After taking a second to compose herself, her slouched dainty shoulders returning to their proud bearing, she glares back down at me. Growling at me her voice drips with a mixture of fury and nausea, her words needing deep breathes between them as she tries to fight back the urge to vomit.
"You...fucking pervert..." she growls, her eyes narrowing as she glares down at me in disgust. Her voice is purely melodic, the sort of sing-song voice you'd expect from a Disney princess despite the rage burning within her words.
As looms closer to me I watch as a flicker of recognition spreads across her face, the same eerie sense of familiarity triggering in her as it had with me moments ago. However, despite this disarming moment she quickly returns to her shouting.
"Urgh, I can't believe this place would have something like...like..." she fumes, clutching at her towel fully aware that it fails to truly cover her whole body thanks to her larger-than-average height. Shooting me a side-eye she turns to the bathroom, mincing over in search of something.
"Wheres the switch?!" she barks at me, her voice naturally commanding. I slowly but surely climb to my feet, my legs shaking a little thanks to all the shouting and the fear coursing through me.
"The...what...?" I ask meekly, watching her as she darts around the bathroom trying to seek out something hidden within.
"The switch! The...whatever it is that made this a fucking window" she snaps back, bending down from an upright position at the hips effortlessly as she searches beneath the low sink. For a moment I get a peek at what lays between her legs as she accidentally presents herself, a set of exposed pink lips extending from a small mound between her legs still glistening and wet after her shower.
"I...I don't know" I mutter back, struggling to compose myself as I slowly get my feet back under me. I needed to regain some control over the situation and I certainly wasn't going to do that while laying on the floor.
"What do you mean you don't know?" she hisses, her voice taking on a mocking tone as she repeats my words back to me. "You were watching me so you must have...urgh...I can't believe Mark booked a room next to a fucking creep like..." she fumes, lurching back upright impossibly quickly as the tight trained muscles in her behind and lower back snap into action.
"I don't mean to" I call out, looking at my shirt laying on the tiled bathroom floor by her feet. My blood runs cold as I remember that I'm shirtless, the strange state of dress doing little to help my case. "It was like that when I got here."
The young woman quickly turns to face me, her long wet hair whipping about her head with a loud slapping noise as it impacts her narrow shoulders. Her eyes dart over my upper body, her gaze rapidly narrowing as she mentally critiques my own slender frame and what unsightly flab I had.
"Yeah, right" she groans, rolling her eyes at the sight of the shirtless man in his late twenties. "And I suppose you were undressing beforehand as well...right?" the young woman asks in a derisive tone, a slight smirk forming on her soft pink lips as she thinks of how to twist the knife even further.
"No I..." I blurt out, freezing up as I realize how insane what I was going to say sounded.
"No, go on freak" she snaps back, walking closer to me in an oddly intimidating fashion. "Finish your thought, justify yourself before I call the fucking cops."
"I...saw your moles, on your arm and shoulder and...well they looked..." I stammer, struggling to form the sentence under the intense pressure I was under. Thankfully however, I don't seem to need to sway her with words. As I bring up the tiny birthmarks I watch as the young woman pauses in place, her eyes darting over my shoulder and right arm as she inspects them in kind.
"Turn around" she orders, the look on her face telling me she wouldn't be asking again.
Following along I turn on the spot, revealing the constellation of dark marks on my skin that mirror her own. I hear a small gasp escape the young woman's lips, the sound of her stomping stride petering out as she minces over for a closer inspection.
"What the...who are you?" she muses, the fury draining from her words by the second as it's replaced with confusion more so than anything else. I listen as she mutters something to herself, the words largely becoming lost in the quivering of her voice. "Did dad...affair?...too..."
Before I can answer I feel a hand grip my shoulder as I'm spun in place to face the tall slender stranger that had barged into my room. Despite looking down at her, albeit only slightly so, she is obviously the one in control of our situation. The way she carries herself, even in this seemingly terrible situation, purely exudes a 'queen bee' energy.
"I'm...uh...Jordan" I say with a slightly nervous chuckle, shifting back a little as I try to build some distance between us. However, with each step back I take the young woman inches closer as she maintains the short distance between us.
