HOTEL ROOM

What strange places hotel rooms are. You’re supposed to relax and sleep and feel pampered in this space that you’ve no history with, that someone else designed and furnished and which has been populated by countless strangers before you. It’s yours for only a short space of time and you cannot possibly feel that you belong there. I’ve spent time in hotel rooms for business and for pleasure and for the most part they’ve left me feeling slightly out of kilter, but only once did I spend a night in a hotel room, terrified.

13th November 2015, Paris. I had spent the day at Paris Photo with fellow art students from GSofA and not wanting the day to end too quickly we walked back along the Seine towards les Halles, wandered until we found a bar we liked the look of and stayed for a few glasses of wine or beer, I don’t really remember now. I was tired and they were young so we parted company at that point and I took the metro back to my hotel. I don’t recall the exact sequence of events but shortly after arriving back I had a text message from a friend to ask if I was okay. Sure. Why wouldn’t I be? She asked if I had seen the news, and of course I hadn’t.

Terror attacks in Paris.

I’ve had to look up the information on the web after the events because at the time I had no idea what was going on. The geography of Paris is only known to me in dislocated patches and I wasn’t sure what was happening or where it was but I could hear sirens, constant sirens, some shouting, running feet and more sirens. The street outside which had been habitually frenetic with traffic, vendors, tourists, pimps, clients, and dogs was ominously calm but for the neverending din of the sirens which managed to sound simultaneously near and yet not.

As the news unfolded and it became clear that it was not just one attack but a coordinated series, fear and guilt set in. I was safe. I was not at the stadium, the concert hall or in the bars they attacked. I had not witnessed any horror for myself nor felt the immediate threat. But I had no way of knowing if this hotel, close to two main Paris train stations would be on their list or not and the fear that it could be was real and immediate. The staff had locked the doors and shut us all in but who knew if there was someone next door with a suicide vest on? All I could do was sit in my strange little hotel room and wait and worry about the friends I’d left at les Halles. I packed my case, not knowing if I’d even be able to leave in the morning as a state of emergency had been declared and borders closed. I phoned my husband. I didn’t want to talk. I was too scared. The room, which had been something to shed and leave behind earlier in the day had become both a sanctuary and a reminder of my vulnerability.