No Vacancy

by Bonnie Randall

  “There are people here,” she whispered. “Hundreds and hundreds of people here. And they’re not just dreaming, Luke.” She swallowed, a rasp. “Th-they’re craving.”

  “Craving?” Odd word. “Craving what?”

  “Eminence,” she breathed. “Fame. Im…immortality.” She faced him then, eyes buried beneath her blindfold, yet piercing all the same. “And they have it. Immortality. Just not…not the way that they’d wanted.” She reached out then, ran an unseeing hand down the white wainscot bisecting the hall, fingers kicking up a small cloud of grime. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “That the dream you starved for, whored for, turned into this nightmare.”

  Luke looked around as if he too could see who she spoke to.

  All that faced him was the narrow set of red walls.

  “This place,” she said. “It’s like a parasite that soaks itself in despair. In agony. In…in loneliness.”

  That little junkie down on the fifth floor. His tepid smile had been lonely, no question.

  “That’s where we are,” Della declared. “In a place that bathes in rage and despair. A place that devours dead dreams.”

  Dreams. Mich had dreamed of being commissioned ‘by the stars’. His gut lurched.

  Della faced him, blind. “You feel it, too. You’re no psychic, Lucas, but you feel it too.”

  He did. “Yes.” He nodded.

  “It’s a hotel.”

  “Yes,” again.

  She nodded too, visibly orienting. “When we deplaned I said ‘Lost’.”

  And ever since he’d repeated it silently, over and over.

  “You need to know, Lucas—I didn’t mean lost as in could not find their way.” She looked at him, blindfold still in place. “They’re not lost literally. They all know exactly how to get where they’re going.”

  “Th-they?” he said and the cold returned. Made him shiver.

  “Lost means lost cause,” she said. “Unrepentant . Unredeemable. After all.” She paused, lifted her chin again. “They don’t call this city Lost Angels for nothing.”

  He started.

  She snorted. “What part of psychic do you not understand, Luke? And let me tell you something else: where-ever…whatever hellhole this is that you’ve brought us to—we’re on a fool’s errand here. Lost means lost and that there’s nothing it will allow you to find here. You can’t outsmart a….a parasite that’s a century older, and a hell of a lot hungrier, than you.”

  “But Mich—”

  “Was seduced by whatever big lie was downstairs in that lobby. ’Cause there was one, wasn’t there? A big lie?”

  Old-school Hollywood was downstairs in that lobby. The seduction of glamor and opulence. A stage set like so many others in a city that proudly, even smugly, called itself ‘Tinsel Town’: all show and no substance.

  “Except there is plenty of substance,” Della corrected. “Every floor, all the walls, every beam holding this place up…blood-soaked bones, Lucas.”

  He flinched, yet…melodrama. Surely that was just melodrama.

  “Of course it’s melodrama!” she snapped. “Why do you think this place has clung to its glory-days era? Melodrama was always what worked for it best.”

  The bright walls, their white wainscot, even all the bold, round mirrors that faced the open elevator upon every floor…Eyes that your eyes can’t see. Luke shifted, uneasy. “So what…what do you think that it wants?”

  “I told you: immortality.”

  It had already been standing a century. “D-doesn’t it have that already?”

  “W-ell…” She shifted, one foot to the other. “It has history—do you know its history?”

  “I do.” Once Mich had come home, his research had been ruthless.

  And so had his need to sleep with the lights on for many nights after.

  “How about you?” he asked. “Can you see…do you know its history too?”

  “Impressions,” she muttered. “Not details. I…I just know this place has never been Disneyland.”

  Talk about the understatement of the century. He looked up and it was as if he could see though the ceiling, all the way to the floors where at least two serial killers had called home.

  “Welcome home,” that cast-member desk clerk had told him and now, neck tingling, he pondered Della’s outburst. What were the odds of so much violence and hatred and tragedy to have happened in one distinct spot?

  “The hungriest people have the most succulent souls,” she whispered, then shook herself. “Sorry. I have no idea where that came from.”

