“Hello, is this Mia Bates?”

“Yes, this is her.” I replied.

“Hello, Miss Bates. I regret to inform you…” a soft, yet monotonous female voice began. She’d given these types of calls before. Hospice. I already knew.

My elderly mother had been battling Alzheimer’s Disease for the better part of three years. I had seen her the previous day, and had promised to return. She was only able to make generalized eye and head movements, and random mumblings. The rest of her body lay stiffened in bed, muscle atrophy well advanced.

“… that your mother, Mary, has recently just passed away. I’m very sorry for your loss. If there’s anything we can do for you, please let us know.”

I don’t recall the rest of our conversation. I remember that my hotel room began to close in around me, my anxiety flaring rapidly. I also remember, after I calmed down, the brief talk about funeral arrangements. She wanted to be buried, so I went ahead and got in touch with a funeral home to start the proceedings.

I was never super close with my mother. We’d talk, and then not talk, and then talk again. It admittedly felt like a strange, fragmented relationship; each subsequent conversation became more and more disjointed as her memory progressively failed her. The fact she lived out of state worsened matters quite drastically.

As such, around a year before her death, I got in touch with a visiting nurse that would see her at home daily, and see to it that she was taken care of. It put my mind at ease, because despite our somewhat frayed relationship, she was still my mom, and I loved her. She’s still the only person I’ve really ever had besides my newlywed husband.

After hearing the news of my mother, I wandered the rest of the day. I was numb. I wasn’t thinking clearly, I just sat in my hotel room. I felt this emptiness inside me. I ordered room service, and picked at the mediocre, overpriced food while watching some shitty local PBS Italian cooking show. She was making breadsticks, and she didn’t even put olive oil or garlic on them. Authentic Italian my ass.

The reading of the will occurred the subsequent week, and because of this and funeral arrangements, I had to extend my hotel stay. I was, of course, only planning a visit. I couldn’t have known that she would pass away.

Since I was an only daughter and the only surviving family member, the will was as straightforward as I expected it to be. All of her earthly possessions went to me.

In the meantime, I drove over to my mothers house to begin the process of cleaning and sifting through her things. Her home, the home I grew up in, seemed practically unlived in, due to her mobility issues. When I walked through the front door, I caught the unmistakable scent of my mother. She never wore perfume, she just had a smell about her.

Which I found funny, because even now, I never liked it. I knew that it was supposed to smell lovely, but it bothered me somehow. I felt sincere guilt after this thought, but it still intruded in my mind.

Forcing myself to push the thought away, I approached the old, white cloth sofa, and seated myself on its pillowy surface. I closed my eyes, and, surprising myself, began to cry. I hadn’t in the previous week since her passing. In fact, I tore myself up over it.

Now, however, alone in my mothers house, I let it out. It felt… appropriate. I felt better. I felt as if I was grieving in the right way, even though the crying didn’t feel all that genuine. I leaned back in the couch, quickly wiping away my tears. I sat for a while, reminiscing, the fond memories of my youth blocking the rather poor memories of her final years..

Snapping back to reality from the fuzzy haze of day dreams, I rose and dusted off some old photos on her fireplace mantle. Just me and mom. As always. My father, whoever he was, never came to see me. Fucker. Even at 33, I’d never met him. Mom, probably for good reason, never really brought him up in conversation aside from the casual mention.

I walked around the ground floor, and, after scoping out the tiny kitchen and even smaller, one car garage, I wandered my way upstairs to the second, and highest, floor in the house. Two bedrooms, one master with a conjoined master bathroom, and another half bath down the hall. Pretty standard.

I went into the master bedroom, opened the window blinds to get some midday sunshine, and began rummaging through her closet, looking for anything interesting. I found her clothes to be quite fashionable, and even tried some on, since we were generally the same size. I did find it odd myself, but I thought it was helping me heal or grieve in my own weird way. I found a silky white blouse much nicer than mine, that, for whatever reason, I decided to keep on.

As I began moving through the closet, I started digging through cardboard boxes scattered about the floor, in unorganized piles. I stumbled upon something rather peculiar in one of the boxes. An…

Artifact?

A container, more like. It was a wooden, rectangular shaped box and was stained a dark brown color. It had numerous, ornate carvings. They seemed almost… hieroglyphic.

Intrigued, I flipped the wooden piece around in my hand and examined the bottom. Carved in the bottom was a name of some kind.

“mors”

What the fuck? I tried opening the thing, but was unable to.

I slipped the artifact in my purse and set it aside, continuing my search. I found little else of interest. Jewelry, some photo albums, and more than a few trinkets. Realizing this was going to take several days to sort through everything in the house, I grabbed my purse, heading back downstairs and out the front door, late afternoon sun casting wide shadows across the driveway. Neighbors, out mowing lawns, planting flowers or playing catch with their kids, stared at me questioningly. The oppressive summer heat was stifling in my pant suit as I slipped back into my Acura RLX, beginning the drive back to my hotel room. The sun was nearly set as I pulled up, my AC blasting.

