The Granulate Hotel Episode (a short story, Abysmal Terror)

The Granulate Hotel Episode
(Abysmal Terror)



Prologue: Seldom do I do a prologue to a story, but I feel I must for this one: the story is not far from the truth, what I write is what is happening in many parts of Lima, put here in story form, and throughout Peru, today—in 2008 and now in 2009. It has been for a while, and it is getting worse. It is sad but true, like most cities, they want to keep such things quite to the outside world, especially the tourist, yet, very little is being done in the law enforcement area in Peru today to counter terrorism, the immense problems with thief, many of them are on the police force, and cheaply bought, and seldom if ever come to assist anybody in need. It starts from the top of course, and ends at the very bottom. The world has their wars, such as the United States, in Iraq, and Israel with Hamas at the moment, Russia with Georgia, and China with Tibet, and so forth and so on, but there is an internal war going on in Peru, in that, the people and the government work against themselves. This in itself is a destructive kind of war, and never ending, and is why they seldom find themselves ahead of the game. There are plenty of laws, but no understructure to implement them, that is to say, laws un-enforced are no laws at all, it is just a show and tell thing. If you love a country, you speak up for it, even if it sounds like you are against it. And I suppose that is what this prologue is, and now for the story of “The Granulate Hotel Episode.”

He was a very cautious young man, just twenty-one, self-absorbed sort of a lad, sitting a spell on the stone wall, above, looking down upon the Lima coat, a cool dampness, a breeze oozed through his hair, Lima, Peru, in 1999, had its peril, and to a Midwestern boy, mostly hidden. A light fog was lifting from the morning heat, the breeze driving it up and out of the city, the wet from the ocean blew upon his face, and the top of his shoes, and socks were getting wet.
From one site to the next of the wall, he paced slowly, quietly, smoking a Lucky Strike Cigarette, then half smoked, he flicked it to the ground. Bright as the morning was, he was not ready to embark on looking for a job; it was only his second day in the city. He moves on through the morning light to the downtown area, Miraflores in particular. The ground along the parkway was soft compared to the long walk on cement. His feet—after a few hours of walking about, felt like pine-needles sticking them. Kind of a new sensation, one he had not yet experience in his youth.
He kind of walked aimlessly through the busy sidewalks, and across the busy inner city streets, that stretched out like the wings of a condor, over looking the restaurant, the Rosa Nautical, below.
He could feel his smallness in this so called international metropolis of some eight-million people, compared to St. Paul, Minnesota, of less than 300-thousand. Strange were his feelings, in the midst of the vast volume all around him, as if he was being shut in by mountains, and not so far in the distance, one could see on one side of the city the Andes, the other side, the ocean.
He lifted up one foot, the next one, rubbed them, leaned against a telephone pole, there were no trees about, he had to go to the bathroom and there was no bushes to hide behind. Slowly and carefully, he moved, found a Movie Theater, asked kindly if he could use their bathroom, and they allowed him to. His sense of direction was not good, was never good, but like always it never seemed to bother him much, he found his way, and he knew he was headed towards his hotel room, he paid $17.00 a night, and the bathroom was in the hallway. It was a dingy room, one bed, no television, a radio though, and a dresser drawer, with a mirror on it.

Now in his hotel room, sitting on the edge of his bed, he heard several footsteps outside his room, they seemed to be rushing back and forth, it made for instant curiosity, he moved to the door, listened, then Bill Warren suddenly looking out into the hallway through the knothole in the door, saw a girl he thought he knew, but something at the same instant snapped inside his head. He staggered back to his bed, weakened, dropped his glasses he had in his hands—he had taken them off to look in the peephole, and his head was in a state of unbearable pain.
He was dizzy, saw shadows flying by, couldn’t focus, he looked about, everything was black, it freighted him. He articulated a moaning sigh; his head was hurling more and more, into some kind of surreal state, he was being restrained, yes he told himself, that’s it, something or someone was restraining him, for his body was like it was paralyzed, as if he was knocked senseless and brought back to sensibility only to be drugged somehow, by someone, someway, into a restraining position.
He told himself, Bill Warren, is not all Bill Warren, somehow he shares a part of his will and body with someone else, that someone has taken charge of him, and a voice said, the word, ‘anachronism,’ what exactly does that mean? He asked himself, perhaps it means ‘leftover,’ something is leftover, from his awaken world, which he was not fully in, only ten-percent in. And it was so very, very dark, and he tried to open his eyes, but he was being restrained.
He know cried, he knew the curse of helpless fear, He was so very afraid, in the deep dark; who put him here, there, whoever it was, was not though with him.
It was like night in a forest, an abysmal terror. His hotel room was in chaos, he had guests in it, he could now hear their breathing, and the sound of police sirens, he felt then, maybe they’re coming to help me, and like any hero, he started yelling, and he could hear footsteps coming toward his apartment, and one person questioned the other and they slipped out the back window of the room, those who were inside his room.

Said one police voice to the other, “Mr. Warren, is that your name?”
“Yes,” said Bill Warren, “That’s my name.”
“We’re going to take you to the hospital, ok sir?”
“What for, just find my glasses please and get these dark—whatever it is out of my eyes, so I can see.”
“Are you in any pain sir,” asked one of the police voices.
“Oh…” he stopped to think, “yes, oh yes, my head and eyes, and everything hurts, why?”
The police voice that was speaking was Sergeant Lopez,
“Let me explain Mr. Warren what took place here. The girl across the hall, said she thought she knew you, and saw three guys go into your room, she thought it was their room until she saw you, then she called us. We didn’t respond very quickly, and then she called us again. The three bandits slipped you a powder and it numbed your body, and they stole your eyes, you have none sir and they were about to cut open your mid-section, and take some parts out of you to sell, it’s becoming a very prominent and very lucrative business nowadays, had we not come when we did, need I say more.”
It was all stupefying, for Mr. Warren, he put his hands up to his eye sockets, pulled out the rags that were left in them, and sure enough, they were empty.
“Take him to the hospital,” said Sergeant Lopez, “I’ll have a look around here to see if they are still about, or perhaps a clue that they were.”
Said Sergeant Lopez in the hallway to the hotel manager,
“Tell Manuel to be more careful nest time, and that the young woman in room 333, has pretty eyes.”


Written in Lima, Peru, 1-10-2009