“Um…I was going to see about getting a room, but I think I might just drive on. I forgot I have an appointment later tonight.” This was a lie, of course, but I was ready to get in my car and find a different place that didn’t give me the utter creeps.

The woman’s face lit up with a smile. “Oh yes, we’ve got a room that’ll be perfect for you. Come on in.”

I started backing down the steps. “No, really, I have to be going.”

She flapped her hand at me dismissively. “Nonsense. Pretty young thing like you, it doesn’t pay to be out on the road late at night. Come in and see the room at least, and if you decide it still isn’t for you, I’ll at least point you toward the way you want to go.”

I almost resisted further, but I didn’t see what the real harm was in looking at the room. I was tired, the place looked fine from the outside, and if the woman tried to do some kind of weird shit, I felt sure I could handle her physically. So trying to put on a smile, I nodded and followed her inside.

The interior of the house was beautiful—well-decorated and clean without coming across as overly staged or sterile. The woman led me at a slow pace up a creaking staircase to the second floor, and when she opened the door to the room, I felt myself relax some.

The room looked…normal. It had a phone, a small but relatively new LCD tv, and a queen-size bed that looked wonderful after hours on the road. It even had a little laminated card on the table with the wifi-password. Seeing all the trappings of and connections with the outside world made me feel less like I was in the opening act of a horror story, and when she told me it was only $75.00 for the night and the included breakfast, I decided to stay.

The owner of the B&B—she told me her name was Valerie as we went back downstairs—didn’t have much to offer in the way of dinner, but she could point me to a nice steakhouse just on the other side of the town square. When I mentioned I was a vegetarian, she quirked an eyebrow from behind her dark glasses and gave a little laugh.

“Well, I’m sure they’ll find you something to eat too.”

****

I headed back to the car and roamed around for twenty minutes looking for other options for food than the steakhouse. The kids were thankfully gone from the town square now, but I had no luck finding any other restaurant that looked open. Resigned to eating a mediocre salad bar, I pulled into the steakhouse parking lot.