by Simon Bourke
Malcolm stayed in his chair, watching her go. Relief poured over him; the pressure was off, he couldn’t sink any lower. He finished his drink and looked at the bar. They were still serving.
21
How long had he stayed at the bar? He couldn’t be sure, but he was definitely the last to leave. They’d been turning off the lights and putting chairs on tables when he’d finished his last drink. Had he told the barman about his marital difficulties? He thought he had told someone. His request to sleep on one of the couches in the bar had been flatly refused. And the night porter was similarly unmoved by his pleas to bed down in the lobby. With no other rooms available in the hotel, he faced quite a predicament. Did he skulk around the lobby until sunrise, head out into the unfamiliar streets of London to see what he could find, or go upstairs to his room? It was still his room; he’d paid for it. He understood that she might not want him sharing her bed, but surely she’d allow him to sleep on the floor? She wouldn’t have him wandering the streets like a dog.
He entered the lift, the same one his wife had made her escape in a few hours previously. There was a mirror across one whole wall, a means for party-goers to check their appearance one last time before hitting the town. Malcolm had no desire to check himself out, the thought of what might be staring back terrified him. He put his back to his reflection, haphazardly pressing at the control panel until the lift jolted into life. The porter had told him his room was on the fifth floor. He would keep going until he saw the number five. It could be a fun game, a little late-night entertainment. The lift stopped and the doors opened. Someone came in, a man; a fat man. Maybe he’d know what floor they were on.
“What floor are we on, mate?”
“Second.”
“Where’re you going?”
“Fourth.”
“Can you bring me to the fifth?”
Silence. He thought about asking another question but didn’t want to impose. The doors opened again and the man started to leave.
“Hey, mate! Can you press ‘five’ on that?” he asked, pointing in the general direction of the control panel, which was now at head height; he was sitting on the floor. He guffawed loudly as the man walked away and the doors closed again. Maybe I’ll just sleep here, he thought, resting his head against the wall, it’s really comfy. Then the doors jarred open again. Five; it had to be.
He struggled to his feet, plunged out of the lift and slammed into the wall opposite. Lights blinkered on.
“Hello?” he shouted. “Is anyone there?”
He’d just triggered the lights in the hallway, the ones to help guests find their rooms. He clambered to his feet once more, grunting in annoyance, and surveyed the scene. It was just like any other hotel corridor: beige walls, closed doors and soft, spongy carpet.
“Is this the fifth floor?” he enquired of no one in particular.
There would be fives on the walls, wouldn’t there? Fives everywhere. Fifth-floor fives, quite a tongue-twister. He turned back towards the elevator. It was shut now. That was okay; he wasn’t getting back in.
“Five?” he asked, staring at the wall beside the elevator.
This part of the wall was a different colour, not beige, darker. Brown? There was a number on it, in a lighter shade, beige, and it looked like a five. It was a five.
“Five,” he declared contentedly. “Five.”
Their room was on the fifth floor, and so was he. The room – but wait, the room number, what was it? He had memorised it earlier, but that was hours ago. It began with a five, he knew that. Five one six, five hundred and sixteen. That sounded very familiar. Too familiar for it not to mean something.
He stumbled onwards, repeating the digits over and over in his head; but having what he thought was the room number and locating the door with that number were two different things entirely. He stopped at the first door he came to and stood, swaying, in front of it. Why did they have to make the numbers so small? He couldn’t see a thing, not from back here anyway. He needed to get closer, but not too close; he didn’t want to wake anyone up. Five-two – what was that, an X? A sudden, unexpected collision sent him reeling; he bounced around, crashing against a couple of walls, before coming to rest in the middle of the floor, cross-legged with his head in his hands. What had happened there? He looked back up at the door accusingly. It remained in place, looming over him, its number still a mystery. Why did everything had to be so bloody complicated?
Amazingly, no one had come out to see what all the ruckus was about. So, once his world had stopped spinning, Malcolm set about dragging himself upright once again. He managed it but it didn’t feel right, it was too precarious. Instead, he took to his knees.
“There, that’s better,” he mumbled as he shuffled back towards the door. At least now if he hit traffic, he wouldn’t have so far to fall.
He made it to the door without incident, resting both hands upon it while he pondered his next move. Looking upwards, he could see the outline of the valuable digits, but he’d need to be face-to-face if he wished to ascertain their identity. Sighing deeply, he rose to his feet once more, using the door for balance until he stood at full height, his hands planted on either side of the door frame. He tried to focus on what was in front of him, but his head lolled from side to side like a ship in a storm, making the numbers moving targets. He closed his eyes and rested his head against the door, reasoning that the occupants must have already resigned themselves to death at the hands of the bogeyman. Taking a deep breath, he opened his eyes and gazed forward, hoping for answers.
