Then guess who pops up out of nowhere? One of the bad boys from before. Kyle. He was just sat there, just like before, man, just like, sat on a wall or something. And he looks up and he’s like, ‘You again.’

  The look on his face man, everything about him, everything was just trouble. Because, trust me, I know trouble when I see it. I know bad boys when I see them, and he was one. Trouble.

  Angel tells me she accepted a cigarette from Kyle. She then made a point of hanging around with him and his friends for the rest of that day and the whole of the next. She tells me they mainly spent it wandering around the streets smoking cigarettes. Bored teenagers.

  —How many of Kyle’s friends were there with you?

  —I dunno, one or two. All the same, just like him: trouble.

  —Were there any other girls?

  —No.

  —Did that not strike you as a bit strange?

  —Nah, I’m used to that. I’m used to being one of the boys. Kyle told me about this party, and I got back a little bit of that feeling.

  —What do you mean?

  —Like someone finally cared enough to actually invite me to something, you know? I remember shrugging and doing my best to act cool. Then I remember the moment when I realised, when it all just came crashing down, when it was all destroyed.

  —How do you mean?

  —They had only told me about the party so I would tell her.

  —Arla?

  —I thought so at first but no. It was her sister. They asked me to go and hang with Arla again, to tell Alice, to tell Arla’s sister about that party. I remember my stomach just folding in on itself, thinking fuck you, just walking away from them, just walking away from everyone after that. No one wanted me – not them, not Arla. I was good for no one.

  —Why Alice do you think? Did they know her?

  —She was beautiful. She was way younger than them, but still she was way out of their league, and none of them had the guts to speak to her. That’s why they asked me.

  After her day and a half with Kyle and his friends, Angel found herself back at the hotel. Alone.

  —And then me and Arla, we just sort of bumped into each other again. Man, it was just … I was pissed because it was like she didn’t even care, man. Like, she wasn’t even concerned that I’d been away. I know it was only a day or whatever, but still.

  —What about Anthony, was he still there?

  —Ugh, of course he was, wheezing away in the background, following her about like a shadow.
<
br />   —What had they been doing while you’d been with the boys?

  —It was like Arla had found her soul mate or some shit, you know? That Anthony, he was a little bit older but full of the same sort of mad shit as her.

  —Mad shit?

  —The lift game, those internet games. He loved all that stuff, too, man – all that other-world bullshit.

  During those couple of days Anthony and Arla had presumably been comparing their knowledge of ‘games’ they had found on the internet. It is interesting to note the similarities between Anthony and Arla were stronger than between Arla and Angel. It is particularly interesting that both were into these games. Arla and Anthony seem to have been looking for an escape of some kind and these games heavily feature the concept of other worlds, of gateways between this dimension and others. A good example is Arla’s Korean Elevator to Another World game. Angel believes Arla and Anthony played this on the days she was with Kyle and his friends. Angel’s own escape was much more literal.

  —I bet that didn’t go down well with you – that they got on so well.

  —You have to understand that for me, back then, all this was a lot. It was rejection, yeah? Another fuckin’ rejection.

  That’s why it went down like it did. That’s why it went down like that. Because of me.

  —Did you tell Arla or Alice Macleod about the party, like Kyle and his friends asked?

  —Fuck no, I didn’t even know Alice! Alice was just like those boys, plastic and perfect. She was welcome to them! You know, my first instinct was to do it, to tell her and then go trotting back to those boys like a good little … But I didn’t. If there’s one thing I’m proud of, it’s that I didn’t do that. Not that it made much difference.

  —What do you mean?

  —One of the bad boys must have grown some balls because I started seeing Alice about with them, you know? They got to her somehow in the end. Guys like Kyle, they always get what they want.

  —Guys like Kyle?

  —Rich, entitled, spoiled. His dad was some sort of doctor and he knew for a fact he could do whatever he wanted. Money talks with guys like that.

  So, anyway, I had no one and just found myself back with Arla. I couldn’t resist her. And pretty much as soon as I start hanging around with her again, Arla starts telling me about this new game Anthony knows – this ‘Hooded Man’ thing.

  The Hooded Man Ritual is similar in essence to the Elevator to Another World. We’ll hear the details of it in due course. What is striking is that it too has a theme of escape, of passing from this world into another. I get the impression that Anthony was just as skilled as Arla and Angel were at finding ways to disappear. Angel’s animosity towards him therefore seems odd. But that’s teenagers, I guess.

  —So I knew those two were going to sneak out of their rooms to meet and do that Hooded Man bullshit at midnight. They were just all hyped up about it. I was ready to walk away then and there, when Arla turns to me and says, ‘Do you think you’ll be able to sneak out?’ as if we’ve all been in on this together all along. As if I was there too.

  So I just nodded and she turns back to Anthony, yeah, just chatting on. I just left, man. I was, like, ‘See you guys later, yeah?’ And I just got up and left.

  Arla didn’t even turn around man. She didn’t give one shit.

  That’s when I decided to actually do something. Not to Arla, yeah, but to him, to that Anthony.

  —What did you do?

  —See, I couldn’t do nothing personally. If people like me do bad things, we get caught and we get punished. I knew that already back then. So I went and found Kyle and the bad boys. Alice was with them. This sounds just so stupid but I just started telling them about Arla and Anthony and the stupid baby games they were playing. They were all laughing and it felt good, man. Like, it was suddenly funny; like, it felt OK again. I regret telling them now. Course I do.