  A shiver seized him, jerked his face ’round to look down the hall. Room 1013. He held up the key as though Della could see. “Mich’s room, Dell. Mich’s mind. I…I want it back.”

  “It won’t let you have it.”

  She was right. The instinctive part of him—the psychic part every human had, remnant from caveman days when the body needed to know how to sense a predator—it said run.

  And so did the open elevator which seemed to be gaping in defiance to this place, practically begging them to hop back in and escape, make the right decision. Run.

  So do it. Run. Yet when he opened his mouth, he said “Can’t we just try?”

  “You won’t win.”

  “Why?” Christ, he sounded like a petulant child.

  And she must have thought so too for she grasped him, albeit blindly, by both lapels and shook. “Listen,” she hissed. “Use your head. Beyond this hotel, consider this whole city, this whole area. Does anywhere else you’ve ever heard of know compulsion, or seduction, like here?”

  No. In fact the notion of ‘Hollywood dreams’ was such a cliché it was now an unfunny joke.

  “Los Angeles inhales people’s dreams, Lucas. Eats their delusions of grandeur. This city…this city sells hope better than the slickest mind-control cult on the planet.”

  She wasn’t wrong.

  “But it does even more than that, Luke, and that’s where, spiritually where, things get dicey. LA…it’s known world-wide as a place capable of making identity, geography—even time—shift. It’s been doing it, and being downright worshipped for it, for decades. So do you really think that’s not powerful? Think that ability, shifting time, shifting identity, hasn’t permeated right down into the soil? It’s become a part of what an old hotel like this can now do all on its own. From trait to state, therapist. You know this stuff.”

  Of course he did—as it applied to people. People adapted and assumed traits. But places?

  “What’s stronger than hope, Lucas?” This, softly. “What’s stronger than a craving?”

  He had no answer.

  “How many times has this city—this hotel—heard the words ‘I’d do anything’?”

  An electric vein of sensation crackled down the vestibule, erected the hair on his arms.

  “There’s a whole lot of power when a whole lot of people are hungry for promises a place like this has no intentions to keep.”

  Darkness oozed in the hall. Still—“S-some people here—in LA—they’re successful,” he said. “They’re stars.”

  “Are they? The children who snort coke at cast parties when they’re barely twelve? The A-listers who submit to group sex, anal sex, any unwilling sex just to become overnight sensations? How much of the glitter and glam that the public licks up is only air-brushed perversion, Lucas? Degradation that you and I make a living healing people from?”

  Souls cast into bottomless wishing wells. Hadn’t he always thought that himself? Especially about old, classic Hollywood that had been borne a mere stone’s throw from here? This place bathes in despair. Yet—“Not all—” he tried again, but his desperation died upon her pitying smile.

  “You want to tell me something pure can come out of a place that tells lies for a living?” She clucked her tongue. “Have you ever, in your practice, seen someone come out of a relationship with a psychopath who’s not emotionally and psychologically mutilated?”

  No. He had not.
/>
  Dark cold floated around them like it listened.

  “A place like this—and there’s more than one in this area—they’re…they’re like batteries. They drain every hope, every dream…and they’re clever, Luke. They’ll show you what you want to see—until you see and do what you never, not even in nightmares, believed you’d see and do.”

  A piece of history hurtled to the forefront of his mind; a group of young hippies looking for peace in a commune out in Benedict Canyon. Living there happily…until their leader compelled them into blood-soaked butchery just a handful of miles away in Beverly Hills.

  Then, more recently, there was Mich, his Mich, screaming incoherently in that soup kitchen: “There’s a razor he’s got a razor get that razor…!”

  You’ll see and do what you never, not even in nightmares, believed you’d see and do.

  “Mich,” he whispered. What had she done with that razor? “Why her?”

  “Why not her?” countered Della. “You think this place is fussy?” A twist of smile screwed her mouth. “All dreams taste the same, Luke.”

  Artist-in-residence. His mouth went to grease.