But it was like looking at ancient hieroglyphics in a lost Egyptian tomb; nothing made sense. His eyes were sending the relevant information to his brain, but it wasn’t being computed correctly. Finally, though, his senses awoke and familiarity swept over him. The first number was a five. He already knew that, but still there was a sense of mild elation; he was on the right track. The second had notions of being an eight but eventually became a big fat zero, and the third was a two. Five oh two. He had to sit down again, the strain of it all was too much. Once settled, he crunched the numbers. Five one six, five oh two. Hotels always had the even numbers on one side, the odd on the other. So if he was at 502, where was 516? If only Dennis were here, he was the maths ace.
He tried counting on his fingers, but discovered to his horror that he only had three of them on his right hand. Not to worry, that could be dealt with in the morning. Lacking the necessary digits, it was left to his overworked brain to figure things out all by itself. He subtracted 502 from 516 and got 504, which meant there were over two hundred and fifty doors to go; that surely wasn’t right. So instead he subtracted 516 from 502, and ended up with minus twenty-four. Did that mean he had to go back twelve doors? He looked down the other end of the hallway, which came to a halt at the elevator; there were no doors that way. This was hopeless. He would have to knock on every single door until he found the right one. People would be upset, and he might get told off, but there was no other way round this. He prepared to knock on the door in front of him, bracing himself for the sight of an irate, semi-clad man, when it came to him, his ‘Eureka!’ moment: eliminate the five hundred. Now, instead of having 516 and 502, he had sixteen and two. That was easy. Sixteen minus two equals fourteen, divided by two is seven. Seven doors to go. Now he just had to count them.
He stayed on his knees, it would have been impossible to count and walk at the same time, and began crawling along the corridor like an unruly infant. One, two, three, on he went, knees burning from the carpet, brain unable to process the pain. Four, five, six, seven. He stopped and looked up at the door. Even from down here he could see that this was Room 516. Now for the hard part. He got to his feet, cleared his throat, and did his level best to regain some composure. Tapping the door gently, he called out his wife’s name. “Margie, it’s me. Let me in.”
“Marge,” he continued. “It’s Malcolm. Let m
e in.”
He put his ear to the door; nothing.
“Marge,” he said, louder this time. “Let me in, please.”
Still no response. He knocked a little louder, a proper knock this time, and put his ear to the door once more. He fancied he heard something so, encouraged, he knocked again.
“Margie, it’s me.”
The door opened, but only wide enough to show half of his wife’s furious face.
“What do you want?” she hissed. “Go away!”
“Margie, let me in, please.”
“Malcolm, if you don’t get away from this door right now, I’m going to call security.”
“Oh, Marge, don’t be so silly. Come on, let me in.”
He put his hand through the small gap and tried to push his way into the room. She resisted, pushing back, her tiny little frame doing its best to repel the intruder.
“Margie, come on!!” he moaned, throwing his full weight against the door. “I just want to sleep!”
Margaret valiantly held on, at one point almost gaining the upper hand, but with one final surge he propelled himself into the room, taking them both to the floor in an unceremonious heap.
“MALCOLM!”
They lay there in a tangle of arms and legs, Malcolm already on his way to the land of nod, his wife about as far from it as she could possibly be.
The commotion had alerted Sophie, who had been sleeping in the adjoining room.
“Mum, what’s happening?” she asked, standing by the door.
“Nothing, love, go back to bed. It’s just your father being silly.”
“What’s wrong with Dad?”
“Just a bit too much to drink, that’s all. Go back to bed.”
“Is he okay, Mum? I don’t think he is.”
Malcolm lay flat on the floor, face down, gurgling and groaning like a sick pig.
“He’s fine, Sophie, I assure you. Now go back to bed, please!”
Far from convinced, Sophie backed away towards the door separating the two rooms.
“Go on, love. I’ll come in to you in a minute, okay?”
“Okay, Mum.”
Margaret took a deep breath. Her next task was to get her husband out of the room. It appeared unlikely she would be able to manage this feat by herself. She was just about to call reception when a member of staff appeared at the door.
“Is everything all right, madam?” he asked, looking at the snoring mass of flesh on the floor.
“I don’t want this man in my room; can you arrange to have him removed?”
The staff member, small in stature and young in years, looked at Malcolm and then back to Margaret.
“I may need to ask for some assistance, madam.”
“That’s fine, as long as he’s taken out of here.”
He took out a walkie-talkie and went into the hall, presumably to recruit a team of weightlifters.
A couple of minutes later he returned with two other men, both of whom looked far more equipped for the job.
One of them sized up the situation. “Friend of yours, love?” he asked.
“My husband,” she said quietly.
“Ah, I see,” he replied, taking one of Malcolm’s arms and nodding to his colleague to grab the other. “He’ll be spending the night in the doghouse, then?”
“He will.”
Malcolm woke up, looking around in confusion as he was lifted from the floor. It had taken a lot of time and effort to get here. And now, after finally making himself comfortable, he was being manhandled against his will.
“Oi! Put me down!” he growled. “Let go of me!”
