“That’s fine,” he replied, his voice clipped but courteous.
“I’m on my way there but if you need some time I can–“
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. I’m ready. Don’t get out of your vehicle until I get there.”
That was another thing, too. He was always ready. Taryn wondered if the man just sat by his phone, waiting for her to tell him she needed to go to the motel.
The thought was kinkier sounding than she’d intended.
The Nashville skyline rose above her as she flew across the bridge towards East Nashville. She could remember a time when she’d been afraid to venture to that part of town, a fear that was probably as much urban legend as anything. Now more and more houses were being renovated and the area was teeming with young professionals, families with children, and funky businesses.
Things changed. Taryn wasn’t sure she always liked those changes but she was always happy to have new places to eat.
Over the course of the past week, she hadn’t gotten much work done. She’d shown up twice to take pictures but the brutal rain had restricted her to the motel’s interior. The interior, as luck would have it, was too dark without any natural light (the electricity was sporadic and mostly didn’t work). The motel’s open parking lot and motor lodge style didn’t offer plentiful protection from the weather.
Plus, with the rain being so bad, there wasn’t anywhere for Aker to go and still keep an eye on her. One afternoon he’d followed her into the small, cramped lobby to get out of the rain and that had been an uncomfortable experience for both parties involved.
Taryn was itching to get some real work done. She’d only taken a handful of pictures and none of them had been of the rooms. At the rate she was going, she was never going to get finished, much less meet her deadline.
The last thing she needed was a pissed off country singer. She’d never be allowed in the Ryman or Tootsie’s again.
“I should have been sketching by now,” she complained.
When her car rudely ignored her and didn’t offer a response, she popped in a CD and turned Shooter Jennings up loud. She was in the mood to jam, despite the dismal news from her doctor.
Determined to make the most out of what was left of the day, Taryn sped down the road with her windows down, her hair flying back from her face. She couldn’t do anything about the state of her health but she could do her job. That was something, at least.
Aker, true to his word, showed up exactly fifteen minutes later. Taryn had barely pulled into the decrepit parking lot herself when his vehicle came sidling up next to hers.
“Better weather today, huh?” she asked with a smile.
“Huh,” he grunted, which could have been interpreted any number of ways.
“I’m probably going to stay about two hours, is that okay?” she asked brightly, trying not to lose the smile she’d plastered on.
Taryn was determined to make this man like her. It had become a personal challenge.
“Take however long you need,” he barked. He was already unfolding his chair and dragging out his cooler.
As Taryn started towards the motel’s entrance, however, he jogged ahead of her. “Wait just a minute,” Aker ordered as he passed her by, a set of keys jingling in his beefy hand.
Obligingly, Taryn stood back while he unlocked the door. She waited impatiently as he marched through the small rooms, checking the dark corners and peering into nooks and crannies.
“Like a little kid at bedtime, asking Daddy to look under the bed,” she snorted.
Although, of course, Taryn’s father had never been that kind of daddy. Aloof and lost in his own head much of the time, he’d had more time for academia than a young daughter who might be afraid of the boogeyman.
She’d checked her own closets.
When Aker gave her the “all clear” sign, Taryn flashed him a thumbs up and entered the lobby.
She’d upgraded to an iPod fairly recently and was enjoying slowly adding her vast music collection to it. Heart was currently blasting from the tiny speakers but to set the mood she turned on Parker Brown. The song was about pine trees and being close to nature–or so she thought, he was a little elusive. For all she knew it could’ve been about his pet parrot. Ruby Jane sang backup and their voices blended in perfect harmony, soaring over the instruments and twisting and turning around one another until you couldn’t tell where one started and the other began.
Taryn had downloaded his albums the night before and uploaded Ruby’s from the CDs she already owned. She wanted to listen to them sing while she worked. It seemed right.
In spite of the sunlight, which probably only felt brighter since it had been so dreary lately, the room was still gloomy. Taryn couldn’t imagine the place feeling welcoming to anyone, even back before it was essentially a flop house.
“There must have been a time when it was okay,” she said aloud. “I need to check out some old pictures of it.”
Her voice got lost in the stuffiness and tepid darkness, but it was still reassuring to hear it.
“I might go crazy, but at least I have myself to keep me company,” she giggled.
The song changed to “Close Up the Honky Tonks,” a Buck Owens cover. The upbeat melody gave Taryn a boost of energy and she found herself working faster with the increased drive.
As she walked around and took her shots, she tried to imagine Parker Brown staying in such a place, and even weirder, Ruby Jane being there with him. Although, of course, Ruby had her house in Nashville; she had no real reason to spend the night at the Black Raven–unless the rumors about her and Parker had been true.
“Everyone thinks they had a thing going up until he died,” she’d informed Matt. “At this point it’s just assumed.”
“Why?” he’d asked, reasonably enough, so it had Taryn pausing.
“Well, I guess because they had such great chemistry. The pictures of them together, their singing, and all the song lyrics she wrote about him after he died.”
“How do you know they’re about him?”
Sometimes his logic frustrated her. Why did he have to be so darn reasonable?
“Because,” she’d stammered. “They’re about loving someone and them being gone. Like, gone as in death.”
