I’ve seen a dozen slasher movies set in a motel like this, the voice in my head said as my brother Dennis drove me to a hotel in Virginia, in the great U.S. of A. It’s two days before Halloween, 2010.
You know those single-story motels where assorted skullduggeries transpire? Welcome to the newly refurbished Motel Helen with a broken neon vacancy sign and walls with cracked olive green paint, the entire joint being run by a guy named “Norm.” My bed was beside the windows, so the headlights of approaching cars heralded the arrival of mysterious guests. When you walk out toward the road, there wasn’t another building in sight, just shadowy pine trees. This can’t be good. The Asian guy is usually the first to get scythed in horror movies. Or the obligatory longhaired pothead reject.
Switched the TV on and AMC has a countdown to the premiere night of The Walking Dead. This would last just one season, mocked I… and wrongly at that.
(I am a big fan of the comic book together with my friend K and we’ve already read Issue No. 103. Fellow fans are probably as annoyed as I am with that gang-leader Negan; I hope Rick ushers him into the jaws of walkers. Initially I didn’t like the TV adaptation, but it grew on me like a festering zombie wound. Now on its third season, The Walking Dead seems to me as interesting as Lost — elliptical plot, the recurrence of the undead, shower-deprived cast, etc. Another friend, CX, tried introducing me to 666 Park Avenue. Hate it. It’s Gossip Girl with guest star Satan.)
Two Halloweens before that, I crashed with a nice Filipino-Chinese family in California, all apple-pie wholesomeness and then some. And I was Edward Scissorhands exiled in suburban purgatory. The mom was a dentist. The dad was an entrepreneur who found time to drive me around to La Luz de Jesus Gallery, J. Paul Getty Museum, the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art and Hooters. The man took me to the best sights in LA — Baseman and boobs.
We also went to Party City so the kids could buy their costumes for Halloween. I went crazy in that store. No need for a costume of my own, the kids assured. Yes, I could get treats for posing as the obligatory longhaired pothead reject.
Back in Motel Helmut. My brother would drop me off at Guitar Center in Washington, he would go to the architectural firm where he worked, then would pick me up in a Barnes & Noble somewhere so we could get a couple of burgers and Blue Moons at Ruby Tuesday.
We talked about our old house in Blumentritt. Dennis told me how he would race against our siblings in falling asleep first because at a certain time the ghost of an old woman in black would float into the room. Yes, float. If there were CCTV cameras during that time, they would’ve made a found-footage movie à la Paranormal Activity or V/H/S. The House to the Left of Misericordia.
The Ruby Tuesday bartender wore glasses and looked like one of the luscious blondes of horror flicks: the girl who gets cursed by a gypsy (Drag Me To Hell) or works in a haunted boutique hotel (The Innkeepers) or spends a weekend with friends in a cabin in the woods (The Evil Dead). Whatever you do, Miss Ruby Tuesday, don’t visit “Norm.”
One time when my brother and I got back to the hotel, we came upon this Caucasian guy, probably in his mid-twenties, bare-chested, shoeless and with lots of cuts and bruises on his body. Apparently, he partied with two girls that evening. Somebody slipped something into his drink. He woke up on the pavement; his wallet, shirt and shoes were gone. Blood all over. His. Could we spare a few bucks so he could take the bus home? My brother reached for his wallet.
You know what my favorite monsters are?
People.