This Is Not My Hotel: Trav's mildly wild night

This story was submitted through the Polymedia Writer’s Guild. Visit Polykill’s Patreon to learn more.

My nights, generally speaking, are extremely mundane but I have a few that spike the wild-o-meter pretty hard. Those very few “extreme wild night” stories will never be shared publicly. At least, not until those stories alone can earn me a handsome income from a Netflix special. Until then, my mildest of wild night stories will have to suffice. This is a story I shared on an Off-Killter episode of Polykill many years ago, but it is written here with a sober mind.

Back in 2008, I was waving around a newly minted bachelor’s degree in psychology. This was right in the thick of a downturned economy, so no surprise, no one wanted to hire me for any jobs whatsoever. I decided I would just go to school for the rest of my life instead. “If you can’t beat them, join them,” I remember saying. That ol adage didn’t perfectly fit my scenario but I do remember saying it.

I had already applied to grad schools for clinical psychology, my first love, and was harshly denied by all of them. Even an online scam college that went out of business in 2011 didn’t want me. Truth be told, I did just enough to get by in undergrad. There was absolutely nothing about me that set me apart from anyone else. I didn’t volunteer, I didn’t join any organization, and my GPA wasn’t impressive on its own. I wasn’t really a desirable candidate for grad school.

According to this chart, if I don’t find a job or go back to school in the next six months, then I’ll probably still be fine. Oh well, better panic.

Being painfully average has never really stopped me from trying though. So without job prospects and realizing that my dream of talking to people on a couch opposite of me for cash was over, I emailed a few professors at my alma mater and told them that I would assist undergrads with research projects as a volunteer in return for a recommendation letter for grad school.

This idea worked! I was tasked with overseeing two international students who were conducting a bilingual study on construction workers. Without getting into the nitty gritty of it all, it was a pretty interesting project and when it came time to write the paper for it, guess who knew enough english to type it up? That would be me.

I ended up with a little more responsibility than I had bargained for, but with the tutelage of the professor who got me the gig, I churned out a report that was sent to the Human Factors Engineering Society for placement in their journal and a spot at their conference. I would have been happy with a poster session or even a “denied” letter, since after all, I had fulfilled my duties. The rest was a bonus, I just wanted into grad school.

Turns out, whoever reads these boring, godforsaken things took a liking to our report and accepted for a full presentation at the upcoming conference in New York City. Guess who spoke enough English to talk about the findings for 20 minutes? That would be me, again.

The Roanoke skyline. Spiderman would eat shit here.

NEW YORK CITY!? As a lifelong bumpkin, I had hardly been acquainted with any city, much less a major one like the Big Apple. Intersections with stop lights still made me nervous, I had only seen a few. I didn’t even know neighboring Roanoke too well, a metropolis of nearly 100,000 people! NEW YORK CITY!?

New York City introduced a lot of firsts to me. My first plane ride, my first taxi ride, my first suit, my first conference, my first presentation, my first Irish Pub, and my first time being terrifyingly lost in one of the largest cities in North America. Well, “terrifyingly” is too strong. “Entertainingly” might be the better word.

Marriott Times Square. Where little bumpkins’ go to spread the good word about construction safety.

I was unable to afford the Marriott hotel room in Times Square that the conference was offering, even with the discounted student and presenter rate. It was cheaper for me to find what amounted to a hostel three blocks away. I stayed at the Americana Inn, where I could touch all four walls in the room if I laid down in the middle just right. It was owned and operated by a man named Mohammed and he’s very important to this story.

The way the hotel was structured, you entered through a door at the basement level and immediately got on an elevator that took you up to the lobby. No matter what floor you requested on the elevator, the doors would always open at the lobby floor before closing again and taking you to your room. The reason for this was because in addition to checking folks in and out all day, Mohammed was security and his desk was directly across from the elevator. Anytime you went up in the elevator from the ground floor, *ding* the doors would open and Mohammed would stare blankly back at you and give a nod after a few seconds. *ding* The doors would close again and take you to your room.

Every day I was there going in and out of my room:

call the elevator

push the button for my floor

*ding* open

wave at Mohammed

*ding* close

up to my room.

I swear the awning was green in 2008 but if it wasn’t that would explain a lot.

The conference was great! My presentation went off without a hitch and was overall a good experience. After a week in New York City, I felt like I had a good grasp of my hotel’s area. I could walk from it to the Empire State Building, to Madison Square Garden, to Macy’s, to the Apple Store, to Time Square, to Central Park, and back without getting lost. “New York City is no match for me!” I probably said at some point.

