The stabbing pain in your neck jerks you awake. You slept wrong and you’re going to suffer for it. Through your closed eyelids you can already tell it’s bright in this room. Did you leave the lights on? You roll away from the brightness and lie face down to the mattress before opening your eyes.
White sheets. You flash on a memory of a cabin in a snowstorm. It fades like steam and disappears completely.
You don’t have any white sheets.
You struggle to sit up, then freeze. Where the fuck are you? The room is a hotel room: clean white linens, matching furniture. That too-quiet air that hums like it’s waiting. You can even see the little hotel soap and shampoo on the counter in the adjacent bathroom. When did you check into the hotel? You strain to remember. What did you do last night?
You stand on unstable legs and stretch, testing your tender neck. Alright, not too stiff. At least you can turn your head properly. As you do that from one side to the next, your attention is caught by the nightstand next to the bed. It’s a small table, with no drawers, just two items on top: a telephone, with a smooth faceplate where the buttons should be, and a small note that reads ‘Safeword’.
Safeword? You look around with fresh eyes. Is someone else here? You walk to the ensuite and push open the door—no one. You look around the rest of the room. There is nowhere for anyone to hide: no closet, no gap under the bed, and the shower curtain is open, so no one is in there either.
Focus. You’re not harmed. You’re dressed in what you assume you wore last night, a black V-neck sweater and jeans. Your shoes are placed neatly at the foot of the bed.
Picking up the phone, you wait for it to ring the front desk but there is no dial tone. You lean over following the cord to check if it’s plugged in. It is.
You put your shoes on and go to the door. The front desk will have a record if anyone else checked in with you. Unlatching the deadbolt, you twist the handle and simultaneously pull. The door doesn’t move. Looking quickly for any other locks on the door, you try both hands as you turn the handle and pull again. Nothing. Crap.
You rush over to the window, push aside the curtains, and look out. You are at least ten stories up, no balcony. You notice the screws holding the window shut just as the phone rings.
You dive onto the bed to get to the phone on the other side. Grabbing the receiver, you shout before the handset even makes it to your ear, “Hello? I’m locked in my room! Send someone to let me out. Please!”
There is quiet on the line, but you can hear someone take a breath, then a woman’s voice, “What’s the safeword?”
“What? I need help. Did you hear me? I am locked in this room!” You yell.
“What is the safeword?”
You sit stunned for a moment. You don’t know what to say. Then you hear a click and the line is dead.
You yell into the receiver, begging someone to come up and let you out, but there is no one on the line.
After hanging up, you go splash some water on your face. You need to wake up. This must be a weird dream. Some kind of nightmare. You dry your face with a hand towel, then lean on your hands looking into the mirror.
Your eyes are bloodshot, your hair is a mess, and you look scared. You remember the voice on the phone. If you knew the safeword, would you get out of the room? You go back out and snatch the paper off the table. Flipping it over, you hope there is something written on the back, even a clue would help. It’s blank.
You look up at the window and stop. Did the window have curtains? You walk over and look up at the wall. No curtain rods, no nails or screws, no holes where they would have been. Huh.
After alternately trying to open the door and picking up the phone hoping someone might be on the line, you sink to the floor with your back to the wall. You are out of options, and panic is chewing its way up your spine.
The phone rings again, and you pounce on it. “Hello?” you breathe quickly. It is all you can do to not start begging again.
“What is the safeword?” the same female voice asks.
“How am I supposed to know that? Please, let me out!” Now you are crying. You feel the tears and hear the shake in your voice.
“What is the safeword?”
You roll your eyes towards the ceiling, and they land on the bare window. “Curtains,” you spit out, half-laughing, half-sobbing. “It has to be curtains.”
“That is not the safeword.” And the line goes dead.
You need water. Standing at the sink, you gulp water until you almost choke. You stand staring at yourself again. How did this happen? You don’t remember anything before you woke up this morning.
There is nothing before waking up.
No yesterday.
No name.
Just this room.
Turning back to the bedroom, you notice the shower is gone. Wait. You close your eyes and give yourself a sharp slap on the cheek. Opening your eyes, you look around. Sink, toilet—no shower.
You stumble out; laughter bubbles up—too loud, too late. Wrong, like acid.
The table next to the bed has also vanished. The phone and the paper are on the floor as though that is where they have always been.
Is this what going insane feels like? Why are things disappearing? No one was in this room, and it is small enough that you would have known if someone opened the door.
You look at the paper on the floor, “Safeword”.
Maybe the curtains and the shower didn’t disappear, maybe they left. Maybe everything will eventually. Maybe the word isn’t to get out. Maybe it is to stay in.
You sit on the bed with your head in your hands. You don’t want to die but you have no way to guess what the safeword could be.
The phone rings. You know it will never stop.
