Mistakes can happen. Like the time I ran late for work because I forgot to set my alarm, or the time I told my mother I was a lesbian;
Me: Mom, I'm lesbian now.
Mom: WHAT. I knew it. That's y u never have a BF.
(My mother fully embraced text language)
Me: Leaving. LEAVING, Mom. Autocorrect mistake! And I do have boyfriends.
Mom: Capitan Spock?
Me: FYI Spock is the Science officer, Kirk is the Capitan.
I'm not sure what was more disturbing, the fact I knew what Spock's designation was, or that my mother thought I was a lesbian.
So it could have been an honest to God, genuine mistake. But the more I remembered the look on pink talon's face, the tone in her voice, the snarky little look she'd given me, the more I began to think that this was not a mistake.
Little could I have predicted that the absence of such a tiny, three letter word like 'sea' could have had such a devastating effect.
The first thing I noticed when walking into the room was the thick blanket of moist, and terribly uncomfortable heat that smothered me and coated my skin with a vile stickiness. The second thing was the smell; musty locker room jock strap mingled with subtle aromas of moldy cheese.
The carpets were in desperate need of a clean, no correction, they needed to be ripped up and burnt. The curtains looked tattered, like someone had ripped them intro shreds in a desperate attempt to escape.
I took a brave step forward. The smell only intensified and I was now aware of a strange dripping, banging, growling, hissing noise.
I heard a loud thud behind me as the doorman, although I doubt you call him that at an establishment like this, dumped my bags on the floor with a large thud. Dust billowed up from the carpet.
He glared at me for a moment or two before extending his pudgy paw. His palm was sweaty and there were some glistening beads of moisture collecting on his upper lip.
"I haven't exchanged any currency yet." I said trying to force a polite smile.
He curled his lip up a bit revealing a particularly coffee tarnished incisor.
"Humph." He turned on his heel and headed out the door.
Oh God what was that sound?
There was a tiny door at the other end of the room and the noise was definitely coming from there.
Note to self; never walk towards strange noises coming from behind doors. Isn't this how all the slasher movies start? Except the first victim is usually a hot blonde teenager with big boobs.
But I did.
Hissing cockroaches and dripping tap? Gurgling sink and mice nibbling on steel showerhead? Donkey trapped in bathroom?
I would have put my money on any of those, because the last thing I expected to see was that "activity" that those two people were "doing" in the shower with their legs up on the wall and the peculiar "item" that looked like an inflatable pool chair.
I couldn't even scream I was so shocked. It wasn't normal. It wasn't natural and it wasn't right! I rushed out of the room as fast as my legs could carry me, grabbing my bag on the way out and slamming straight into the greasy looking doorman.
"Humph." He mumbled again as if he didn't give a continental shit that I would never be able to look at inflatable objects in the same light again.
Another key was thrust into my hand.
I glanced down at it. 'Room 5'. I glanced up at the door next to me. On closer inspection you could clearly see that the '1' that was meant to be next to the '5' had fallen off. The faint outline of dust and what looked like burn marks indicated that.
I rushed down the corridor, located my room and barged in. The first thing I did was peer into the bathroom...empty. I was finally alone and I was completely exhausted and traumatized. I hadn't slept in over 24 hours. I glanced at the bed. The duvet had debris on it. The once white pillow had a yellow smudge on it that looked like a Rorschach test- the more I stared at it, the more it started to look like the gates to hell.
Tomorrow morning I would definitely go online and find a new hotel, but tonight I would have to stay here and brave it and pray that small mammals wouldn't come in the middle of the night and carry me off.
I reluctantly entered the bathroom. There was mold growing on the walls and fungal spores on the roof. I needed a wee but quite frankly the toilet frightened me. I slipped my pants off and hovered over the loo as I would normally do in a public toilet. I was just about to flush when I saw the signs;
"PLEASE. Do not flush paper down the toilet."
"WARNING: Fines will be imposed."
You're not serious! I looked into the bowl where my paper floated. This was a joke.
But when I saw the sign on the wall with the picture of King Poseidon rising up out of the toilet bowl and stabbing a woman's bum with his Trident, with the big red words "DANGER" underneath it, I decided to take it seriously.
"Shit!" I glanced around the room to see if there was anything I could use to fish the paper out of the loo.
