The Hotel

The hotel is sandwiched between two abandoned houses and like those houses it is in ruin. It sits on a street simply named “Street”. It is called this because the sign is so scratched you cannot read the rest of the name. The street is squeezed in the midst of Manchester, no wider than an alleyway, and is potholed along its length. Because of its narrowness, the street acts like a funnel for the wind, which whistles and winds its way down to the end. From whichever end you enter you get the same view: a row of faceless houses running along either side, and a dank road snaking its way into the distance. For it’s a very long street and you can’t see the end from the beginning or, for that matter, the beginning from the end. 1

The hotel’s facade leers its full three floors, one floor more than the neighbouring houses. It has six windows, two for each floor, each broken in its own individual way. The front door is painted a shabby russet, camouflaging itself amongst the red Victorian bricks. There is a simple metal knocker set just off centre. There is no handle: the door simply swings open or shut as the wind, or the occasional customer, wishes. 2

As you step into the dusky entrance you hear a distant Elvis record playing from somewhere above. The record is badly scratched. If you look hard enough through the gloom you will see a hatch cut into the wall. In its heyday staff would have sat here and slapped on their fake smiles, welcoming guests into the hotel, yet today it isempty. On the right hand wall of this miniscule hall there are carpeted stairs reaching into the darkness of the landing above. If you step up these stairs and turn right you will find three doors.3

14

You get to the top and the Elvis music stops right on cue. Thanks god for that.5

They are all the same, each door: made out of cheap, tacky wood, with one golden knob which sits slightly off the middle. 6

The choice of which door to go through is simply down to chance. You can’t distinguish anything from the wood in your way. You may as well pick at random. Say, for example, you go through the door on the right. You take a couple of steps forward, grip the handle and pull. You gasp and take a step back out for the change in atmosphere is vast. The first thing that you see almost makes you dizzy; it grabs you by the throat and spins you around a couple of times - the light. It’s blinding. It’s almost as if the furniture, the walls, the room are emitting their own glow. 7

Once the giddiness subsides and your eyes adjust you will notice the smell, a clinical, man-made smell. It creeps up your nose and sticks in your throat, making your eyes burn and a different kind of giddiness overthrow you.8

The walls follow suit to the rest of the hotel: grey with little chunks of concrete missing. However, these have no dirt on them, not one mark, not one spec…nothing. The floor is wooden planks nailed in. Again these are old, scratched, stained…but no dirt. 9

To the right of the door is a bookshelf, obviously old; there are many cracks and scratches, yet it’s pristinely clean. A see-through bottle of polish stands on top of an exactly square cloth, spread out to make you think it’s been ironed profusely. There are no books on this bookshelf, in fact not even a spec of dust sits. 10

On the right wall is a cracked window, almost falling of its hinges. A draft is banging the window open and closed now and then, threatening that it will break it even more. A bed sits under the window. The frame of the bed is just like the bookshelf, just like the walls, just like the floor: old, scratched, yet completely clean. It’s, again, made of wood. A mattress, covered by a white sheet, sits on the bed, spotless, of course (judging by the rest of the room). A white, unspoiled…maybe untouched duvet, floats airily above. 11

There is one more piece of furniture, a chair, and the on the chair, a man.12

The chair that mimics the cleanliness of the bookshelf. A limp figure perches on it, right on the edge, as if afraid to dirty it. He’s hunched, elbows on knees, face in hands. He’s wearing a suit, the type you wear to a wedding: black blazer, black tie and white shirt. Under a grey, bob-cut head of hair and bushy eyebrows sit a pair of fierce (ice cold, blue flame, blue heat) blue eyes which dart to and fro constantly. Something’s coming to get them. He has a wrinkled, round face. Like a deflated balloon the skin sags off the bones, the whole face is melting. The nose is drooped, those piercing eyes are drooped and so, it seems, is his smile. 13

He sighs. His hands are by his sides, drumming, and his legs are crossed, with one foot on the floor, tapping. He’s in a new, unfamiliar room and sat on the decaying chair that is in the centre. He’s scared.14

He’s facing the cracked window and, in a way, a mirror. Just like the window he is cracked: not just in the physical form that comes with old age, but inside. He is cracked. He is broken, kaput, wrecked and he doesn’t even realise. Sunlight is bursting through the glass pane and breaking through the room. Blinding light in the metaphorical and literal terms: Light that blinds the man’s eyesight; blinds the man from the perfection he’s craving and blinds the man from the imperfection he needs.15

He chokes on the light. His vision blurs, yet the light is still clear. It is illuminating everything. He’s under scrutiny: nothing escapes, everything has to be perfect. He craves darkness: he wants to hide himself and his flaws. He flicks his head to the right, dirt. He twists his neck to the left, marks. He stares at his own hands, scars. His weathered face winces as he sees a black dot on the polished wooden floor. He glances at it. It has grown. A disease. He looks away and stares at the dank wall, no, more marks; he spins his head back to face the stain on the floor. Its spread, it’s contagious. His heart thumps. Contagious. It’s coming for him. He needs an antidote, perfection. His heart beats. But it’s still growing, he needs to be quick: every time he spies that stain it grows, though in his head, in his mind…not in real life. 16

