HOTEL HORROR STORY
By Eduard Joseph
Published by Eduard Joseph
Copyright 2015 Eduard Joseph
This is a work of fiction. The events and characters described herein are imaginary and are
not intended to refer to specific places or living persons. Any resemblance to any person or
persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
All Rights Reserved
The right of the writer to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him under the South African Copyright Act of 1978 (as amended).
In September of 1985, the Odendale Hotel in the small town of Haysville was closed down for good by the authorities after numerous complaints from the town’s residents. The hotel, which was situated about a mile outside of town, was advertised per highway billboards as ‘your home away from home’, but residents and guests of the hotel had a different opinion.
Some of the residents of Haysville noticed strange happenings in town during the construction of the hotel and there were even rumours that the hotel was not built on ancient burial grounds like in horror movies, but that the hotel might have been some kind of doorway built by the developers – targeting Haysville specifically for the fact that they were a small town in the middle of nowhere.
Construction started in April 1980 and curious kids would go to the building site after school to watch builders build what they hoped would be the future of their little town.
Alex Jensen, aged 12, reported that he and his friends went to the building site after school on the day of April 25th, 1980 and noted that all the streetlamps leading to the hotel was on despite it being 3 in the afternoon. He didn’t think much of it, until each light started switching off after another – as if drawing his attention to the site of the new hotel. He reportedly heard voices whisper, “come and see…”
None of Alex’s friends noticed the lights or heard the whispers, but Alex couldn’t help but feel that they were being watched by something other than the builders who occasionally glanced at the kids from afar.
On the night of April 29 while preparing herself a cup of tea, Mrs Martha Williams reported seeing at least fifteen cats running down the street in the same direction as they all growled and hissed. When another ten cats came running by, she went out onto her porch to see what the commotion was about and noticed that the cats all seemed to run down Main Road – the street that led out of town towards the Odendale Hotel.
On the morning of April 30th, 1980, construction was unable to continue due to the fact that the carcases of at least a hundred cats were found scattered across the Odendale Hotel building site – some of the cats were badly decomposed as if they had been lying there for months. It took a clean-up crew five hours to remove all the dead cats as some of them were compressed between building equipment and vehicle wheels.
The hotel opened its doors on May 29th, 1980 after a hurried construction to meet deadlines and its first guest, Peter Smith, checked in on June 4th, but never checked out. According to the front desk clerk, Mr Smith was last seen in the dining hall on June 5th, having dinner with one of the other guests, but he was never seen returning to his room. When housekeeping entered his room on the morning of June 6th, they found a message on the bathroom mirror written in what seemed to be blood; “I was here. I used to exist.”
A missing persons report was filed at the Haysville Police, but it would be the first in a string of bizarre disappearances at the hotel, but with no signs of foul play, the case became known as a cold case and speculation suggested that Mr Smith snuck out during the night in a bid to avoid paying for his room.
On the evening of August 9th, 1980, Jeremy Clarkson called down to the front desk to enquire whether he was in possession of the only key card to the room that he checked into the night before. He claimed that he awoke during the night to find a woman with long white hair and a face as black as night standing at the foot of his bed, but when he switched on the bedside lamp, the woman was gone.
The front desk clerk assured Mr Clarkson that he had the only key card, but offered to have the room searched by security. Mr Clarkson declined the offer, but called the front desk again later that night at 23:05 sounding terrified.
“Front desk.” The clerk answered.
“She’s back.” Mr Clarkson whispered.
“I’m sorry?” The clerk asked confused.
“Room 142.” Mr Clarkson uttered, “The woman at the foot of my bed… she’s back. I woke up and saw her standing there in the dark, but this time when I switched on the light she was still there.”
“Is she still there now, sir?”
“Yes.”
“What is she doing?”
“She’s just standing there.” Mr Clarkson whispered, “Standing in the corner of the room with her back to me… oh God…”
“What?”
“She’s walking towards the bed… backwards.”
The call was disconnected and that was the last anyone ever heard from Jeremy Clarkson. The front desk clerk sent two security guards up to room 142, but it was unoccupied and the bed was made – there was no trace of Jeremy Clarkson or the woman he reportedly saw. Despite finding no Jeremy Clarkson in the check-in register, hotel management filed a missing person’s report. The Haysville police completed their investigation, but with no record of Jeremy Clarkson ever checking in, they simply closed their file and shipped it off to the archives.
Jenny Peters started as front desk clerk on September 10th after the previous clerk failed to report for duty and it was on her first night-shift on September 12th that a surge of darkness made all the lights in the foyer flicker in an echo of whispers telling her to ‘come and see.’ Everything returned to normal within three seconds, but it was enough to freak her out. According to the telephone records, Jenny called her mother’s home at 20:15 on September 12th.
A guest going up to his room reportedly heard Jenny tell someone on the phone that she heard voices whisper to her from behind despite being alone behind the front desk. According to the guest, Jenny Peters seem hysterical and mumbled incoherently until she abruptly stopped, looked down at the phone receiver and asked, “Hello?” The guest didn’t stick around for much longer, but stated in an affidavit which would later form part of an investigation, that when he went down to the foyer the next morning and asked the day clerk how she was, the clerk seemed confused.
“Jenny?” The day clerk asked.
“The girl that worked the front desk the day before.”
“There’s no girl, sir.” The day clerk said with a smile bordering on sinister, “I’ve been at front desk since last night six o’ clock.”
Convinced that the clerk was lying and confused by his bizarre demeanour, the guest decided to contact the police and tell them what he witnessed the night before. The police investigation led them to the home of Jenny Peters who claimed to work at the hardware store and stated that she had never been to the Odendale Hotel. The guest who reported her missing checked out that same day with no forwarding address.
Between October 1980 and April 1981, numerous guests reported to front desk that they saw Jenny Peters nervously talking into the telephone receiver of the front desk the night before and were told the same story by the front desk clerk – that he was the only clerk on duty. At first the Haysville police didn’t pay much attention to the complaints, but when they received a seventh complaint of a similar nature to the first complaint, they decided to do a follow-up interview with Jenny Peters. The investigating officer was told by her mother that Jenny had died on October 1st, 1980 – almost 6 months earlier.
Stephen Jackson started as the front desk clerk on May 12th, 1982 and was oblivious to the mysteri
ous happenings of the Odendale Hotel as he was new in town. On the morning of his first shift he grabbed a cup of coffee at a coffee shop and started flirting with Samantha, the cashier, who was quickly drawn into a conversation by his deep, green eyes. When he told her he was starting at the Odendale Hotel that day, her face drained of colour and she begged him to stay away from the hotel.
“Please.” Samantha pleaded, “You have to stay away from that place. It’s not safe.”
“What do you mean?”
Samantha glanced around her as if checking whether they were alone and asked, “You haven’t been in town for long, have you?”
Stephen shook his head and then she leaned in closer; “Town folks steer clear of that place. There is something strange about that hotel and you should steer clear of it as well.”
“I’m not sure I follow.”
“I’m not exactly sure what goes on there,” Samantha said, “but I can tell you what I’ve heard – guests have a habit of disappearing without a trace.”
“Surely that’s just rumours?” Stephen was unconvinced, “People don’t just disappear into thin air.”
“They do at Odendale Hotel.” Samantha insisted, “Please, don’t go there.”
“I have to.” Stephen said, “I need the money.”
Samantha could see that it was fruitless to try and convince him to stay; he had to learn the hard way that there were places on