I’ve been a night auditor at the Ashworth Hotel in Manchester for three years now. It’s not glamorous, obviously, but the pay’s decent and I don’t mind the quiet. Most nights, it’s just me, the hum of the radiators, and maybe one or two guests stumbling in late from the pub. I’m twenty-six, and I’d honestly take this over dealing with the breakfast rush any day.
But there’s this one thing that’s always bothered me about working here. Room 237.
In our system, it always shows as occupied. Always. Every single night I’ve worked, that little red indicator sits there next to 237, meaning someone’s checked in. But here’s the weird part—housekeeping reports it empty every morning. I mentioned it to my manager about six months ago, and she just shrugged. “System glitch,” she said. “IT’s been meaning to look at it.”
I should have known better than to accept that explanation.
It was a Tuesday in November when things started getting properly strange. About half eleven, this guest came down to the desk—Mr. Pemberton from room 235. Middle-aged bloke, looked knackered.
“There’s someone crying in the room next to mine,” he said, rubbing his eyes. “Been going on for twenty minutes now. Proper sobbing, you know? Can you ask them to keep it down?”
My stomach did this little flip. “Room 237?”
“Yeah, that’s the one.”
I checked the system, even though I knew what I’d find. Occupied. Red light glowing on my screen.
“I’ll go have a word,” I told him, trying to sound professional. “Sorry about the disturbance.”
I didn’t want to go up there. I mean, I’d walked past that room hundreds of times, but I’d never actually been inside. Looking back, I realize I’d been unconsciously avoiding it. The third floor always felt colder than the rest of the hotel, and that corridor especially.
I grabbed the master keycard and took the lift up. The hallway was empty, lit by those awful fluorescent lights that buzz slightly. As I got closer to 237, I noticed my breath was fogging. Properly fogging, like I was outside in winter.
“That’s not right,” I muttered to myself. Maybe I was just paranoid, but the temperature had to be below freezing.
I stood outside the door for a moment, listening. Nothing. No crying, no sound at all. I knocked anyway.
“Hello? This is the front desk. I’ve had a noise complaint.”
Silence.
I wish I had just left it there. I wish I’d gone back downstairs and told Mr. Pemberton I’d sorted it. But I didn’t. I swiped the keycard, heard the lock click, and pushed the door open.
The cold hit me like a physical thing. I gasped, my breath coming out in thick white clouds. The room was absolutely freezing—colder than any room should ever be, even with the windows open. But the windows weren’t open. They were shut tight.
The bed looked like someone had just gotten up from it. The duvet was pulled back, and there was this clear impression in the pillow, like a head had been resting there moments before. The sheets still had wrinkles, still had that rumpled look of being slept in.
I felt my heart start to pound. Hard.
“Hello?” My voice came out shakier than I’d intended.
That’s when I heard it. A soft intake of breath, coming from the bathroom. Not quite a sob, more like someone trying very hard not to cry.
Every instinct I had was screaming at me to leave. Just turn around and walk out. But something—curiosity, stupidity, I don’t know—made me take a step toward the bathroom door.
It was slightly ajar. Through the gap, I could see the edge of the mirror, fogged up completely with condensation. Which made no sense, because the room was freezing.
“Is someone in here?” I called out.
The breathing stopped.
The silence that followed was somehow worse than the crying. It felt heavy, expectant, like the air before a thunderstorm. I took another step forward, reaching for the bathroom door.
That’s when I saw it in the gap—a reflection in the fogged mirror. A pale face, but wrong somehow. The features were blurred, indistinct, but the eyes… the eyes were opened wider than should be possible. And they were staring directly at me.
I should have trusted my instincts. I should have run right then.
Instead, I froze. Completely froze. My hand was still outstretched toward the door handle when the bathroom light went out with a sharp click, plunging that corner of the room into darkness.
The sobbing started again. Loud now, anguished, coming from right behind that door. Building and building until it wasn’t crying anymore—it was screaming.
I finally moved. I stumbled backward, tripped over my own feet, and basically fell out into the corridor. I didn’t even bother closing the door properly. I just ran to the lift, jabbing the button over and over until the doors opened.
My hands were shaking so badly I could barely hold the master keycard.
When I got back to the desk, Mr. Pemberton was waiting. “Did you sort it then?”
I stared at him. “You… you didn’t hear that? Just now?”
“Hear what? It’s been quiet for the last ten minutes.”
I checked my watch. I’d been gone exactly ten minutes.
I told Mr. Pemberton we’d comp his night and moved him to the second floor. I didn’t tell him why. What could I say? That room 237 wasn’t empty? That something in there was crying, screaming, waiting?
I filed an incident report that night, but I kept it vague. “Possible heating malfunction in room 237. Extreme temperature drop.” I didn’t mention the bed, the breathing, the face in the mirror.
The next morning, housekeeping checked the room. Empty, they said. Pristine. They even commented on how cold it was and called maintenance to check the radiator.
I handed in my notice two weeks later. Told them I’d found a position closer to home. My manager seemed disappointed but understanding. She never asked if it had anything to do with room 237.
To this day, I still can’t sleep with the bathroom door open. And sometimes, late at night, I hear that same desperate sobbing in my dreams—that sound of someone trapped, alone, crying out for help that never comes.
I looked up the hotel’s history after I left. Turns out, back in 1987, a woman died in room 237. Overdose, they said. She’d been there for three days before anyone found her.
The system glitch makes more sense now. Because technically, maybe she never checked out.
