Red Keyhole

Ghost Story- United States

I asked another one of my friends for a ghost story, and although he did not have anything specific, he had read about an interesting ghost story from the Internet. He agreed to tell it to me.

The story begins with a young man checking into a motel at night. It was late, and he was very eager to jump into bed and recover from his day of travel. As he finished checking in, the woman behind the desk gave him a specific warning: do not bother the room with a blank number on the door. Although the man thought this to be strange, he shrugged it off and just thought maybe there was an important client staying there that did not want to be disturbed.

            He grabbed his room key and his luggage and headed up the stairs. As he got to his floor, the third floor, he looked for his room. 310… 311…312… He was there at his room, 313. He could not help but notice that the room with the blank number was only a few doors down from his. He thought nothing of it and put it out of his mind, as he was looking forward to his night of rest.

            That night, the man was awoke from his sleep by a chill. No matter what he did, he could not get rid of it. He tried turning on the heat or covering the vents but to no avail. He decided to head down to the front desk and ask for extra blankets. As he did, the room with the blank number seemed to draw him in. He was about to knock and see who was staying there, but decided against it. It was late and it would be rather rude of him. Still, he could not help but be curious. He decided to look through the keyhole and see if he could see anything. When he did, he could only make out the figure of a young woman sleeping on the bed. He did not want to disturb her, so he went down to retrieve his blankets.

            After he had gone down and gotten his blankets, he came back up to his floor and wanted to see if the woman was still sleeping. He peeped through the keyhole once more and was disappointed. All he could see was red. He guessed that the woman had somehow figured out that he was peeping at her and covered the keyhole with some sort of red cloth or paper. Because he was certain that the woman had discovered his rude behavior, he decided to go to his room and avoid her.

            The next day, as he went down to check out of his room and resume his travels, he asked about the lady at the front desk as to who was staying in the room with the blank number. The lady did not answer him at first, but he was insistent and demanded the answer. She responded, “A married couple was staying there a few years back. During the night, they got into a fight, and the husband stabbed the wife in cold blood and fled. When the wife was found, it was already too late. Now she haunts the place, dressed in white. She’s a ghost and all white except for one part. Her eyes. They became as red as the blood that drained out of her as she lay dying.” The man was terrified and fled the motel without any further explanation.

In my opinion, this story is quite frightening. It was interesting to hear that ghost stories could be spread so widely through the Internet. Although it could not be discerned whether this story is true or not, as the author is unknown, it still unnerves me and is quite a good ghost story. I would not be satisfying my curiosity with any strange rooms any time soon.