I walked into the room, still looking for something I could use as a rod and saw a fly swatter. Just as I was thinking about where flies choose to breed, thankfully I remembered the surgical gloves that I had packed in my bag (you can never be too careful).
After I'd successfully fished the loo paper out and thrown it in the dustbin, I'll spare you the messy, graphic details, I took out my toothbrush, dental floss and my two-minute egg timer and turned it over. It's not about how hard you brush, something most people get wrong. It's about the time.
As I brushed a glossy magazine caught my eye, it wasn't hard to see it. It was just about the nicest looking thing in the room, possibly in the entire hotel. I reached for it and started flipping through the pages until his familiar face was once again staring at me.
I tisked loudly and a little bit of toothpaste foam dripped onto my chin.
This time he was with a woman. A really beautiful woman with long dark hair and a mole on her chee—
Never! This couldn't be the model he said I looked like. We looked nothing alike. I had more in common with one of those blue things from Avatar than this voluptuous, beauty that looked like she ate men's hearts for hors d'oeuvres.
He and the woman in question were tangled up in each other's arms, implying some kind of post-coital thing. Both looked naked and their perfect bodies were silhouetted against atmospheric lighting. In arty black and white I might add.
The only thing they were wearing were large, designer wrist watches- as one does during sex, naturally. Because it makes perfect sense that you would wear a diamond bedazzled timepiece while bonking just in case you needed to time your foreplay, or better yet, the nine hour-long orgasm you gave her before she passed out from sheer pleasure due to the size of you manly spear.
They were also lying in the sand together, which I've never understood. Sand gets into strange hard to reach places under normal circumstances, let alone these kinds of circumstances. There were some words written in the sand...
"Your time. Your rules. Your watch."
Really? What a load of crap! I closed the magazine and tossed it back towards the toilet where it belonged. The sand finally ran out and I did my usual gargle and floss routine and then headed back into the bedroom. I approached the rancid bed and suddenly felt relieved that I had the letters DR in front of my name in case I needed to prescribe myself emergency medicines for tentnis or rabies.
Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad if I slept on top of the covers, fully clothed and wearing my shoes and a hat? Unfortunately, I hadn't thought to pack a full hazmat suit.
This place was more depressing than the latest Adele song. And way too hot.
But despite all that, the second my head hit the pillow I started to give in and surrender to the exhaustion that was wracking my body.
**
I was soaking wet when I woke up. I was dizzy, dry mouthed and felt absolutely disgusting. The heat in the room was unbearable and the long sleeved jumper with a hoodie, jeans and sneakers that I'd slept in hadn't helped much either.
I stumbled off the bed and peeled my clothes off until I was standing in my underwear. I looked at myself in the dirty, half cracked mirror. My chest and forehead were wet with sweat. My hair, as usual, had a mind of its own – hanging in a thick, heavy mop behind my head. My underwear looked great, though. Black and pink Victoria Secret balcony bra and thong set. I always bought sexy underwear, although I never have an occasion to use them. The only living thing that had seen me wearing them was Pierre, my pet Chameleon.
Sudden thought; I hope my mother was feeding him.
Another sudden thought; I hope she hadn't taken it upon herself to redecorate my flat. Last time I went away to a conference my mother had pulled up my old, out-of-fashion carpets and put laminate wood flooring in.
She was worried that my old-fashioned décor was scaring off potential husbands- and giving them the wrong impression about me. And when I'd protested and reminded her I was not looking for anyone, she reminded me that my eggs are shriveling and dying as we speak.
"Tick-tock-biological-clock darhling."
As the sun was streaming through the crack in the curtain and highlighting the horror that was my hotel room I could almost hear my mother's concern about the type of men I would be meeting here.
I reached for my phone and did a double blink in case I was seeing incorrectly. The phone said 2:30 pm. As in, the afternoon.
I knew I'd set my phone to local time, so this wasn't a mistake. I'd slept the entire day away, no wonder I felt so bad. I had that hangover feeling one gets from totally oversleeping and was dehydrated from not drinking water in hours.
I'd wasted an entire day when I could have been out there looking for my father. I quickly scraped my hair back with my comb, not quite managing to flatten it as perfectly as I would usually like it, and went online to start looking for the Aegean sea Villa's. But before booking I decided to leave this one a little review...
Liked: That I made it through the night without catching a dreaded disease
Disliked: The fact I could have caught a dreaded disease
Tips: Make sure you're up to date with all vaccinations when staying here