A friend and I took two days off and headed to the Highlands area of North Carolina. We’ve gone a day trip there almost annually for twenty years. It’s a tradition.

This time we decided to spend the night in the vicinity. I won’t say exactly where, but it was within 25 miles of Highlands proper.

Wow. I booked The Motel before I investigated it on Travelocity. The reviews weren’t promising. In fact, there were a bit scary. Because I’d gotten a really low rate, The Motel wouldn’t let me cancel the reservation (even within an hour of making it.) BAD sign. I called The Motel’s corporate connections. They wouldn’t let me cancel, either. VERY bad sign.

I figured there must be other places to stay if it came to that, but my friend and I have travelled together a lot (Road Trips!) and decided we’d manage.

Well, it was sketchy. The Motel had two strips of single story rooms, and the manager put us in the back strip. Where we were alone.

The parking lot was dark, pot-holed, and faced the woods. It truly looked like all the bad motels in slasher movies when the chicklets run outside in their underwear to have a surprise rendezvous with an axe murderer. The connecting door between our room and a vacant room had been broken open and couldn’t lock on the far side. The lock on the patio sliding door (which did lead to a nice little covered porch area) didn’t work, either. Nor did half the lights in the room.

And let’s just add that we didn’t put our luggage on any floor or padded surfaces for fear of bed bugs.

However, The Motel’s housekeeper was very sweet. She rushed up as soon as we got into the room and explained that she’d been busy cleaning the lower strip and would return soon with towels. And Kleenex. And toilet paper.  (We never got the disposable plastic drink glasses). She and at least three kids lived at the far end of the strip. We decided that if she felt safe living there with her kids it couldn’t be as evil as it looked.

So my buddy and I poured some wine and sat on the porch overlooking the highway. Eventually we had some free entertainment when the housekeeper’s kids went skateboarding down the steep driveway. Fortunately, they were much better at it then we’d expected and there was no bloodshed.

Imagine my consternation when—quite late and after much wine—my friend began screaming in her sleep and begging for the cops to come. Now, we’ve travelled together A LOT and she’s never had nightmares nor talked in her sleep. Here I am, wearing earplugs (she snores like a champion) hearing her crying out. I don’t have my glasses on which means I’m completely blind (literally). 

By this time I can’t tell if there IS someone in the room or not. Very calmly I jump
out of my bed and rush to hers, shaking her like an earthquake and demanding
that she wake up. I didn’t hear any scary music playing (always a dead giveaway) nor seen any sign of an axe murderer so I figured it was a false alarm. 

Thankfully, it was a false alarm. Still, when I took a shower in the morning I left the bathroom door open and the shower curtain mostly open. No sense taking chances.

Got a scary motel story? Tell me about it!