The Motel at the End of Route 13

The rain had been chasing Daniel for three straight hours, blurring the highway lines into liquid streaks of white. His wipers beat a useless rhythm against the windshield, struggling to clear the downpour. The GPS signal had died twenty minutes ago, leaving him alone on Route 13—a cracked two-lane road that cut through endless black fields and rusted fence lines. His gas tank light blinked red. He cursed under his breath, praying for a sign of civilization.

When he saw the glowing vacancy sign through the storm—THE LAST REST MOTEL—it felt like salvation.

The building crouched at the edge of the road, a single-story strip of faded doors and flickering lights. A half-broken neon sign buzzed and hissed as he pulled into the gravel lot. There were no other cars. The rain softened to a drizzle as he stepped out, the smell of wet earth and rust thick in the air.

Inside the small lobby, a bell jingled weakly as he entered. The walls were paneled in fake wood, the kind that absorbed decades of cigarette smoke. A register book sat open on the counter, next to an old brass key rack. Behind it stood a woman in her fifties with a stiff smile and skin too pale for the dim light.

“Long drive?” she asked in a flat tone.

“Yeah,” Daniel said, setting his wet backpack down. “Just need a room for the night. Got caught in the storm.”

“Storms can be tricky around here,” she said, her eyes drifting toward the window. “Sometimes they wash things away that shouldn’t be.”

He forced a laugh. “Well, as long as they don’t wash me away too.”

Her smile didn’t change. “Name, please.”

He leaned over to sign the register. The book’s pages were yellowed, each entry written in precise cursive with dates stretching back decades. He found the next blank line and wrote Daniel Harper – 2025.

The pen scratched faintly. As he lifted it, something in the ink shimmered like oil. He blinked. His name looked older than the page itself—like it had been there for years.

The woman slid a key toward him. “Room seven. Don’t leave your door open after midnight. The wind gets in.”

Daniel hesitated. “The wind?”

“Good night, Mr. Harper.”

Her tone left no room for more questions.

Room seven was halfway down the row. The air smelled faintly of mildew and something metallic, like old coins. Inside, the room was plain: a bed, a table with a dusty lamp, a rotary phone, and heavy curtains that muffled the sound of the rain.

He peeled off his wet jacket and collapsed onto the bed. The mattress sagged, the springs groaning under his weight. He told himself he’d leave early—at sunrise. Just a night, nothing more.

As he drifted toward sleep, he thought he heard footsteps outside. Slow. Careful. He sat up, heart pounding, listening. The footsteps paused outside his door. A shadow slipped across the thin gap beneath it.

“Hello?” he called.

No answer.

He crossed the room and peered through the peephole. The hallway was empty. The sound had stopped. Only silence remained—until the faint hum of a phone broke it.

He turned. The rotary phone on the table was ringing.

Daniel picked it up. “Hello?”

Static crackled, deep and low, like a distant storm. Then a voice whispered through:

“Don’t sign the book.”

He froze. “What? Who is this?”

The line went dead.

He stared at the phone, its dial trembling faintly, as if something underneath it was moving. The lights flickered once. Twice. Then steadied.

He swallowed hard and sat on the bed, trying to convince himself it was a prank. But when he reached for his phone to check the time, the screen stayed black—even though he’d charged it earlier. Dead.

Sleep didn’t come easy. When it did, it came in fragments: flashes of the front desk woman standing over him, her hands folded neatly, the register open in front of her. Rows of names written in faded ink. His among them.

At some point, the sound of wind woke him. The curtains rustled. The window latch was trembling as though someone outside was testing it. The air grew colder, the kind that smells like wet stone and rot.

Then came a soft knock at the door.

Three times.

He didn’t move.

The knock came again, louder, impatient.

“Front desk,” a voice called. “Just checking if you’re comfortable.”

It sounded like the woman—but wrong. Too flat, too stretched, like a recording slowed down.

Daniel reached for the doorknob, then stopped himself. Her warning echoed in his head. Don’t leave your door open after midnight.

The handle turned from the other side.

He stumbled back. “Who’s there?”

Silence.

Then the sound of footsteps moving away, fading toward the lobby.

He waited until morning light filtered weakly through the curtains before stepping outside. The sky was gray, the storm gone. The motel looked smaller in daylight, almost deserted. He noticed then that the lot had changed—his car was still there, but it looked… older. The paint dull, the tires cracked. As if it had sat there for years.

Uneasy, he walked back to the lobby. The bell over the door didn’t ring this time. The woman was gone. The air was stale, the coffee pot cold and empty.

He looked at the register on the counter.

Flipping through, he froze.

There was his name—Daniel Harper—but the date beside it read June 12, 1978.

He flipped more pages. Every name had a birthdate after their check-in date. People who couldn’t have been alive yet.

One entry stood out, written in the same shimmering ink as his:

Sarah Collins – 2019.

His stomach turned. Sarah Collins. That was the name of a missing person he’d seen on a podcast last year—a hitchhiker who vanished near Route 13.

He turned another page. The next name stopped him cold.

Daniel Harper – 2025.

Below it, in faint writing: Checked out: Pending.

He backed away from the counter. The lights flickered again, and a soft hum rose from the walls, like a whisper of voices blending together. He ran outside.

The road beyond the parking lot looked endless, stretching into a horizon that shimmered like heat haze. But when he tried to start his car, the engine coughed, then died. The key wouldn’t turn again.

Something moved in the rearview mirror.

A figure stood in the motel doorway—the woman from the front desk. She was smiling, but her eyes were hollow now, filled with swirling gray mist.

“Leaving already?” she called. “You haven’t checked out.”

Daniel bolted from the car and ran down the road, his shoes splashing through puddles. The motel lights faded behind him—but the hum followed, deep and steady, like machinery grinding somewhere beneath the earth.

He ran until his lungs burned. When he looked back, the motel was gone.

Just an empty field stood there, weeds waving in the wind.

He stumbled forward, disoriented, until he saw headlights in the distance—a car approaching. A woman leaned out of the window. “You okay?” she shouted. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

He climbed in, gasping out the story as they drove. She listened silently, her face pale. When he finished, she said quietly, “I’ve heard about that place. My sister disappeared there.”

“What was her name?” he asked.

She hesitated. “Sarah Collins.”

His blood ran cold.

He turned to look at her—and froze.

Her reflection in the window wasn’t matching her movements. While she stared at the road, her reflection was staring straight at him, smiling faintly.

The car lights dimmed. The road vanished into mist.

Two weeks later, a highway patrolman reported an abandoned car on Route 13. Inside, there was a half-open motel brochure on the seat. The Last Rest Motel, printed in faded ink.

The patrolman turned it over and frowned—there was no address, no phone number. Just a single handwritten line on the back:

“Checked out: Daniel Harper.”

And beneath it, a fresh name beginning to form in that same oily ink:

Officer M. Turner – 2025.

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