“Unless you’re the cops, I don’t have to show you shit.”
“I’m not the cops but I can kick your ass from here until next Sunday if you don’t cooperate,” I smirk wishing I could see someone teach Erik a lesson. That’d be the day.
“Fuck you,” I imagined Erik stepping into the man, his face blotchy and red, ready to take up his challenge. Erik didn’t like to be challenged but he wasn’t above putting a man in his place for such disrespect. I pictured him flexing his large biceps to prove prowess. Erik was always ready for a fight, even when there wasn’t a threat. He is a ‘natural born fighter’, at least that’s what he calls himself. “Are you going to let me in or not?”
“Or not,” my neighbor responds. I know the question wasn’t meant for him but he answers it anyway. I hear a lighter shoe scrap uncomfortably against the concrete, Roland the motel manager. I briefly wonder why he’s not trying to appease Erik.
“Fuck off,” Erik says. “Open the fucking door.”
“Roland, please go to the office and call the police. Our friend here needs to be removed from the property,” my neighbor’s voice is firm and unyielding. I could sense that he too is prepared for a fight. I cringe. Erik is trained in three different fighting techniques, he won’t stand a chance.
“He says this is his room...” Roland’s voice cracks in but he doesn’t get to finish his sentence because Erik cuts him off.
“It is my room. Now open the fucking door before I call the police and tell them about the scam you’re running here.”
“I’ve been here several days and haven’t once seen you enter or exit this room. Whoever is staying here is either not home or too damn afraid to answer the door with you out here causing a scene. Who could blame them really, the terror you’re raining down out here. Why don’t you leave and find someone else to harass,” I hear the drag of Roland’s feet moving away to do as he was told. I’m sure he wasn’t looking forward to the mess he’d have to clean up later if the two men come to blows outside my door. Calling the police, though also had its downside, was the better of the two choices.
“Oh, she’s in there alright and I know she’s afraid. She better be. When I get this door open,” Erik pauses a moment for a dramatic effect. Taking a deep breath, his voice growls from the depths of his dark soul. “It’s open season, bitch.”
I gasped silently knowing full well what he meant. The air crackled in the closet around me, the tension radiating into the room now. He knows I’m here. Which means he’s been watching me. For how long I don’t know but it seemed odd for him to wait before striking. I curse again.
Why did I allow myself to feel safe?
My heart picks up a notch as a new thought dawns on me. Erik’s composed mask was beginning to slip and that was something he never allowed to happen. Maybe the chase was finally beginning to wear on him. It could be a good thing but I doubt he’d give up and walk away. No, I decided then, it was a bad thing. A really bad thing.
“You need to leave right now,” my neighbors voice is menacing. Yes, he understands what Erik is about. “I don’t know who you are but I can tell you sir, there is no she in there.”
“Bullshit, she walked in less than an hour ago, after her shift at the diner down the street, cleaning tables,” venom in his words, their poison confirming my fears. I’m right. He had been watching. I shiver.
Fuck! How did I miss the signs?
A set of shuffling footsteps approaches outside, Roland returning.
“The police are on their way,” his voice is low and unsteady. He’s nervous and rightly so.
“Looks like your time is up,” the calm is creeping back into my neighbor’s voice. A moment of silence passes but the tension doesn’t lessen.
“Fuck this,” Erik spat. “I’ll be back and no one is going to fucking stop me from getting into that room. Do you hear me Ali, no one will stop me. You. Are. Mine.”
I shiver in fear. His words are ones I knew well. They’re words he used constantly to justify the abuse he put me through. I hate those words.
My hearing strains with each step he takes, carrying him farther away from me. My heartbeat slows a bit but I know I don’t have long before he comes back. I have to prepare.
“Hudson, should I cancel the call to the police?” I hear Roland ask but never hear an answer. His hobbled stride moves away from my room as well.
Hudson. My neighbor. My hero.
I never heard him walk away. In fact I didn’t realize he departed from his spot at my door until I hear the click of his door closing. It was an unsettling sound, one I felt deep inside my chest. I take a deep ragged breath and push the feelings aside.