"Freaks That Carry Your Luggage Up to the Room": Chapter Four

 OK, one more chapter from my pulp novel-in-progress before I put it away, at least from public view, until I finish it. Chapter One is here, Chapter Two is here, and Chapter Three is here. Cheers.

FREAKS THAT BRING YOUR LUGGAGE UP TO THE ROOM

A Novel by Will Viharo

Chapter Four

THE SINFUL DWARF

Boris the bellhop rubbed his grimy little hands all over the nude, voluptuous body of his boss, Clara Cleaver, as she lay strapped, nude and unconscious to a dirty table in the basement of L'Hotel du Frisson, with bloody pieces of rotting corpses strewn here and there around the dank, dark "dungeon," amid tables full of glass jars containing human organs floating in strange fluids. Once a prominent surgeon, Boris Yakov lost his practice, his career, and his Russian citizenship when he botched the heart surgery of a prominent Russian ballet dancer who had suffered a near-fatal seizure after overdosing on diet pills, and whom Boris happened to be secretly in love with. He blamed the tragedy on his nervousness, since he couldn't stop shaking as he operated on her. He had been shaking ever since her death, which everyone blamed on Boris, including Boris. His self-loathing ran deep in his tortured soul.

Clara had been hidden down here for nearly two days, and Boris knew he'd have to release her soon, before suspicion was aroused. She often vanished for days at a time anyway, away on trips to undisclosed locations, drinking and fornicating, or so the stories went. Clara was very lonely as well. Not only had her husband died on their honeymoon, leaving her a small fortune with which she purchased this very hotel, but she had lost several babies, some via abortion, some via miscarriage, and two that were stillborn. She felt cursed by the universe, and often wanted to die. Instead, she had random, unprotected sex with willing strangers, hoping one would impregnate her with a child that could be brought to term. It was a procreative crapshoot. 

The dwarf, Boris, was in love with Clara and knew of her birth-challenged plight, and he wanted to help her by helping himself. He had drugged her by spiking her customary morning latte from the cafe, then lured her down to the basement, where she never ventured, knowing Boris had lived there for years, before she purchased the building, and she was afraid of what she'd find. He always creeped her out, but she couldn't find it in her heart to fire him. Perhaps she would if she regained consciousness while he licked her bosoms and torso and legs and feet, running upstairs to masturbate in one of the empty rooms when he became aroused beyond endurance, because he didn't want to defile her, not while she was unconscious, anyway. He wanted her to love him, and he knew if he could cure her barrenness, however surreptitiously, she would love him forever, just like Katarina, the beautiful ballerina who died on his operating table back in Moscow, twenty years ago.

There was a thunderstorm raging up above, which Boris could hear through the basement's single window, the lightning illuminating horrible things. Boris paid off the local mortician for access to corpses on which Boris could conduct mindless, pointless experiments. The problem was, Boris had no idea what he was doing. He had a vague notion of bringing the Dead back to Life, but was unsure exactly how to go about it. He paid the mortician with money he stole from the seemingly endless stash of cash hidden in the back of the closet of one of the residents, whom everyone called The Mantis Man. Boris had seen The Mantis Man's hideous collection of shrunken heads, but didn't think much of it. Since he had keys to all the rooms, Boris could come and go as he please, and he wound up searching all the guest's rooms during their stay, when they weren't in the rooms, of course, stealing whatever he could, but mostly just sitting on their beds and masturbating, often with whatever feminine undergarments or lingerie happened to be handy. He hoped The Mantis Man never discovered that he was constantly stealing his cash, which The Mantis Man apparently never counted. The worst thing that could happen would be that The Mantis Man might kill him. That wouldn't be so bad, really. Boris just didn't want to die a fifty-eight year old virgin.

In her coma-like state, Clara was dreaming of her past, as a hot young stripper in various nightclubs on the Eastern seaboard, including Atlantic City, where she once had a one night stand with a young Elvis impersonator, now named Danny Falco. She had been engaged to a Jersey mobster at the time, but he broke it off when he discovered her many affairs. He didn't kill her, though, because he loved her too much. He just sublimated his heartbroken rage by killing everyone she had ever slept with. Except for Danny, who disappeared without a trace. Clara was in love with Danny and offered him sanctuary at the hotel, under an assumed name. His real name was not Danny Falco. He had changed his name so many times, he didn't remember what it used to be anymore. It didn't matter. He never knew himself very well, anyway, and was always open to change on his journey of self-discovery. He told Clara he loved her, even though she knew he was lying, just so he could rest for a while under auspices. She just wanted him close to her, to perpetuate the illusion of romance and domestic stability that had always eluded her. Clara was thirty-eight, eight years older than Danny, who truthfully claimed he had never been in love with anyone. They still had sex sometimes, even though their trysts often left her lonelier than ever. So much sex. So little love.

Clara suddenly moaned as Boris was eating her pussy, and he stopped suddenly. He had another erection and wanted to go back upstairs and relieve himself, but now all the rooms were booked, except for the room where Clara slept, which was as sacred as her womb and could not be violated, so he had no choice but to go to his own little bathroom and jerk off in the sink, which he hated to do, mainly because he had to stand on a stool to do it. He didn't want to ejaculate anywhere near, on or inside Clara, not until she was in love with him, and ready to bear his child. Boris knew Clara was in love with Danny, which is why he had told those gunmen where to find Danny. He wanted Danny out of the way, preferably permanently.

Sensing she was snapping out of it, though she would not be able to recall anything following her first sip of the spiked latte, Boris whistled and a very large mute brute, chained to the corner of the basement, stirred. The mute brute, like Boris, was horribly deformed, not due to the fickle cruelty of Nature, but as a result of Boris's bizarre experiments. The brute had once been just another guest at the hotel, a disgraced football player, kicked out of the league for steroid abuse. His name was simply LeRoy, born African American, but now his skin color had been lightened via Boris's various injections, so now he resembled an albino. He had no mind of his own. He was simply Boris's slave. 

"Take her upstairs and leave her in The Scarlet Room," Boris told him as he unlocked the shackles. "Be careful, it is late but someone may be about. Use the secret staircase. Hurry, before she comes to."

The seven foot tall LeRoy nodded sadly and walked toward the table in the center of the room as Boris undid the straps. LeRoy lifted Clara's nude body and entered the service elevator, which he rode up to the third floor. The Scarlet Room was left unlocked so LeRoy could deposit Clara inside quickly, then return to the basement undetected. As a reward, Boris often fed LeRoy scraps of human flesh, for which LeRoy had developed quite a taste.

After LeRoy gently laid Clara down on the scarlet bed, he stood and admired her beauty, then put his tongue on her bosoms, then her face and mouth and neck, and was working his lips down her body when she suddenly opened her eyes, and screamed.

Copyright 2011 Will Viharo
All Rights Reserved