He stands up and moves towards it, sweating and armed with the now beautifully folded cloth that was on the bookshelf, not understanding that’s nothing’s perfect, he’s the imperfection.17

218

Room number two is identical to room number one except it fits snug in the jigsaw of the hotel: dirt is there. It is as smelly, unhygienic and repulsive as the rest of the building, though the choking smell is slightly masked by the waft of deodorant. Glancing around it quickly there is nothing out of the ordinary. If you look closer and narrow your eyes slightly, you still see nothing out of the ordinary. If you pace the room, look in every nook and cranny, turn the room inside out you will find nothing out of the ordinary. This is because there is nothing out of the ordinary. 19

The room is painted a green colour and, of course, the paint is peeling off the walls. There’s a matching green carpet, which is littered by chewing gum and cigarette ends.20

A light bulb swings to and fro in the middle of the room, causing the room to have an empty feel, as if the light is searching the for a sign of life. It is the same layout as room number one except the window and bed are opposite the door. 21

On the bed, spread out on his back is a man. A chameleon man, though wearing a bright green polo and jeans he fades into the duvet. It’s almost as if he sinks into it. He’s a tall man; his brown, leather shoes are hanging over the end of the bed and his arms are straight and panned out, 30cm away from his arms, like a starfish. Long legs - which look stapled together and are in a perfect 90 degree line parallel to the edge of the mattress - protrude from the short stump that is his torso. He’s got brown, short, almost bald hair which looks like a stubble sticking out of a head that is smooth and babyish. He has no beard. However boring he is you can’t escape one feature that seems to pop out at you: wild, hazel eyes that are framed and nearly tamed by a pair of glasses. 22

The brown suit which he is wearing says nothing for him: a boring, run of the mill, tie hangs limply down his shirt; a shabby blazer, instead of making his shoulders broader, seems to drag him down and a white shirt that you wouldn’t look at twice. Yes, this shabby outfit says nothing for what’s going on behind those calculating pupils. They don’t explain that the reason for his boring appearance is not due to the lack of success or money but for the fact that this man doesn’t care much for trivial things such as clothes or that the reason why he is in this dingy hotel is so that he can get a broader view on life, meet people he usually doesn’t meet and have experiences he hasn’t ever had. For this man isn’t the ordinary, run of the mill bloke in any way, simply because his brain never stops whirring. 23

324

The shabby blue curtains are closed, though a thin strip of white light manages to burst through the centre of the two limp rags. The windows are shut; it is hot and muggy. The burst of sunlight catches a column of cigarette smoke. A butt smoulders, moodily, in a bin by the door.25

The room is in panic: a limp, white duvet is in a bundle at the bottom of the bed; a broken, shadeless light bulb hangs from the ceiling; magazines are haphazardly strewn over the floor, their pages fanned out; a bin by the bed is upside down and scattering multi-coloured litter - old magazines, cigarettes and bottles of Tesco’s Cola - across the room; weeks of green, matching underwear is falling off the bookshelf; and to complete the portrait of panic, a man has curled into a ball and is now rocking backwards and forwards on the bed. 26

Music is playing: “Blue Suede Shoes”. The record is scratched. 27

The figure on the bed sighs hoarsely and uncoils, straightening out his legs and letting them hang over the side of the bed, but keeping his torso curled over and head hanging down. He looks like a question mark. 28

He’s wearing a red glitter all-in-one suit. This suit hangs loosely over a thin body, with only the bones protruding. It is V-necked; a triangle of pale and hairless chest is visible. The man is breathing quickly, almost panting. His small head pokes out of the neck hole, rather like a tortoise. In fact, his neck is slightly too long, and it is wrinkled too; his eyes are wide and curious; and he has a slightly squashed face. He has a puzzled expression, as if he’s discovering the world around him for the first time.29

Blue eyes blink. Thin fingers tap. He licks his lips. He’s nervous. His shallow eyes glance down to his red watch. Five minutes until the taxi comes. To the right of him, on the end of the bed, is what looks like a ball of black hair. This is a wig. This is what he’s going to wear tonight. 30

He stands up on his feeble, shaking legs. He turns around to face the bed. He picks up the wig. He turns on Elvis. He turns the record onto full volume. He walks down the stairs. He can still hear the music. He opens the front door. He looks around the darkening street. He can still hear the music. The black wig blows off his head. He chases after it. He curses the narrowness of the street. He glances at the hotel. It’s sandwiched tightly between two other houses. Moments later the taxi pulls in. He gets in. He can’t hear the music anymore. The taxi leaves. It winds its’s way to the end of the street. He takes one last glance at the street sign: “Street”. Then he moves on to a better life.31