On the final night, I decided I wanted to do something fun but not venture out too far. Everyone else I knew at the conference had already left on earlier flights so I was there to do my own thing. I settled on visiting the Irish Pub just down the street for a few drinks. I had gone there a previous night with some conference folk and made really good pals with the bartenders there. When I came back, they all recognized me, and we got to chatting away and time started to melt.

As the night went on, and I sat there joking around with the bar staff, a few bachelor’s parties had sauntered in. Three, to be exact. It must be a thing to have a stop at this Irish Pub if you’re partying it down near Times Square with your boys, and for every shot that the parties ordered, the bartenders would slide me one. This happened several times for three different parties over the course of six hours. Most of the time I didn’t even know what I was drinking but I was young, having fun, and most importantly, knew my room was across the street.

Until I didn’t.

The inside of the actual pub, Blaggard’s, that tried to poison me.

When it was time to go, I stepped out on the street at 2:30am looking for the Americana Inn awning, and it wasn’t where I had left it. I started to walk in that direction and assumed at some point things would look familiar. It was dark and late, it made sense that things would seem a little off compared to my bright, daytime jaunts around the block. My very drunk brain had ideas that my sober brain would not have approved of. The first was taking a mix of lefts and rights with a very strong, “I’ve got this shit” attitude when in fact, no shit was gotten. After about 15 minutes I realized that not only was I lost, I didn’t even remember which way I had come.

The good thing about New York City, and almost all cities, is that the streets are numbered. The bad thing about that is the streets are long and I couldn’t really recall if I had gone north or south, or what my nearest cross street was. To remind you, this was 2008 and Google Maps was not a robust feature. My Blackberry hardly had any signal in the city because of all the towering buildings and I was on roaming! We all remember roaming.

After some mild panic I decided to avoid as many dark alleyways as possible and just go until I saw a street number. I needed to find 37th or 36th, I decided. My hotel was on 37th but the Irish Pub was on 36th. Probably. If I could get back to either, that would be great. Thankfully, after a long stroll, I found 37th! This is my street! And as I began to walk down that street, more briskly now because fear had sobered me somewhat, things were starting to look familiar again. Lots of things look familiar in the dark though, plus I had been here for a week and had seen a lot of streets. What wouldn’t look familiar? I knew roughly how far down the street from the intersection the Americana Inn was and lo-and-behold, when I got there, there was a small concrete landing leading to a narrow door just like my hotel! Let’s go inside and see Mohammed, we’re home!

Saw a lot of this. For a long time.

I stepped through the door that I expected to lead to an elevator but after a few steps inside I realized this place looked different. Wait a second, where’s the elevator? I turn and see a check-out counter with three very creepy looking men sitting behind it with intimidating postures, coldly staring back at me, silent. Three not-Mohammeds. “Hi,” I say timidly. No response. Embarrassed, I look around the store as if pretending I fully intended to stagger in here at 3am only to suddenly realize this is a porn store. And not just a store with porn, this is a full on “go try one out in the booth if you want,” kind of store.

Well, since I’m already here, I figured I might as well peruse the selection. I mean, after all, I’m pretty smashed and I never get this lucky when I’m smashed. I make my way around the store thinking about what I’m going to do. The easiest thing to do would be leave. After all, this isn’t where I meant to go and no one is making me stay. But another part of me could feel the judgmental eyes of the weirdo guys up front and for whatever reason, I didn’t want them to judge me for being lost in here as I judged them for choosing such a baller career.

I can’t explain why I decided to go from a lost citizen in need of directions to a paying customer, but I did. I should have just left. But what was more important to me at that moment was buying some porn like a gentleman and then hastily retreating to my quarters for bed. So, I made up my mind that I absolutely needed to make a purchase. I would make it a small purchase. One DVD. That would be fine. I tried to rationalize why I shouldn’t just leave several times and the only thing I could come up with is, “why would anyone stagger in here at 3am and NOT buy anything? Is that not more weird? I don’t want to be the weird one.”

I have since relinquished caring so much about what people think of me at any given moment, but for the 8 minutes I browsed numerous shelves of porn DVDs in New York City while three horny perverts with mustaches and thick glasses silently judged me as I did so, I cared SO MUCH. Nervously, I grab a DVD from the “clearance” bin. I don’t recall the title but it was just girls tickling each other. Yes, I watched it later and there’s not even nudity. It’s just softcore tickling. I couldn’t have been more disappointed but it was on clearance for a reason I guess.