After getting out of my car, I dropped into the dimly lit ambience of the main lobby, and asked the young, bearded, middle eastern man working at the front desk if they had any spare towels; I had used up the last one and since I left my “do not disturb” sign on the door, the maids wouldn’t have cleaned my room since my departure earlier that morning. I thought the man was out of place, I had been staying at the hotel for quite some time and had never seen him working before. Perhaps he was new?

“Yes ma’am, it’s unfortunate that those lazy Mexican maids didn’t get to your room. I’ll be sure to have that rectified.” His Arabian accent was thick. I was troubled by the comment, and the least bit concerned that he would refer to the maids as “lazy Mexicans.” Stereotypical. Gross. Ignorant.

I brushed off the strange comment as an example of the widespread bigotry still present in society, not wanting to get into an argument. I said nothing, grabbing the towels and turning my back as I began walking towards the elevator. I got to the elevator landing, flinging my purse over my shoulder. I pressed the up button, but, then, suddenly, a voice. From behind.

“Shall I say a prayer for you, Mia Bates?” The same male voice from the front desk called from behind me. The words eerily cut through the air, the already present tension from the maid comment now became nearly unbearable for me.

I turned slowly on my heels, the nape of my neck to the top of my head buzzing anxiously from the strange, unexpected question. Sweat beads, already formed from the hot weather, now trickled down my shoulder blades, past my bra straps, and began collecting in the small of my back. I took a deep breath, and, working up my inner courage, said,

“Ex… excuse me?” I stuttered, tilting my head to the side questioningly, eyebrows raised, my lips parted in a confused, “wtf did you just say” expression.

“Shall I say a prayer for you tonight, Miss Bates?” The sarcasm was palpable.

“Wh… why?” I asked, my voice cracking with each syllable. I coughed, my hoarse throat seizing. Fear gripped my chest.

“I just thought, that, perhaps… considering your current predicament, it may be beneficial.”

“No, no, that’s alright. I’m not religious. Thanks.” I said, an uncomfortable line spreading across my lips. I awkwardly turned away and pressed the button for the elevator once more.

I tapped the heels of my boots impatiently on the wooden floor paneling, the elevator still descending at a snail’s pace. Desperate for an escape from the man’s eyes that I just knew were staring daggers into my back, I darted up the stairs.

“Have a good night Miss Bates.” I heard echo off the staircase walls. I ascended faster, eventually reaching my room after three flights of stairs. I jammed the keycard into the door, swinging it open, and just as quickly slamming it shut. I locked it, deadbolt and chain. As I sagged back against the door, my feet regretted taking the stairs, the high heels of my boots ensuring their soreness.

I threw off my clothes and drew a bath, the painful aftermath of the anxiety attack crippling my muscles and joints. Pain moved from spot to spot, never staying in one place long, but long enough to cause a helpless feeling of despair. Sitting in the tub, I broke down. My stomach became a cauldron of fire. My breathing became faster and faster, my vision, spotty and tunneled. Another attack. Much worse.

My chest ached, weighed down by itself. The room began spinning. My thoughts raced, raced so fast I couldn’t breathe. The overhead light became blinding, causing green, red, and blue spots in my vision. Nauseating. I needed to puke. My stomach lurched. I pulled my hair back right as I barfed in the tub water. Once. Twice. Then dry heaves. Powerful dry heaves that stretched my rib cage to its limits and tore at the muscles in my stomach. Then cold chills. Then hot flashes. Then more nausea but my stomach was empty. Dry heaves again, the smell of my own vomit making me sick. The stomach pain suddenly became torturous once again, my lower intestines on fire. My bowels begged for release. No, I can’t. I’m an adult woman, not an animal.

Get up, water splashing everywhere. Sit down on the toilet. The seat is disgustingly moist and slimy under my wet body as I shit my brains out, wave after wave of excruciating, burning hot diarrhea violate the toilet bowl, my small, broken down body pleading for mercy but receiving none. Any shred of dignity or self-worth I still had was vanishing with each passing moment.

Finally, after what feels like hours but is probably more like five minutes, I’m done. I lean back against the raised toilet lid, panting heavily as I clear away the sweat from my brow. I wipe, using most of the paper roll, still feeling unclean and itchy. The smell of my own feces makes me start dry heaving again. My bowels still feeling irritable, I stand up wearily, hurriedly flush the toilet, and return to the tub; I was in too much pain from the anxiety attack to care about the food particles still floating in the warm bath water.

The spots in my eyes now look like old television static as I reenter the water. Shiny electric waves dance and ebb across my visual field. A visual aura. Pain shoots into my eyeballs.

