FROM THE "ROAD NOTES OF MAVEN": WELCOME TO TRANSILvania! The Hold Up House

FROM THE "ROAD NOTES OF MAVEN": WELCOME TO TRANSILvania! The Hold Up House, a photo by mavenimagery® Officially Away... on Flickr.

FROM THE "ROAD NOTES OF MAVEN": WELCOME TO TRANSILvania! The Hold Up House
Acknowledgment
Thanks to Mr King (not Larry, Stephen, the horror novelist) for a very useful tips. But, this is not a horror or vampire fiction. Hate to disappoint you...again!

missed part one?
www.flickr.com/photos/maven_imagery/5811554298/

The Hold Up House
Storybook Trasnsilvania. Land of Dracula, I think to myself.
On either side, the trees slump; beneath their twisted boughs, the irregular adobe-like white houses with red tiled roofs grow smaller and uglier. The rain-abraded and snaking semi-asphalt road gets narrower and as I slow down to grab the now almost forty-five degree curve, I almost run over a three-legged, scrawny dog which painfully squirms through a hedge and, despite the strong morning sunlight, I spy policeman leaning over the driver window of black BMW just five hundreds yards ahead. The black shiny Beemer has a Vanity German plate DER FÜHRER(see image: www.flickr.com/photos/maven_imagery/5814787359/), and as I start to make meaning out of it, the cop who is six-foot tall, in a dark Politia uniform, waves at me to pull over.
Damn! I curse under my breath. What is now, scared your mutilated, miserable dog? If you greet in German or say ‘my friend’ only ones, I’ll fucking drive you over till hell freezes!
I exhale a seething breath through my gritted teeth. I drive to the right gravel shoulder and wrench the gearshift into park, and I bark in English, “Yes? The problem is?”
“You did not slow,” he says in a thick accent but otherwise okay English. I notice a zigzag lightning-bolt scar on his left side of his face, then, my eyes travel over a 9mm pistol in Sam Browne holster and wide belt strapped to his hip.
“For what?”
“There is a SLOW sign at the turn,” Scar Face says
“Where?” I hiss through my teeth.
“There,” he gestures with his hand at the forty-five degree turn. I look at his scar, suddenly, wondering if he has fang vampire teeth, but I leave the notion in flash, I turn my head and look at the turn, but I see no sign.
“I don’t see a sign there,” I say.
“Driver License, pleaz,” asks Scar Face.
I reach at the holster and take out my almost passport size special issue Driver License and hand it to Scar Face. He takes it and without looking at it he says, “Come with me,”. He strides across toward a stone building the size of a two story house. I roll up the window and squeeze myself out of the seat. I stand behind him while he is unlocking a padlock with a rusty chain dangling down.
A padlock? What’s this, the house with thousands windows and one iron door where they filmed The Shawshank Redemption?
In tandem, we enter an empty room except for an old desk and two chairs on both sides. The stench. What is it, is unbearable? Dead rodent? No. Human decay? Being familiar with the smell I decide on decomposition. Scar Face walks behind the desk, pulls the chair, sits down and takes a dog-eared citing ticket stub from his uniform’s chest pocket where his rank reads ‘COMISAR’
“According to Romanian law violating traffic signs is 260 euros,” Scar Face says, raises his wire-brush eye brows as he starts jotting down.
“What is this place?” I ask.
“It’s a hold up station for criminals,” answers Scar Face proudly.
Criminals? What sort of crime can be possibly committed here? Robb a gas station that doesn’t exist? Haven’t seen even a store or a kiosk since…I don’t remember when. In Hungary?
“According to Romanian Law—“
“I don’t carry cash,” I cut him off. “All I have is twenty,” I reach into my pocket, take the twenty euro bill and place it on the desk. The son of bitch has my Driver License, he holds the power.
“According to Romanian Law your Driver License will be send to the Embassy. You pick it from there.”
The son of bitch Scar Face will never send my Driver License anywhere. It will end up in a trash bin and I’ll never see it again and I can’t drive across Europe without a Driver License and the Embassy is in Budapest which is too fucking far…and…and this fucking smell!
“What’s this smell?” I ask
Scar Face stands up from the chair, his hand on the holster and says in stern tone, “Please sit down!”
“I’m fine,” I say in an equally firm tone. “Been sitting in the car far too long.”
“I insist,” insists Scar Face.
I see the signs of a carnage.
I sit. So does Scar Face.
“According to Romanian law—”
I push the Stoic Button “Stop!” I cry. “I see what you’re doing here. It’s your set-up. You call the shots,” I take another twenty euro bill and lay on top of the other one.
“According to Romanian law the vio—“
“I see carnage,” I change my voice into deep a trembling lunatic man’s. “I see blood. An abattoir. I see dead people. They’re close. They’re… in here!” I stand up and walk toward the doorless entrance in the back…time spent in theatre plays paying off now...not in Hollywood but here. In Transylvania. Performing ‘man gone crazy’ in front of Scar Face. To beat him in his own madness I have to be him. I have to be Scar-Face…Because that’s what he is and that’s what this place is: Loony bin…
I hear the cocking-click of the 9mm.
“Anatomy of a Revolver,” I say with my normal voice and turn around. “How were you in the Academy? Good shot? Bad shot?”
“I was good shot,” says Scar Face, still the gun points at me. “Want a demonstration, my friend?”
“What’dija just call me, ugly face?” I snap. “This your friend talking: yezz, maybe zome oder time, my frenz. Ah, zee yu hef a beeyoodiful beeyoodiful grib on de gunz, yezz? Diz iz mozt-mozt impordand, my frenz…it iz. This is me talking; not your friend: why don’t take a second look at the Driver License? And don’t ever call me ‘my friend’.”

The hold up house is pretty bad; infect, aside from the stench and hundreds of mixture of aroma, it is terrible…but this is going to get worse…

Will continue…