I carried the DVD to the front and placed it on the counter. One of the guys behind the counter finally spoke up. “3 for 1, pal! Read the sign!” He never indicated where this sign was and I never found it, but okay, fuck. Okay. I would look like a FOOL not to get 2 more for free! Right? I won’t make a fool of myself, I’ll get two more so they’ll see me as a dignified young man in a nice suit who was very obviously on a quest for his late Thursday night porn. Or maybe it’s more dignified if it’s early Friday morning porn? Either way, I need two more DVDs. So I turned around and hastily grabbed two more DVDs only looking to make sure that the contents didn’t appear verifiably illegal (one was a compilation of boat orgies and the other was the same two women in the tickle DVD except now they were just cuddling for 90 minutes. The boat one was pretty good).

The man rang me up and I walked back out onto the street, still lost but now armed with enough wank fodder to get me through the tough times ahead since I assumed this was only the first hour of many that I would be spending homeless. I walked to the nearest corner to see what the cross-streets were and realized my mistake. My hotel is on 38th street, not 37th! I zipped directly down the block, turned the corner and right where the porn store was on 37th sat the unmistakable green awning of the Americana Inn on 38th. “Mohammed! I’m coming home!”

*Ding* Open. Mohammed stares back at me. I wonder if this guy ever sleeps. After a brief moment of hesitation, he asks, “You need a DVD player?” I hold the elevator door from closing. “What? Why.. “ Oh no. I had pulled out a DVD to read the back while waiting on the elevator and it was still in my drunk fucking hand showing anyone around me with eyes (thankfully just Mohammed) that I was embarking on a quest to see how jazzed I could get about two chicks tickling each other through their clothes for a full 90 minute run time. “Nah, nah. I’m okay.” *Ding* “THANKS THOUGH!” Close.

I should have just been lugging one of these things around.

I woke up to the worst hangover I could possibly have had after only 3 hours of sleep and still being mostly drunk. So drunk, I nearly missed my flight. Mohammed was at the front desk that morning at 7am as I lumbered downstairs looking more confused and disheveled than I had just 3 hours ago. He helped me get a ride to the airport by calling in this company that looked like secret service agents. No lie, I thought the guy who picked me up was in the Men in Black. I was whisked away in an all black car with tinted windows by a hispanic man in a dark suit and sunglasses who wore a bluetooth earpiece before the technology was even mainstream. We listened to classical Spanish music at full blast for a 35 minute car ride. I thought it might be to cover up the sound of the gunshot for when it was time to put me in the trunk but thankfully it didn’t come to that.

The story doesn’t quite end there where it should. Thunderstorms delayed my flight back to Charlotte from New York and when we finally landed, I had missed my connection. The next flight out was in the morning so we received vouchers to stay in a hotel downtown for the night and we’d be shuttled back over first thing. There weren't enough hotel rooms for everyone so we had to pair up with people. I paired up with a dude who was on his way to Miami. He was a nice enough guy, a bit older than me. And when we got to the hotel room he made it very clear that he was not afraid to show me what he looked like in just his underwear. Thankfully he jumped between his sheets shortly thereafter.

And he was a ringer for Uncle Rico.

He turned on the TV while I’m still figuring out how I want to modestly fold into my bed with my nightly garments. “What if he sees a little bit of my belly?” I really cared what people thought about me back then. Now I would wear a belly shirt covered in boat porn to just about anywhere. While I’m opening my suitcase, a little bag of DVD cases spill out onto the floor, illuminated by the soft glow of Conan O’Brien’s Late Show.

“OOoooh, what ya got there my man?” Fuck. Fuck! I should have thrown these away. Granted, I really did want to check out the boat movie, it had promise. I quickly, while now sweating from embarrassment, stomped them back into my suitcase and said nothing of it.

“You know how to pack!”

I finally got back home, with my drunken New York porn loot in tow. I tossed them in the trash (after watching the boat one of course) because I had the freaking internet.

This submission was accepted through the Polymedia Writer’s Guild. If you have writings you would like to contribute, such as your “one wild night” story AND you’re a Friend Tier on the Polymedia Patreon, you can submit yours to Polykillpodcast@gamil.com.