Bring Me Merlot

I can't believe I died over a glass of Merlot, while being at the mercy of a nutcase from a stupid dating app.

It's a long story, but I am practically writing this while looking down at my pathetic body contorted off the side of the Vincent Hotel. Too much? A little gory? My bad. I guess I should explain how this unfortunate incident happened and trace it back to the beginning of the night.

Here we go:

The Vincent Hotel was hanging on by a thread. Its cracked brick walls and unfriendly exterior were a brutalist highlight to a city full of life and lights.

This faded hotel sat in a darkened corner of the street, with lots of dead and dying grass surrounding it. Suprisingly, the plans for tearing it down never came to fruition and it still remained open for business. The guests it pulled into its ancient gold doors were there for the historic atmosphere. Certainly, not for the 5 star service. It was almost as old as time itself, being built in the late 1800's.

My date was supposed to meet me for a picnic near the lake, only a few minutes from the entrance to the grand city of Cedar. I met her on Love Lillies, a boring dating app that I almost gave up on. Somehow, I managed to stay on it even though I felt empty on most days. Swiping through all the potential matches and not finding anyone who was compatible was becoming a headache.

That is, until I swiped on Evalyn.

The only sentence in her bio read, "Bring me the best merlot you can find."

What her bio failed to mention, was that she was an absolute lunatic.

Upon meeting her at our romantic moonlight picnic, she opened my bottle of expensive Merlot and began drinking it right away. Without considering her guest, she downed it right from the bottle.

To my utter horror, Evalyn said she brought double cheeseburgers to eat with the merlot. She noted the smoothness of the Merlot and how it reminded her of candy, but that she wanted something greasy to compliment its flavor. Who in the world drinks Merlot with cheeseburgers from a cheap fast food place?

Without offering me a glass, Evalyn chugged the Merlot for a hour while gobbling down flattened cheeseburgers from Fry Boys, the local hotspot for late night munchies. I was intrigued as much as I was disgusted, and we argued over the pairings of Merlot for 20 minutes straight before deciding on an activity for the night.

"I can't believe you are drinking the entire bottle without offering me a single glass. This is the worst pairing of Merlot and food I have ever seen! Wouldn't you want to drink this with a nice dinner? Like with a steak or something??" I rambled on angrily.

"Why would I do that?" Evalyn grinned, taking another large bite of a double cheeseburger with its contents oozing from the sides.

"Because you are ridiculous."

"If I could eat one food for the rest of my life, it would be a competition between dark chocolate, this bottle of Merlot, or cheeseburgers. Duh"

Evalyn proceeded to eat obnoxiously, uncaring of my distaste for her food choices.

"To top this all off, you didn't even offer me a glass! Not even a sip!"

"Hey, I said I wanted you to bring ME a bottle of Merlot. It said it right there in my bio." Evalyn nodded and happily continued.

God she was such an oddball. I don't know why, but I let the night continue after witnessing this monstrosity.

After we finished our picnic, Evalyn excitedly mentioned that we should visit the Vincent Hotel. It was getting late, and she wanted to experience the full creepiness of its halls to satisfy her craving for the perfect horror night.

Evalyn was attracted to all things related to the occult, the supernatural, and the unknown. Not only was she a big fan of horror movies and reading about witchcraft, but she loved getting herself wrapped up in real life paranormal episodes as if she was driving the Mystery Machine van herself. After some teasing, I didn't want to seem like a wimp so I agreed to go with her to the Vincent.

Yeah, yeah I know...I succumbed to toxic masculinity in trying to prove that I was "man enough" to do this kind of adventure. I paid the price, anyway, seeing that my body was at the bottom of the hotel's parking lot.

Was that too intense? Come on, a dead person can make a joke or two here!

When Evalyn and I reached the front entrance of the Vincent Hotel, it looked even more menancing in person. The gnarled red welcome mats lined the revolving doors and a single light was on under the broken check in desk. Evalyn mentioned that people had died here or seen some sort of specter on the 6th floor, which only made my anxiety much worse.

Racing inside and pulling me by my jacket, Evalyn checked us into a room right on the 6th floor. Naturally, I was angry that I wasn't able to break away from this awful date because I felt immense guilt at being rude for doing something like that. Great.

Evalyn and I took a shaky elevator up to the 6th floor, noticing the deafening silence of the hotel hallways. The walls were messily painted over with an eggshell white color, and the floors remained a tacky 90's style print.

Everything about this seemed off, and I sat there wishing I was back in my comfy apartment with Merlin, my grouchy housecat. Little did I know, I would see Merlin again in a different form than now.

As we wandered around and explored our barren but unsettling room, Evalyn began to tell stories of the hotel's past. She mentioned rumors of murders, deaths, and so many other terrible events. Not once, did she seem frightened. With growing boredom of not seeing any ghosts yet, Evalyn sat me down in the 6th floor hallway to play a game with her mobile Ouija board.

At this point, I was getting incredibly uncomfortable. This whole night was a flop, and it was all too much for me. I wanted to go home, but I was also feeling way more afraid of her now than ever before.

Evalyn pulled out candles, random dried herbs, and her ouija board. She forcefully moved my hand to the planchette to begin the questioning. Once she asked if anyone was present, I saw the small wooden disk move violently across the board.

No way in hell was I dealing with this any longer. Even if she is scaring me, I had to get out of this somehow.

Evalyn continued asking questions and our hands moved together, spelling out abominations on the board and scaring me to the core. But as the game continued, I started to feel dizzy. My level of panic was increasing and the halls felt blurry.

Where was everyone? I had to get out of here.

With one quick motion, I stood up and removed myself from the game. I lost control of my mind while my ears picked up whispering as I ran through the hall trying to find the elevator. But it was gone.

In my attempt to exit at once, I found a window and assumed there would be a fire escape I could crawl out of. Evalyn ran after me as I crashed myself through the window, screaming for her aid as I hung on by the tips of my fingers. The wind picked up and Evalyn couldn't hang on much longer. I fell from the top and there I went, tumbling in the air down to the cold flat concrete.

My life had ended all because I had brought some idiot a bottle of Merlot.

Death itself didn't even feel strange, as I floated back up next to Evalyn's side to analyze the tragedy below right along side her. Out of all things I had ever done, this was the most clown like. How does someone die from a bad date? Apparently, I do.

After I realized what had happened, I drifted back to my apartment that night, sinking into the bed and petting my cat. He still sensed me as usual, and I decided to never leave this space again.

Who knows? Maybe since Evalyn is into talking to ghosts, we will actually work out as a couple after all. Even if she is insane and the ultimate cause of my embarrassing death, I never said she wasn't pretty.