We both turned to the frozen statue, and I grimaced. “How…how do you want to do this? Should we wrap him in something?” The limited amount of murder movies I’d watched flashed through my memory, “like, in the shower curtain or something?”
“No, we don’t want his hair or skin cells to get onto the shower curtain.” Charlotte frowned at the fake detective, like he was the one to blame for the dilemma we were having in disposing of his body. Which in a way, I told myself, he was. If he hadn’t tried to kill me, I wouldn’t have frozen his ass. I blinked away a fresh wave of stinging tears, telling myself over and over that I hadn’t mean to kill him.
“Can you keep him frozen?” Charlotte either didn’t notice my tears, or she pretended not to. Either way, I was grateful, “Yeah, I think so.”
“Great, keep him cold. We don’t want him melting on the carpet on the way there.”
She checked her watch, “it’s four thirty, so no one should be awake roaming the halls right now. Let’s grab him.”
We approached him cautiously, like we both thought he might just unfreeze himself and lash out at us. For all her brave talk Charlotte was obviously just as uncomfortable about the whole dead body thing as I was. She hesitated, hands hovering over the icy surface. I took a deep breath and said, “You take the feet.”
She looked relieved. It was the least I could do considering the circumstances. I reached out, gingerly grasping his arms. The surface of his shirt was a bit slippery, but not cold. Charlotte crouched down and grabbed his feet, making a face, she hissed out, “Cold!”
“Sorry,” I grabbed his arms more firmly and tilted him back so she wouldn’t have to heave him up all by herself. He was heavy, and we carried the body to the door huffing and puffing, moving awkwardly till we reached the front hallway.
“Set him down here, “Charlotte panted.
We did, and his feet clunked heavily onto the carpet, making us both wince. Charlotte was rubbing her hands on her pants, mumbling about freezing hands. “Check outside,” she instructed, “make sure the coast is clear.”
I eased the door open a crack and peered around the door frame. The hallway was long, lit by eerily humming florescent lights and decorated by plastic ferns in squat black pots on both sides. It was totally empty.
“See the cameras?” Charlotte hissed.
I did. They were subtle, but they were there. Two little black domes at each end. “Yes.”
“See if you can freeze them.”
I drew in a deep breath and stuck my hands out, touching the wall on either side of the door just above the tacky red carpet, doing my best to concentrate on the camera to the right of me. At first nothing happened, so I tried to replay the feelings I’d been having when the fake detective had attacked me. Just thinking about him was enough to make me upset, and I heard a thin crackle as ice shot out from under my fingers, coating the wall. I needed more fuel for the emotional fire though, so I finally let myself think about the guilt burning in my stomach.
You killed a man, a nasty little voice reminded me, seventeen years old and you killed someone already. You’re a murderer. You’ll go to jail. You deserve to rot in prison for what you did. What if he has a family?
My gut was crawling, and I felt limp with fear and horror. A line of ice shot up the wall, traveling quickly all the way down the hallway, engulfing the little black dome, covering it with a thick layer of white frost. I looked to my left, seeing a second line of ice streaking across the wall. The black glass of the camera’s dome cracked as it froze.
“Done,” I slumped; feeling exhausted, but Charlotte nudged me, “Good job! That was awesome! We gotta move fast now.”
I forced myself up, grabbing the body’s arms. Charlotte and I navigated the stiff form through the doorway. Once we were out in the open hallway my heart began to gallop wildly, as if the rest of my body was finally understanding what we were about to do. We were carrying a body down a hallway in a hotel. I eyed each door as we slowly passed it, panicked, feeling certain it would burst open and someone would be there in the doorway, staring at us with wide, accusing eyes. “A body!” They would say, and point at me, “You’re a murderer!”
After what seemed like an eternity we reached the elevator, and Charlotte punched the down arrow, “Drag the body to one side,” Charlotte whispered, “just in case.”
Just in case? Just in case anyone came out of the elevator when it opened. My heart was pounding in my ears now, drowning out the humming of the lights overhead, and my own gasping breaths. I did as I was instructed, stashing the body to one side, for all the good it would do. If someone was in the elevator, we were screwed.
The doors wooshed open, and my heart stopped…and then resumed beating when it became obvious that no one was coming out. Charlotte pinned the door open with one hand while I froze the camera inside.
“Let’s go,” she hefted her end of our heavy burden, and we wrestled it onto the elevator, grunting. My forehead was beaded with sweat and her face was bright red. Luckily I was so emotionally distraught at that moment, that my hands were constantly producing ice, recoating the entire body.