“Hmmm…”
She knew what he wanted to say, that since she’d lost someone herself she read death into everything. And, the fact was, he might have been right.
But I’m also right about this, she thought. Parker had died before she was born but even a fool could see and hear the love between the two.
No way was that superficial Matt, she thought smugly.
“I clearly need a life,” she mumbled. “I’m walking around mentally examining the love life between a dead person and my boss.”
Even worse, she was having a make believe argument with Matt.
Taryn let herself get back to the task at hand. She couldn’t see the elegant Ruby being comfortable on one of the rickety chairs or what she imagined were hard, unforgiving mattresses. Even as a young woman in her twenties, Ruby had been sophisticated and looked every inch the lady, especially next to her fellow band mates who looked like they’d just robbed a motorcycle gang. It was as much Ruby’s elegance and beauty against their rough edges and wild reputation as it was their innovative style of country music that had given Silver Streak its fame.
Given its location on a main road, the motel was unnaturally quiet. Taryn felt like she could’ve been on an isolated mountaintop rather than downtown Nashville. As she got lost in her work she became even more focused on surroundings, the idea of Aker’s presence waiting outside and the faint sounds of passing vehicles drifted away. Miss Dixie provided a special rhythm for her that fell instantly in tune with and as Taryn moved from room to room, trying different angles and taking shots, she fell into her own little world, lulled by the “clicks” and flashes of light.
It was the closest she ever got to meditating, and the most relaxed she ever fel
t.
When she entered the small break room with the fetid mattress and garbage-covered table, Taryn turned in slow circles to ensure she captured the entire space. A rustling sound from one of the corners had her surprised and she hesitated, finger half pressed down on the button.
She couldn’t make out much more than the outlines of the furniture in the darkness, but when the noise came again, this time louder, a shadow materialized on the wall in front of her. As the rustling sound increased, filling the room with a crackling that was as painful as fingernails on a chalkboard, the hefty shadow grew and grew until it was nearly as tall and wide as Taryn herself. She watched in fascinated horror as the darkness of the silhouette swirled and seemed to move inside its boundaries. Then, in a move that should have been impossible, it seemed to leap at her, coming clear off the wall.
“Eeeekkk!” Taryn screamed, her voice muffled by the room’s stillness and dampness. In a reflex move, her finger pushed down on her camera, filling the space with the bright light of Miss Dixie’s flash.
Wasting no time for answers, Taryn turned to run and collided straight into the wall behind her, tripping over the large sewer rat that was also trying to escape the airless space.
“Miss Magill!” Aker’s voice boomed from the lobby. “Everything okay?”
Embarrassed, Taryn clutched her head in both hands and leaned against the wall. “In here. I’m okay.”
When Aker found her, she was rubbing at her temples and cursing. “What happened?”
“I heard a noise and saw a shadow,” she explained. “I thought it was–well, I don’t know what I thought it was. It just turned out to be a rat, though. A really big rat, like a 1970’s horror movie kind of rat that’s been eating radioactive cheese, but still just a rat. He’s gone now.”
“Would you like for me to find the vandal?” Aker demanded, face lined in determination.
“’Vandal?’” Taryn croaked. “It’s a rat. I think it will be okay. I’ll be ready for the sucker next time.”
Although Aker did not look convinced, he left her alone and went back to man his post.
“A damn rat,” she shook her head, embarrassed with herself. She’d done some foolish things on jobs before, but she didn’t usually have a witness. That was going to take some getting used to.
Figuring she’d done about all of the administrative part of the motel that there was to do, Taryn wrapped things up and went back outside. The sun was starting to drop down over the buildings in the distance; soon the moon would make an appearance and then she’d lose all her natural light. She needed to get her butt in gear.
“A walk around the perimeter. I can finish that up today, too,” she told herself.
To Aker, she hollered, “Hey dude! I’m gonna walk around the motel and take some shots. I won’t go in anywhere!”
He hesitated as though he might get up and accompany her, but then he apparently decided she was safe enough, what with the wall and gate surrounding the property, and settled back into his chair. Taryn noticed, however, that he didn’t pick up his book or magazine. He might not be following her, but he was remaining alert.
“Who the heck is he?” she wondered, not for the first time. Besides a hire-a-former-cop bodyguard?
Taryn had made her way all the way around to the back of the motel when she remembered her camera and the picture she’d inadvertently taken of the wall when the rat dashed out.
She stopped walking and turned Miss Dixie on. It was the last shot on her card.
The small break room was no longer dark. Instead, it was full of artificial light, supplied by the overhead light and small lamp that rested on a side table.
The bed still looked ratty and it wasn’t anything she would sleep on, but it was cleanish. A wool blanket was pulled up over the stained mattress. The table was clear of clutter, save a plate of what looked like pasta and a cup of something. A worn area rug covered most of the floor.
There was no sign of the rat or the shadow.
“Well, that’s interesting anyway,” Taryn said with a little laugh.
She might have been making light of what she was viewing, but the truth was that she was incredibly unnerved. She never got used to seeing the past in this way, of seeing the things Miss Dixie revealed. It was a shock to her system each time.