“Now, now, sir,” the first man said. “Your wife has decided she doesn’t want you in here, so we’re taking you somewhere else.”
“PUT ME DOWN!” roared Malcolm, now fully coming to his senses.
He began to struggle, flailing his arms wildly as the men attempted to get him out of the room. The young staff member who had been watching from a distance suddenly sprang into action, grabbing Malcolm by the legs and holding on for all he was worth.
“LET ME GO, YOU BASTARDS!”
A kerfuffle ensued, with the four men jostling for position by the doorway: Malcolm screaming blue murder, while the other three fought to get him into the hallway. A lampshade was sent spinning to the floor, Margaret’s jewellery box came toppling down from the dresser and Malcolm lost both of his shoes. Finally, after much consternation and no little drama, they got him out of the room and away from his wife. Now all she wanted to do was to close the door behind them and cry herself to sleep, but she couldn’t do that – because someone else had been alerted by the goings on in room 516.
22
Jonathan had been worried that he might not sleep. As soon as he’d returned to his room, the nerves had begun to kick in. And as he lay down in the unfamiliar bed, he willed the powers-that-be to bring him a good night’s rest. He needn’t have worried; within minutes he was out for the count. The day’s activities had worn out the seemingly indefatigable fifteen-year-old.
But then, from somewhere deep in his dreams, he heard voices, voices he knew. They were raised in anger. He tried to ignore them, to drift back to oblivion, but it was no use. Those voices weren’t any old voices, they belonged to the people most important to him. He awoke and looked groggily around the room. He knew he’d woken up for a reason, but couldn’t remember what it was. Then he heard the voices once more. They were coming from the room across the hall, his parents’ room. He jumped out of bed and went to the door. What he saw next would haunt him for years to come.
His father – the same man who he had toured the Imperial War Museum with only hours earlier – was suspended in mid-air, his arms and legs corralled by three panting, red-faced hotel workers. He couldn’t see his father’s face, but he knew it was him, or at least a version of him, by his voice. That voice was unloading expletives at a dizzying rate, words Jonathan had never heard come from that mouth before. His initial reaction was to run to his father’s side, to protect him from these thugs by any means necessary; but when he saw his mother looking on in anguish, he realised that the only person his father needed protecting from was himself.
“Mum!” he shouted across the hallway. It was neither a cry for help nor an offering of assistance, it was the voice of a frightened child unnerved by the sight of his parents at war.
Margaret’s face crumpled in despair at the sight of her elder child. If only he could have been spared, everything might have been all right.
“Jonathan,” she called out above the din, “your father’s just had a bit too much to drink. Go back to bed.”
But she knew it was pointless. How could he possibly go back to bed without seeing the last act of this dreadful charade?
Jonathan crossed the hallway and watched aghast as the men grappled with his father. They had pinned him to the floor, the two bigger ones taking out their frustrations with unnecessary force. Malcolm cried out in pain, the fight now completely knocked out of him.
“Hey, leave him alone!” Jonathan cried, unwilling to renounce his father just yet.
“It’s his own fault, mate,” one of the men replied ruefully, tightening his grip.
Another yelp of agony spurred Jonathan into action. He shoved his father’s assailant, sending him clattering against the wall. The man reared up, fists raised, before being calmed down by his colleague. With only two men holding him down, Malcolm strained to see who had come to his rescue.
“Jonathan, is that you?” he asked, twisting his neck upwards.
“Yes, Dad,” Jonathan replied, keeping a watchful eye on the man he’d just assaulted.
“Good lad, Jonathan. These bastards just attacked me for no reason.”
Jonathan looked at his mother for affirmation; had they just attacked his dad for no reason? If so, why
was she standing there silently, doing nothing to help him?
“Jonathan, I don’t want him here,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “He’s very drunk, and I can’t have him near me when he’s like this.”
“Talk some sense into her, lad,” Malcolm slurred as the men eased their grip and allowed him to get to his feet. “Just a few beers, no need for all this.”
His father looked like a complete stranger, wild-eyed and cantankerous. Jonathan didn’t know this man.
“I think you should go, Dad,” he said assertively.
“Eh?”
This was too much for Malcolm. His son, the one he could always depend on, was turning against him too. “Come on, Jon, not you as well?”
Jonathan cast his eyes downward.
“Please take him away,” said Margaret, standing by Jonathan’s side in a gesture of unity. It was as though Jonathan had risen in rank; he was the man of the house now.
“Jonathan,” Malcolm pleaded as the men led him away. “JONATHAN!”
His cries grew louder as they escorted him down the hall and into the elevator, until he disappeared and there was nothing but silence.
They returned to the room to find Sophie standing there, in floods of tears.
“What’s happened, Mum? Is Dad going to prison?”
Jonathan set about tidying up the mess while his mother attempted to soothe her daughter. He also wanted to know what had happened, how their lovely evening had descended into chaos, but he was afraid to ask.