"Parents?" she barks, the sentence barely qualifying as a question as she tries to drill down to reach more information. "What's your last name...Jordan?" she asks, the way she says my name making it seem like she didn't quite believe what I had told her.
"Oh...um...my mom is Mary Hughes and my dad was John Roads" I state, weirded out by the line of questioning but eager to keep the angry young woman placated. As I state the names I feel her hand on my shoulder grip down hard before suddenly easing up, the woman's low lip quivering slightly at the mention of my parents.
"Bullshit!" she snaps, her voice shaking slightly as she tries to maintain her commanding tone. "How do you know about them? Are you like...a stalker or something" the young woman asks, her question kind of bouncing off me as I struggle to think of the answer she was looking for.
"I... they're my parents" I reply, cocking my eyebrow as I find myself getting a little more control in our interactions. "Why wouldn't I know them?"
"Well..." she snaps back with a slight sniffle, "how fortunate for you that we can't ask them huh?"
Looking down at the young woman as she begins to shake with a mixture of anger and sorrow, the sniffling only getting worse as we talk about my parents, I take my chance to slip by her. Weaving to the left I manage to get free from her grip, pulling my phone from my pocket as I back peddle towards the exit of my room.
"Hey!" Get back here!" the young woman snaps as she sloppily lunges towards me, her actions hampered by her need to hold the tiny towel up as well as the wave of emotions wracking her internally.
"Look, I'll prove it" I state, quickly dialing my mother's number and switching the phone to the loudspeaker. The room feels like it's frozen for a moment, the young woman standing completely still as the sound of a ringing phone fills the room. Suddenly, as the receiver is picked up on the other end I watch as the young woman's face drops and her eyes go wide.
"Hi sweetheart" coos my mother from the other end of the phone, her voice still distinguishable through the crackling of her ancient mobile. "Did you make the drive up okay?"
"Yeah, it was a bit of a drive but it wasn't too bad" I say back, shooting a look at the young woman that purely said 'I told you so'. "This hotel isn't great though, why did you have to redo the guest room so close to..." I begin to chide, my sentence being cut off as the young woman begins to speak up.
"Mom?" she asks in a shaky voice, the quivering of her lip having grown worse as her eyes glisten with tears.
"Yes honey? Sorry, but...am I on loudspeaker? I'm having trouble hearing you" she responds, not even questioning why there was a girl calling her mom.
As I hear the interaction my blood runs cold, my mind racing as I try to work out what was happening. Was this girl some long-lost sibling? Like a younger sister or something? I couldn't imagine when that could have happened though, considering I would have been around eight or nine if my guess at her age was correct I would have certainly noticed or remembered that sort of thing. Besides that, the birthmarks were too similar for just binge siblings who were several years apart. No matter how I try to think of an answer I only seem to draw dead ends that make little to no sense.
"Sorry, I...it's good to hear your voice and..." the girl blurts out, inching closer as she reaches for the phone. Thinking quickly I pull the phone up high, holding it out of her reach and above my head as I call out.
"and I've got to go quickly, I'll call you back" I shout, hoping my voice reaches the phone.
"Oh...alright sweetie" my mother says in mild confusion on the other end of the line. "It's good to hear your voice too, we'll talk later." she remarks sweetly, eliciting a whimper from the young woman as the call disconnects.
For a moment there is nothing but silence in the room, just the faint sound of the ocean nearby creeping ever so slightly into the quiet soundscape around us. As I inch my arm back down I look over at the shocked and deflated-looking young woman, her own face reflecting the same mental gymnastics that I had just undergone.
Looking down at my phone I hold it up for her to see the contacts page, displaying the contact for 'Mom' and the number I had just called. "See, what did I tell you" I remark, the sense of vindication making me feel like I had turned the tide somehow.
"That can't...she's..." the young woman mewls, rubbing her eyes with the back of her hands.
"So my turn, who are you? Why did you call my mother..." I begin to ask, only to be cut short by the young woman as she pipes back up. I watch as she readjusts the towel once again, the lighting of the room seemingly making the once pure white towel tint a very subtle shade of blue.
"I'm Emma" she states with a deep breath, her momentary deflation dissipating as she quickly recovers her imposing and confident bearing. "And that's my mom and...and...she died three months ago"
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