And a big part of Taryn was afraid that one day she’d get sucked into the picture herself, with nobody to drag her back out.
“What do you want me to do with this?” She spoke to the motel but it remained aloof and stoic. If it had an agenda, it wasn’t revealing it.
Taryn wrapped her arms around her chest and swallowed hard. She couldn’t imagine a scenario in which anything good came out of her working with the motel’s inner demons.
“Maybe it’s just a fluke,” she whispered to Miss Dixie. “Maybe I am just picking up random things and it doesn’t mean anything.”
For the time being, she would make herself believe that.
The back of the motel was in far worse shape than the front. From the back, she could see how the building had deteriorated over the years and really gone downhill. Management had obviously done nothing to keep up pretenses back there since nobody could see it from the road or parking lot.
The building was a square, with five rooms on each side for a grand total of twenty. The five that faced the back were the worst of the lot. The ones in front had at least been renovated in the past twenty years.
The back rooms, which seemed to house long-term residents when the motel was functioning, could only be entered from the courtyard, while visitors could drive up to their doors on the other fifteen. The motel had never had central heat and air installed and had relied on individual A/C units in the summertime. None of the units remained; Taryn had heard that vandals had stolen them for the copper and metal, which evidently fetched a good price if you didn’t mind taking the unit apart.
Still, although they were missing they’d left their marks behind. Literally. Over the years, runoff from the machines had dripped down from the windows, leaving a discolored stain in their trail. Plywood was still nailed into the walls and windows, a sign that the units hadn’t fit properly and the owner had simply patched up the empty space with whatever wood was handy. In some cases, the windows were missing or had been broken; ratty curtains billowed out from the empty rooms like emaciated arms beckoning passersby.
It was clear that the back had not been painted in many years. The wood back there was a crazy shade of yellow, almost orange in some places. Vines grew up the side of the building and, in some cases, through the building. Nature was slowly starting to take over as if to say, “Leave something unattended long enough and we’ll take it back!”
The grass was tall, wild, the weeds nearly up to Taryn’s waist. She took pictures of the roof and its many holes and unmatched patches, broken windows, vines, billowing curtains, and broken drainpipes. She stopped below a gutter that had an actual tree growing from it and stood, mesmerized, at just how quickly things could go downhill if someone wasn’t there to take care of them.
At last, she worked all the way around the square, taking pictures of the doors and exterior. By the time she finished, it was twilight and Aker was starting to look pointedly at his watch. She still hadn’t been inside a room, or inside the courtyard.
“Weather’s meant to be good tomorrow. Want to get an early start?” she asked as they both began packing up.
“That’s fine. So do you want to meet here at 7? 8?” he asked.
Taryn snorted. “Okay, when I said ‘early’ I really just meant before noon. How about 10?”
Aker nodded. “That’s fine. I’ll see you here at 10.”
Although they packed up at the same time and got in their cars in chorus, Taryn noted that he waited until she pulled out onto the main road before he left.
“Oh sweetie, I’m so sorry,” Matt said softly.
Taryn, stretched out in a hot bubble bath, groaned. When Matt resorted to the tradition
al pet names, rather than the goofy ones he’d cooked up himself, like ‘my queen’ or something Star Trek oriented, she knew things were bad.
“We just know that it has grown,” she said, letting the hot water relax her muscles and take away some of the aches and pains. “The doctor didn’t say I was going to die tomorrow or anything.”
“Is there anything I can do?” he asked quietly.
Taryn could imagine Matt sitting in his living room, long legs outstretched before him, a Sci-Fi movie on low in the background. Knowing him, he’d probably cooked up something gourmet or had stopped and picked up Cajun on his way home from work–a far cry from the microwaveable macaroni and cheese that she’d had for dinner. She suddenly wanted to be there with him, snuggling in next to him and watching whatever apocalyptic movie he had on for entertainment.
As if he could read her mind, Matt asked, “Do you want me to come up there?”
Taryn hesitated and almost told him “yes” but then stopped.
“No, that’s okay,” she frowned at her stubborn pride. “I’ll see you in a few weeks. I’ve got this job to do and am already behind and you’ve got your students to deal with. I’ll be okay.”
“You want to talk about it?”
The fact that Matt, who could sometimes get lost in his head and not always empathize, was worried about her almost scared her more than what the doctor had told her. Matt had always had a sixth sense where she was concerned, even when they were kids. It made Taryn nervous.
“Not really,” she replied. “Not yet. I’m still processing, I think.”
“You want to tell me about the new job then?”
“Okay, do you know something I don’t? Like I’m going to kick the bucket tomorrow or something? Because you almost never ask me about the project,” she laughed.
“I just thought it might take your mind off it.”
So Taryn began telling him about the motel, going into the grisly details of the structure’s appearance and care. “To be honest, it’s kind of a mundane job,” she finished. “I mean, there’s nothing really interesting about the building, other than its history and my employer. The building itself is just your average roadside motel. Well, your average abandoned roadside motel. There are probably a thousand like them in the desert out west.”
Black Raven Inn: A Paranormal Mystery (Taryn's Camera Book 6) Page 5