The rain in Maine & the criminally insane

It was very dark, and very quiet. The road to our motel twisted ahead of us, past the thick trees and small houses, leading farther away from any semblance of city life. The sun had set just a short time earlier, as we crossed the border from New Hampshire into Maine, but with the lack of fellow travelers, it felt like we were deep into the night. Kyle was not with us that Friday evening. We had left him at my parents’ place on our way to Springvale, where one of my friends was about to get married.

The motel's sign glowed ominously from the side of the road. As we pulled into the lot, we noticed that very few people had done the same, as most of the parking spaces in front of each building’s strip of rooms were empty. The place was eerily quiet. A lone man sat in the motel’s dimly-lit office, next to a monitor that glowed with the images captured by several outside security cameras. The Holiday Inn this was not.

"You will be staying in room 138," the man said as he gave us a key with a black plastic tag. "It’s in the building farthest to the back, by all the trees and cut telephone lines. Our free continental breakfast starts at 7 a.m."

We chose this motel because a group of my friends were staying there. We met up with them after dropping off our things, and they, too, said they felt our motel resembled one of those places where serial killers hide out. Little did I know that our remarks would foreshadow the events that would happen to us later that evening.

A noise from the bathroom startled me awake shortly after four in the morning. I wasn't entirely sure what I heard, since my mind was still in that fog between dreamworld and reality. I listened more closely to make sure I was not hearing just the rain outside. A shuffling sound confirmed my fears: somebody... or something... was in the bathroom, and must have entered through the window in there.

I slowly rose from my bed and crept towards the bathroom, trying hard to not attract the attention of our intruder. I also did not want to wake up Jennifer until I knew for certain we were in trouble.

Once I turned the corner, I had a clear shot. The bathroom door was closed, and the light was on. I froze.

Then I heard the flush. Whoever it was in that bathroom had the nerve to break in and then use our toilet. I didn't know what to think. Maybe it was someone who had been living out in the woods for a while and wanted to freshen up before beginning the slaughter.

Suddenly the door started to open...

WHOOMP! I jumped on the door and slammed it shut, trapping the intruder inside. I didn't know where to go from there. Perhaps I could have used the ironing board or a chair to jam the door shut, leaving the killer with nowhere to go as Jennifer and I made a run for...

... then it dawned on me: I hadn't checked to see if Jennifer was still in bed.

"Honey?" I asked, "Are you okay?"

Jennifer opened the bathroom door. Fortunately she did not have a broken nose. She also wasn't upset with my overreaction, though I'm sure she wouldn't have been to happy if I did more than just slam the door in her face. Needless to say, we didn't have any intruders that evening.

The rain continued throughout the next day, but nobody cared since the wedding was inside. We had a blast, and, that evening, with all the wedding guests filling up the parking lot, the motel lost its horror house charm.

The next morning we came across a crazy, disheveled old man who puffed cigarettes and then sprinted across the parking lot (this is true). When he approached our group of friends and said that he had spent the last four months in the woods (also true), we figured it was probably a good time to leave Maine. Who knows what I would have ended up doing if we stayed another night after that. You can be sure Jennifer's glad to be home.