A migraine.

“No! Please no!” I say aloud, the words reverberating off the cheap, white porcelain shower walls. I pushed my palms into my forehead, the pain intolerable. I had no medication on me, I, forgetful as ever, left it at home.

I layed back in the tub, reaching to turn off the lights. My head pounded, a knife being thrust into it once every second or two. I didn’t care that the water was filthy, the light was KILLING me. I layed down, darkness all around me. The waves in my vision were still visible under my closed eyelids.

I don’t remember falling asleep. I remember the pain slipping away, then darkness. I recall waking up still in the tub, marinating in the puke water. Sunlight peaks in around the bathroom door. I hear a maid cart rustling out in the hallway. I hear my phone buzzing from a call on the counter. My head still pounded in unison with my heart, but it was painless. I tried standing up, my body still thoroughly exhausted, even after the rest. Crippling anxiety, panic attacks, and migraines. All at once. I felt them taking their respective physical tolls on me.

Dripping wet and feeling like a zombie, I jostled over to my phone, and answered, still fully nude.

“Hello?” I ask groggily, not having checked the caller ID beforehand.

“Yes, may I speak to Mia Bates?”

“This is her speaking, who is this?”

“I am calling on behalf of your mother’s funeral home, and I’m afraid I have some regrettable news, ma’am.”

“What is it?” I asked, worry springing my body into a state of alertness.

“Your mothers body is missing.” The voice said flatly.

“What?” I asked, thinking I misheard.

“Your mother’s body disappeared overnight in storage. I’m so, deeply sorry.”

“What?” I asked again, my voice quivering in denial.

“Like we said, it’s a very regrettable situation. We are doing the best we can to locate her.”

I became frantic. My hands trembling, shaking terribly. Then, rage.

“WHAT THE HELL DO YOU MEAN SHE’S GONE?! WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?!” I shouted into my phone, saliva molecules exciting my mouth at top speed, my anger seething.

“Ma’am, please calm down. I’m sure it was a mistake. They are rare, but they can happen.”

“DON’T TELL ME TO CALM DOWN!” I screamed, the immense feeling of invalidation seeping through my pores. Silence from the other end of the phone.

“HOW I AM SUPPOSED TO HAVE A FUNERAL WITH NO FUCKING BODY?!” I shrieked, my hands trembling, my IPhone shaking.

“Miss Bates, I, I don’t, I, uh, I don’t have that, um, answer for you right now. She just… vanished from her storage bag in refrigeration. Mia, please, believe me when I say this; I offer you my sincerest, and deepest apology. There are other arrangements we can make if you’d like.”

I hung up without another word, throwing my phone across the room, the case protecting it from any serious damage. I paced around the room, pissed. Eventually, I sat down on the bed, pounding my foot into the carpeted floor again and again. My face, beet red, pulsated with the pumping of my heart. I was panting and sweaty, the anger fading away to helplessness. As tears began welling in my eyes, my mind blanked. I felt… everything… and yet… nothing. My swirling feelings, like an ocean tide, morphed and shifted with each passing second.

My mother’s body was GONE. How was that possible? Morgues don’t just lose bodies! What the fuck?!

No. Nope. I had to calm down. I really needed to calm down. Bathroom. Yes, my head was starting to kill me again. No, no, no, I couldn’t repeat last night. I decided to lay on the bed, and relax. I slowed my breathing. I calmed down. I had to think clearly without causing my body and brain to shut down.

After an hour, I opened my eyes and picked up my phone. I spoke on the phone for so long that I could’ve been a telemarketer. The synopsis:

They had no clue. That was it. No body. No idea where it went, who took it, anything. They offered a settlement fee right then and there, which was probably to avoid the lawsuit they thought I would file. I was still royally pissed, but thinking clearly. I accepted the money, seeing as how I didn’t want to get tied up in the courts since I was from out of town.

I threw myself down on the lumpy couch facing the television, already exhausted. The clock registered 12:30. Good lord.

The television provided ample background noise as I once again slept, this time throughout the afternoon. Finally, at around 4, I awoke, and, deciding that I needed food, slipped on a white, long sleeved Katy Perry tour shirt and a pair of blue jeans. The jeans proved to be a bit too loose, so I begrudgingly threaded a brown leather belt through the loops. As I finished the rummaging through my suitcase, however, I came upon something that made my blood stop.

Mors.

The artifact was sitting on top of my suitcase. Impossible! It hadn’t left my purse all day! Had someone been inside my room?! I hadn’t touched it!

I lurched backwards in horror, slamming my back against the room’s door. The object beckoned to me with a faint red glow. The bolt lock of the hotel door stabbed my shoulder blade as I retreated, shooting firey pain into my bones. I cried out, reaching around my body reflexively. I cursed and winced, reaching for the doorknob to get me out of the room. I hurriedly turned it and exited out into the hall. Then, suddenly, panic.