  “And some cannibals feed off human flesh to survive, but others, like here? They do it because they crave the flavor.”

  The darkened cold seemed to laugh and a rush of vomit jellied in his stomach, shot up his throat. He swallowed it back, spitting, and trying to reorient.

  The décor waxed and waned wildly; the present, the past, and he wondered—had time folded over on itself here in The Cecil? Was this campy art deco style not really a reproduction but instead a reaching, from backward in time?

  “Lots of things warn folks to stay away from this area, Luke.” Della’s voice had fallen dead quiet. “Even the land this city sits on—it’s called a fault, did you know? Now consider that language. A fault. Could that mean at fault? And if it does, do we even need to wonder why all of Heaven’s Lost Angels once landed right here? The Universe planned it that way, and yet….” Her face fell, mouth inverted under her blindfold. “Yet here we are, an adoring public who worships the people this city creates.”

  As had Mich. So proud to be commissioned by the stars. And now that beautiful, gifted part of her had been…well, if he was understanding Dell right, it had been inhaled by this place. Locked up in Room 1013. He gazed down the hall. “Just…please, Dell. Let’s try.”

  “You’ll lose, Luke. This place…you told me you could feel it. So you know it holds trump. Blind,” she tacked on then, spontaneous like before. “Have you figured out what it means?”

  “No,” he said, and kept his eyes fixed, down the hall. “Della, please.”

  Her feet parted, one butted up against the still-open elevator, the other pointed toward him. She was going to refuse. She was going to rip off her blindfold and dive back into that elevator which, relieved, would hustle her back downstairs and spit her back out in the lobby where she’d see that compass rose and know exactly what direction to run.

  And then he’d have no hope of ever fixing his sister. His throat closed. Burned.

  Della sighed. “Take my hand,” she said.

  Shadows swam up the hall and led them down to Room 1013.

  †

  The painting was the first thing he saw, and when he cried out Della grabbed him, hands patting. “What?” she said. “What’s happened?”

  “It…there’s a picture. Mich’s picture.” The original of the still life she repeated now, except… “Lovely,” he breathed. A period piece straight out of 1924, it was unlike Mich’s current efforts (which had degenerated into little more than manic tossings of paint upon canvas) and instead a true reflection of her photo-realism skill: a razor, gleaming silver, angled atop a fluffy white towel and nestled beside a rich puff of white shaving cream. A crystal vase of cream colored roses stood off to one side and Luke stared at the picture, transfixed, until his gaze hit the brass placard at the bottom, the title.

  Welcome Home.

  A bolt of adrenaline cut through his belly, and Della said “The razor. Lucas. Is the razor in that painting?”

  His head bobbed and he forgot that she could not see him.

  “I’ll take that as a yes. Lucas, listen to me.”

  Her words and tone registered, rapid-fire, yet he only paid scant attention. Mich. His gaze roamed the canvas. What was it about this painting? What did it do to make you not Mich?

  “We need to get out of here, Lucas, are you listening? Cut your losses. Let’s leave.”

  Leave? And “Losses?” he hissed. “This isn’t a poker game, Della, it’s my sister. And just because you were okay giving up and cutting out on your sister doesn’t mean that I am!”

  “My…” She jerked back. “My sister told you I gave up and cut out?”

  “Well, she certainly told me that you two don’t talk anymore!”

  “We don’t—of course we don’t talk! My sister is dead you blind jackass!”

  What? He ripped his gaze from the canvas, stared at her.

  “The person you seduced to get the goods on me—she’s been a corpse in the grave for ten years!”

  No. That…that couldn’t be.

  “And that should have been my first clue. No matter how much I love—” She jerked back. “This is wrong. So wrong!” She began weeping.

  “Dell—” He made for her, but when he stepped the room tilted. Weaving, a thought—time folding over!—whished in and whished out and his feet jumbled together and he stumbled, striking a hand out to the bed so he wouldn’t fall.

  When he righted himself, the room glowed.

  “What?” he said.

  All the paint was brand new. And the grime and the stains on the carpet and bedspread...gone.

