Twisty Inn

My name is Jess. I own an inn for resting mountaineers on the bottom of a mountain. I have a lot of regulars and get a new customer every once in a while. There can be little scout groups as well, but most of the time, it is pretty quiet. Although recently there was one adventurous time...

I was opening my little inn early in the morning. I usually don't get many new customers. I usually have a few people in my inn at all times, but not many on the weekday. On the weekend there is more, but right around Christmas, there is a lot of people. So when a shady group of people walked into my chalet early in the morning, I should have been more suspicious of them than I was.

"Hello and welcome to my little inn! I am Jess, how may I help you today?" I smile broadly at them, although they did not seem in the mood to talk to me. I had never had a group of people like this before. Especially not this large of a group before. They didn't really look like a biker gang, but at the same time, they kind of did look like a biker gang. In an odd way.

The leader then came to speak to me first. "I'm here to find a man named Harold. My gang and I heard he might be in room 210?" I looked at room 210. Vacant. I don't often get to know the people that stay, and I certainly didn't want a gang in here. They didn't seem to even want to pay for a room. They definitely didn't look like mountaineers that wanted to do business either. I couldn't kick them out though, because they hadn't done anything. They may still want to stay as well, so I had to offer rooms to them.

"Look, I don't want any trouble. I don't know any 'Harolds' for regulars or usuals. As for new customers, I have not had any in two weeks. Room 210 is vacant at the moment. Please feel free to get a room, but if you do not intend on staying at this inn, please leave. I have plenty of rooms and it's 120 dollars per night." I smile at them, reaching for the little knife I always had kept underneath the register. My parents had warned me to keep one, but most of the time I used it for packages.

"We would like to have two rooms. We want to stay here one night." I was worried something may happen, but they did have the cash. I needed it for rent and food. I couldn't deny a paying customer, that would be wrong. So, I gave them to room 150 and room 132. I decided that they must be good enough to get paid money, they must be good enough to stay here.

I was just sweeping one of the halls and had one of my co-workers working the front desk when I heard some noise. People talking. Cheering. In the daytime, people check-in, get settled, and get to the mountain. No one just sits around and "has fun" in the inn. So hearing people talking was odd at this time of day. I grabbed some folded towels so I had an excuse to come in. It was room 150. I quickly knocked on the door. I heard people shuffling.

A shorter in stature man with a scruffy beard opened the door. "Hey, everyone, relax. It's Jess, the owner of this darn place." He says with his back turned. He then turns back to me. "What do you want? We weren't being too loud, were we?" He says the last part sarcastically. I was worse than a deer in headlights. Football was on. The room was trashed and people were getting back to being crazy. I snapped out of my trance, realizing I had to come in.

"May I please come in? I just want to put some more towels in this room. I keep spares in the cabinet, and I can't remember if I had or not." I sounded as innocent as possible. Maybe if I sounded pathetic enough, I could come in and call the cleaning lady to the rooms. They allowed me in, I went to the bathroom. On my way, I managed to call the front desk. I made sure to tell my co-worker. I put them in the cabinet and I left. Luckily, we got the place cleaned up in no time. I told them they had to keep it clean.

My co-worker left and I went to my quarters, but right before, I checked a man named Harold into room 127. I thought that it was just a coincidence, and the man looked like a mountaineer. He looked nothing like the people that had checked in earlier. I went into my quarters and went to bed. I heard a loud bang right as I was drifting off, coming from the main hall. I put on my bathrobe and hurried down the hall.

I saw Harold knocked out on the floor. I called the police but right as I was hanging up, I heard people behind me. "Do the same to her! Queen of the killjoy!" there was another bang, this one louder, as if next to my ear. The last thing I remember was people who sounded like the gang laughing.

"She's awake!" People sounded rejoiceful. I saw doctors, and myself hooked up to plenty of machinery. "Thank god she's alive!" the voices said. Apparently, people had saved me from what was supposed to be a deadly incident. I was supposed to be dead, but I luckily lived through and made it to the end.

One month later the gang was in jail, I was running my inn again, and now I am careful about my customers. I hope this never happens again. I suppose I learned an important lesson that day. People are not always what they seem. I think that everyone should learn from their touch of death experience, and this one was mine.