Charlotte dropped her end the second we got into the elevator, sticking her hands underneath her armpits, teeth chattering. Then she put a finger to her lips in a shushing gesture and pointed up at the frozen camera. She was right, of course. We could freeze over the camera, but not the sound. If we talked, they would be able to tell it had been two girls in here at this hour. I nodded that I understood, waiting impatiently while the elevator lurched downwards. It hissed to a stop only seconds later, and we both braced ourselves when it slid open. The hallway on floor number one was empty, identical to the floor we’d just been on, with the plastic fern décor and glaring lights. I slid one hand out onto the walls and froze both cameras, ice creeping over both walls, coating more then I had intended.
We struggled out of the elevator and took a left, and the glowing blue light of the ice chest became visible. It was like seeing the gates of heaven. The blue glowing light that said “ICE” in huge letters might as well have spelled out “SALVATION” for me. It was almost over, everything was all good.
“Hurry,” Charlotte whispered, and we headed for the chest as fast as we could. Our feet made shushing noises on the carpet as we struggled to move faster. We got to the ice chest and put the frozen detective down as gently and quietly as we could.
I opened the ice chest with a feeling of triumph, which faded fast upon seeing the bags of crushed ice inside. “There’s too much,” I whispered, “these bags are huge! He won’t fit.”
Charlotte bit her lip, “Here, just take a few out. We’ll take them back to our room, melt it and ditch the bags.”
“Okay great,” I lifted a couple bags out and set them down beside the ice chest. “Four should do it.”
At last there was enough room, it would be tight, but it would have to do. “Okay, this will work.”
We heaved the frozen statue up again. My back protested at all the heavy lifting, but it didn’t matter, this was almost over. The detective’s legs went in fine, and his torso, and….his head stuck out. “He’s too long!” I hissed in panic. “What are we going to do?”
Charlotte frowned, “You’ll have to try to bend him. Shift the ice around.”
I stuck my arm in, wincing as my skin brushed his frozen cheek. I struck out randomly at the bags of ice, trying to get them to move, and to my relief they shifted. The body slumped further into the ice chest. I breathed in relief and shut the door, forcing myself not to slam it closed.
“Oh, thank god. It’s over.” I leaned down and picked up the ice bags, handing two to Charlotte, and taking the other two myself, feeling a rush of relief that swept all the way from my head to my toes and made me feel dizzy and light. We’d done it.
We turned for the elevator, and then there was a “click” from nearby. We both froze as the door to our immediate right – room 117 – swung open. A woman stood there, a blonde woman in a fluffy white dressing gown. She was leaning with one hand on the doorway, her body turned back into the room slightly, calling over her shoulder, “I’ll get more ice for the drinks.”
Cold dropped down my spine. My skin was flashing hot and cold as the woman turned back and spotted us. Her cheeks were flushed bright red, her eyes glassy. She had a wine glass in one hand.
“Oh hi,” she giggled, and took a staggering step forward, the door slamming shut behind her. “You two are up late…” she stopped, her sky blue eyes turning up to the ceiling as she thought about something, “I mean…you’re up early.” She giggled again.
It felt like a boa constrictor was wrapped around my chest, squeezing the life out of me. I couldn’t speak. Why hadn’t this woman looked up and seen the ice coating the walls? Surely she would notice!
“I’m Rachel,” she wobbled forward, holding up the wine glass like she intended to make a toast, “and you must be lesbians.”
Charlotte and I exchanged a speechless look. Her cheeks were pale, and my stomach flipped uncomfortably. She’d known what to do up to this point, but now she was clearly panicking. I took a deep breath to try to steady myself.
“Hi…Rachel,” I stepped forward, praying I wouldn’t have to freeze her too. There was no more room in the ice chest, and beside that, I refused to kill anyone else. I would rather be caught by the people chasing me. I just couldn’t do it. “We…we took the last bags of ice. There isn’t any left,” I cleared my throat, “but we don’t need that much, so do you want a bag?”
I held out one of the bags of ice, hand shaking violently. Rachel didn’t seem to notice the shaking, or how weird these girls standing in the hall in the middle of the night were acting. A huge smile lit up her face, and she snatched the bag of ice from me, “Hey, thanks!”
I felt like sagging onto the carpet with relief when she turned back and yanked the door open again, screeching into the hotel room, “Hey Frank, these lesbians gave me some ice!”
The door slammed shut behind her, and Charlotte and I let out a shaky breath at practically the same time. Charlotte leaned forward, hands on her knees, “Oh my gosh…that was so close. I - holy shit…”
I grabbed her arm, “let’s go, let’s get back to the room as fast as possible and never talk about this again.”
“Agreed.”