Reality bites… a magpie tale.

Why are you doing this to me? Who are you? Stop! I remember myself crying out loud while thinking this must be a dream. I don’t even know where I am or if I am really here. All I know is that I can’t see a thing, I feel numbed, yet forced to breathe.

I can half-see a big bed, feel the 300-thread Egyptian sheets, comforter, downer and pillows… lots of pillows. It seems like a 5-star hotel, one of those with an “at your service” button always available. I open my eyes and the room is dark, yet a tiny ray of light shows thru the heavy blackout drapes. Ok, I get it – I am in a hotel room, but where? What am I doing here?

My legs are heavy; the alarm clock is blinking with that green flashy light that makes my eyes feel tired. Why can’t I move? Is it night or day? I kept wondering while the remote control of a fancy flat screen TV rolls down my thigh. Then I dozed in again…but I can hear a constant bip… bip bip bip…. bip bip bip…. It has a pattern, I think to myself; but what is that? Water dripping then a loud noise, not far yet not close enough to identify the source. My ears are swollen, I can feel it; this noise must be unreal.

The more I fight it the less I can stand it. I am half sleep half awake yet so aware. No familiar voices, no familiar smells. I manage to turn around and my hair got over my face, but my hands are useless, I can’t brush it away. Then I see a red light blinking and I closed my eyes… fell asleep, but was I really awake?

First I’m cold, then hot… then shivering again. It is the constant changes what makes me wonder if it is true or fake, if I am here or there… but really, where am I?

Finally that sound, coming from my cell –the first sign that indeed, this is happening, that it is real. Is the alarm set to wake me up at 6 AM. I open my eyes, the sun is bright and shining; looked around, recognizing the field: room service menu tossed by the bed, fluffy sleepers, magazines…a glass desk and my laptop on it. My suitcase open, half empty half full with dirty clothes. A bathroom door, a safe box, two sad looking apples on a wooden plate; the voice mail red light blinking on the phone. Sitting on the bed, making sense of the whole scene; looking around, rubbing my eyes and stretching. On my way to taking my shower I stopped by the door, looked to my right and a fancy antique mirror greets me: it reflects the room, big bed with white sheets; it has a golden frame, clean surface, crystal clear... and then the bip…bip bip bip…. bip bip……bip distracts me again; is the ice making machine! I giggle a little – silly me. It was all a dream, a bad one, but nonetheless a dream. I turned around, grabbed a towel and closed the door. Hot water running, steam filling the room. I am happy and calmed that it is all under control. I’m singing in the shower, getting ready for work.

Outside the bathroom door, my singing starts to fade. It gets hot, then cold, and then hot again…it is dark, time stops. Then it kicks me: if there was a mirror, why wasn’t my reflection there? Because there is no mirror on the wall… It has never been there.

Last thing I remember, I was

Running for the door

I had to find the passage back

To the place I was before

’relax,’ said the night man,

We are programmed to receive.

You can checkout any time you like,

But you can never leave…

Hotel California, Eagles.

This is a Magpie tale - Mag 37 - for other Magpie tales click  Magpie tales

A bad dream… wasn't it?

Santiago de Chile, October 19th 2009

It was one of those nights, away from home in my hotel room. Tired from a long day of meetings, documentation, decision making and a nice seafood dinner with colleagues that lasted longer than desired for a Monday night; I was finally there, ready for bed.

I was debating in the dark with my eyes closed if it was good to watch some TV or better to drift away, a moment that could’ve lasted forever if I was awake or maybe I was already gone. And then I heard, a loud voice, it seemed like a cry or perhaps just a whine; it was awfully close, could it be the TV? But then a second voice and the clear sound of struggle: door slamming, knocking and banging, then the voices again: “Págame, págame, tu me robaste!” and the next: “Get out of here!” and then again: “You owe me, págame, tu me culeáste! Dame mi dinero!” with a reply back: “dinero? You want money? no way Jose! OUT! OUT! OUT!”

It was disturbing and very surreal; I was in my refuge, at a good brand hotel, is it possible that something like that is actually happening in the middle of the night? The worst part was, even if I couldn’t see a thing, both voices sounded, oh so manly. The supposedly unpaid sex service claim came from a very masculine Peruvian voice. The authoritarian order to leave the former pristine room was executed by a deep repented American middle age-crisis masculine voice.

And yes, neither the one paying for the room nor the visitor asking for his money, cared about the rest of the 12th floor guests, some of which were calling desperately the “at your service” extension, yours truly included, to report the bizarre incident that was escalating to terms like “Ayúdenme!! No me pegues! Help por favor! Alguien que me ayude!” followed by: “I alredy paid for your services, now you want more money? Enough already! Out, Out now!” It was both scary and I have to confess, a little bit funny in a way. I guess I felt safe behind my locked dead-bolted door, with my super duper power of calling “at your service” whose super duper powers were limited to sending the night manager and a small skinny bellboy to the rescue. (In case you were wondering, yes, by now I was looking thru the peephole and that was all I could see).

The two heroes knocked at the crime scene in progress door after being hearing the development inside, long enough to realize it was a text-book confession of a not so legal carnal activity (and if I was able to hear loud and clear, they were pretty much absorbing the words by direct osmosis). “Is every thing ok, sir?” was the best they could manage to say, then the Incan Diva got carried away with a very explicit story about how many times the gallant guest did her (oh yes, by now I knew the Peruvian-sounding male was a Peruvian-sounding butterfly), that then he paid 140 bucks for the services,  that such money got extracted from her purse when she went to the bathroom, then she started screaming: “Ladron! Este es un gringo disfrazado de ladron! Yes, you gringo thief! “. The two hotel wannabe guards allowed the other side of the story to be heard, which was the coolest made up version of the innocent foreigner in a wonder- land of the have sex with strangers for free: “ I was in the lobby, minding my own business with my book, when she came on to me, and I thought, you know, one night stand… and then we consensually agreed to make all the love, you know, to come upstairs to my room, and you know, ehem, do the intercourse-o”… I was laughing inside, saying: yeah right, you freak!... but apparently that was all the rescue squad needed, since the speaking-one just said: “I hear you, no problem sir; is “she” staying here with you or do you want her out of your room?” then the man: “oh no, OUT OF HERE! Pronto!”… the crying game-look alike asked: “que dijo? Que pasa? Y mi dinero?”, only to hear her time was up, that she was not even a legal alien in this country (but an alien nonetheless, I thought) and that they were calling the police if she refused to leave the premises.

After that convincing argument she was fixing to leave, but not before spitting the last part of the cursing speech full of “ya lo pagarás, gringo ladrón, call police, the gringo bad, me good, this is my finger” in a desperate attempt of speaking some English… that was the end, a settlement of 20 dollars for a taxi, an escorted out of the place midnight queen, a finally closed quiet door two rooms to my left… with a bitter flavor in my mouth of anonymously witnessing the sad story of the desperate cheap working “girl”, the man who risked too much and the deep unexpected feeling of pity and unfairness the whole thing left behind.