  “Wh-what?” he repeated. “How?”

  “Lucas?” Della’s voice seemed to project from somewhere other than where she was standing. “I…I can’t undo the blindfold.”

  Orienting, and teetering a little, he searched for her.

  His breath caught. Of course she couldn’t undo the blindfold. He regarded her and heat he could not help, heat he’d always felt, welled inside. Trussed up like that on the bedspread (chenille, he believed the soft fabric was called) in a black slip and with all her black hair cascading…her image called to mind Vivien Leigh. Elizabeth Taylor. Every classic calendar girl he’d ever seen: creamy skin and soft, vintage lingerie.

  “Lucas.” She sounded breathless. “I can see what you’re seeing—and that’s not what you’re seeing. I-I’m still standing here by the wind—oh!” She shrieked and, distantly, he heard a clatter—like a hip or knee had just jostled a table. “Oh my God, someone just jumped from this window!”

  “Della,” he chided and stooped to where she was tied, ready to at last kiss her plump mouth, taste its rich, dark lipstick. “Wait.” He drew back. “I should shave first.”

  “Lucas, no!” she cried and “There’s a razor!” he heard Mich say.

  He blinked. Why, yes. There was a razor. There’d been a razor waiting here all along. Grinning, he reached out and Della babbled “LA, Lucas! It’s capable of making identity, geography—even time—shift!”

  Indeed. And how handy. He placed his hand in the portrait.

  Mich yelled “He’s got a razor get that razor…!”

  “Lucas!” Della, shrill, strangely still did not sound anywhere near the bed where she was tied up.

  “Luke!”

  Was she crying? Dimly, he heard someone—or something—whisper Despair.

  “Listen to me: there’s a young Asian woman waiting out in the hall. She’s crooking her finger because she’s ready to play hide and seek with you in the elevator!”

  Yes, well perhaps she was bored. Maybe lonely. “I’ll get there, honey. All in good time.”

  “No! You don’t understand! Th-there’s an addict too. A kid who tells me you smiled at him. He’s wearing a green army coat and he’s waiting for you to come talk to him down on the fifth floor!”

&nbs
p; Yes, of course he was waiting. That poor kid needed a therapist. And now…here he was. Luke exhaled, relaxed for the first time since they’d arrived. Helping people. It had always made him feel right at home.

  Welcome Home. The painting. That desk clerk. Now he understood. He was home.

  “No, Lucas! Stop! Listen! It’s greedy. It took Mich but she wasn’t enough. It knew it could get you here too! It kept her so she could call out to you.”

  How clever. And now—“I’m here,” he told it, and pulled the roses out of the painting too.

  They smelled divine.

  “Lucas, please listen: ‘The hungriest people have the most succulent souls’. I understand what it means now. It means you’d do anything to find Mich, restore Mich, and now look where you are!”

  Yes, look where he was: a luxury hotel in the most glamorous city in the world. About to bed a blindfolded Della who looked like a starlet ready to play sex games. “I just need to shave.” He took the razor, ambled into the bathroom.

  Indoor plumbing and scalding water. This place really was modern.

  “Lucas!” Della called and, strangely, that black bellhop from downstairs appeared behind him, a reflection in the mirror.

  “Hot shave, sir?”

  Luke bestowed him the razor. “Why, certainly.”

  The bellhop tilted Luke’s face back with one hand, positioned the razor with the other, and leaning close, rested his mouth on Luke’s ear. “You’ll see and do what you never, not even in nightmares, believed you’d see and do.”

  Then a red wash jetted out before them, the same blaring color, Luke thought dimly, as the gaudy paint out in the hall.

  Della’s throat was raw from screaming by the time someone came, and she had no clue how dark the night had grown once police arrived and a detective untied her, took her blindfold off.

  She scampered off the bed, recoiling from its spread—picked-clean chenille; threadbare and soiled with long-standing stains. “H-how?” she croaked, astonished that her wrists truly had been trussed up and now hurt from being tied behind her back.