I had left my room key and purse in the room. I pounded on the door in frustration; I jiggled the locked door handle, not wanting to accept my own stupidity. Finally defeated, I trudged down to the front desk to replace my key card barefoot. I froze. A wall clock softly ticked in my ear.

Tick Tock.

The same man from last night. The middle eastern man. He smiled at me, his eyes unblinking. The front desk beckoned to me, I had no choice. Fuck.

“Hi, um…” My words stopped. The man kept staring at me, still smiling. I was petrified.

“I think I locked myself, um, sorry, uh… locked myself out of my room.” I stammered.

“Oh?” He said, as if already knowing my predicament.

“Yeah, I was hoping to get a replacement key card.” I faked an awkward smile as I looked down towards the floor.

“My name is…” I was cut off sharply.

“MIA!” He shouted loud enough to startle me. I winced and shut my eyes. Social anxiety stabbed my chest.

“I prayed for you last night!” He winked at me as he slid a room key across the desk. I slid the card into the rhinestone encrusted back pocket of my jeans. I was silent as I turned away. I braced myself for something, anything.

“Mors.” The voice said from behind. I stopped. The same word on the artifact.

“What did you say?”

Tick Tock.

“I defiled your mother’s corpse.” He smiled childishly.

“What?!” Tears of confusion began to stream.

Tick Tock.

“Like a dog.” His grin faded to a straight line. I stared at him, mouth agape, unmoving. My eyes were still watery.

“Then I took it for myself.”

“I…I…” I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t form words.

“She was an evil woman, I'm afraid.”

I still couldn’t push words past my lips. My hands shook uncontrollably.

“Mors.” He snapped his fingers. The artifact was… in my hands.

“I thought it was strange that you came to me holding it. You know what it means I presume? Once you find it?”

“No.” I shook my head, my brain unable to decipher the information into something that made sense.

“That’s because you’re an indulgent, self absorbed moron.” He cooed. “I was shocked that you held it and never opened it!”

“Open it.” He said. I looked down at the artifact. The beady read glow illuminated my flesh.

“Come on. Open it..”

Tick Tock.

I slowly twisted the end of the artifact, pulling off a wooden block. Inside was a hollow tube, in which sat a tooth. My tongue instinctively felt around in my mouth. I panicked as I felt a squishy, gummy opening.

My tooth.

“Yes! Your whore mother Mary is dead! And you shall join her in eternal damnation!”

I started to weep, tears splattered on the tiled floor. I stumbled backwards until my legs hit into a sofa. I threw myself into it, my knees weak.

“What’s… what’s Mors?!” I shouted, my face a blurry mess.

The man strolled out from behind the counter. I saw his lower half for the first time…

Hooves.

“Mia, there are devils all around you! Some are more successful than others! Look at that man out in the parking lot! Look! White as snow! Did you know that he is a priest?! A good man by all accounts! And yet… he has his malnourished daughter tied up in his basement for dating! Dating, Mia! How depraved!” He chuckled, his long nails digging into my shoulder.

“Oh yes, your mother, Mary, was… well, an evil woman. She was also a virgin.” I looked at the devil. His eyes were red and delighted.

“As for Mors, it’s that box in your hand. It’s Latin for death, actually. People I wish to dispose of piece by piece. Sometimes a whole body, you’d be shocked at how efficient they manufacture things in this great country!” He propped his hooves up on the sofa.

“Your mother’s body disappeared overnight in storage.” His voice matched the woman from the funeral home. He laughed heartily.

He was the woman.

She took the box from my hand, and began pulling. An arm, then a head, then…

“Oh no!” I shrieked. My hands flew to my mouth. I began to dry heave.

“Oh god!”

“There’s no god here, Mia!” The woman changed back to the hotel receptionist. He licked his lips as he pulled out my elderly mother’s naked, mutilated corpse out of the tiny box. The dead weight flopped like a fish onto the hard tile.

My mouth burned, my teeth clicked on the floor as they fell out of my mouth in gummy, bloody clusters. My gums bled sheets down onto my shirt. I threw my hands out in terror.

“You’ll live for a while, Mia. But you're the offspring of the whore down there, so it’ll be in misery. I’ll take all your family from you first. You’ll wither away alone and miserable. You’ll find their body parts in the box from time to time. Then the bodies. Then I’ll pillage your corpse. There’s nothing you can do about it.”

“STOP!” I screamed. The lack of teeth made the words sound mushy and unintelligible. The devil held up Mors, pulling my teeth out of the box one by one.

“Oh, that’s cute Mia. As for you, I’ve heard dental implants are quite expensive. I’d get on that if I were a pretty woman like you!”