  According to Angel, what she told Kyle and his friends was what she now tells me: that Arla and Anthony had agreed to meet in the hotel drawing room at midnight, a leisure area adjacent to the main reception, to begin the Hooded Man Ritual.

  The Hooded Man is supposed to be a particularly ‘dangerous’ game and Angel says Arla and Anthony could talk about little else that day.

  —The way they went on about that game! Like they were witches or some shit. I thought there was no way they were going to get out at midnight and go to the drawing room with no one finding them. Arla and Anthony, though – they were more concerned with the fuckin’ game! They were more worried about being taken off by a ghost or some bullshit than getting in trouble. Different lives, different worlds we were from, me and them. I was, like, why can’t you do that shit in your rooms? But they just looked at me, sat there with all these plans and bits of string and lighters and shit. They looked at me like I was a million miles away, man. So, after I felt good. I felt good that I told Kyle and the rest of them about their stupid fucking games!

  There would be plenty of CCTV cameras in the hotel, not to mention hotel staff and other guests that could potentially challenge the youngsters. But the reason they chose the drawing room as the location to begin the game will become clear.

  The Hooded Man Ritual’s origins are sketchy at best, but my internet searches suggest it is Japanese in origin. For the ritual, you need an old telephone – one with a rotary dial. There was such a phone on a table in the corner of the drawing room, according to Angel – explaining why Arla and Anthony planned to begin the ritual there. You also need some black cord – rope or string – matches and a watch.

  The ritual begins on the stroke of midnight. Participants should count to thirteen before dialling a certain number with the phone still on the hook. I’m not going to divulge this number – people keen to partake in the ritual can find it out for themselves. I’ll simply say that, apparently, this is one of the most dangerous of these types of games.

  After calling the number, you must tie one of the black cords to the handset, lift the handset with the cord and dial another number. Count to thirteen and speak into the phone receiver: ‘Hello, I need a cab.’

  The black cord must be untied from the phone receiver and burned as soon as possible.

  It’s at this point that a black cab should turn up outside. According to the game’s rules, you must exit the building, get into the back seat, close the door and go to sleep.

  Like the elevator game, there are certain rules the participant must adhere to while inside the cab to make the game a success. For example, if you wake and see the time is anything other than 3.30 am, you must exit the cab and return home, and wait for another night to begin the ritual again. If you awake at exactly 3.30 am, however, you should see a hooded man driving the cab. It seems you must simply ride in the cab until he stops. That’s when you must whisper in the hooded man’s ear, ‘I have reached my destination.’ You will then fall asleep, waking back where you began.

  It is ambiguous where the hooded man is taking you on your ride. Like the Elevator to Another World, it seems you enter another dimension. And the websites discussing the game state that the longer you ride, the harder it is to return to this one.

  —Did you try and connect with Arla and Anthony again that night?

  —So, those two were planning to go downstairs at midnight. Anthony’s family were staying, like, on one of the lower floors and Arla was up on the fifth. I was on the ninth floor. We were nowhere near each other. They agreed to meet in the lift at 11.50 exactly. Arla would take the lift down to the first floor and wait for him.

  I don’t know if I even slept that night but I remember turning over, looking at the radio clock thing on my bedside table. Quarter to midnight: 11.45 – I’ll always remember that, you know? Those red digits seared into my brain. I could have made it different. I could have got up. My carers were fast asleep in the room next door, so they wouldn’t have noticed. But I didn’t, I just lay there. All I could hear was my heart beating. It was hot that night – hot and muggy
– and my duvet was caught up in my feet and I kept telling my body to get up, to swing my legs out of the bed, but they just refused.

  —So you never went with them?

  —I never even got out of bed. I just lay there, breathing, my heart beating. And then, just past midnight, I heard a noise. As soon as I heard that noise I jumped. I felt prickles all over me and this horrible feeling of dread – this horrible tingling, dragging feeling at the bottom of my belly. The only other time I’ve felt that was when I heard Arla’s name on the news. I got that same feeling, and I thought, what if I’d got everything wrong after all?

  What if they were right?

  What if they were right about those other worlds?

  There is a huge pause as Angel stares into the night, lost in her own thoughts. I almost don’t want to ask about what she heard on that still night in Cornwall all those years ago, and I’m still at a loss to see what any of this has to do with what happened years later.

  My phone buzzes, horribly loud from my pocket. We both jump. We then both laugh nervously, when a few moments later Angel’s phone, which has lain silently on one of the work surfaces erupts in an even louder buzz. The ice seems broken – the shadows of the salon less dark – as we both turn our phones to silent and put them away.

  —What did you hear, Angel? In the middle of the night?

  —It was a car engine, man. It was an engine. I swear, as soon as I heard it, I put my head under the covers and started praying. I swear to you I have never prayed so hard in my life.

  —So what do you think happened that night? Are you saying you think it worked – the ritual?

  —I know – that car engine, it could have been anything, right? It could have been a night porter or something. One of the guests coming back late. That’s logic – that’s a logical explanation. That hotel was huge, man.

  —That’s right. It could have been anything. Arla and Anthony were still there the next day weren’t they? They hadn’t gone?