Wide Atlantic Weird: A Phone RInging In A Deserted Hotel

Wide Atlantic Weird is an on-going collection of stories that attempt to create that feeling you get when you come across a delicious little fragment of weirdness, a story that's so out-there it can't possibly be true, yet one which you can't dismiss out of hand. When you stumble across such a tale buried in a chapter of an old collection of 'unexplained' stories, or when a friend reluctantly tells you an impossible story in the small hours after a night of playing Resident Evil, that's Wide Atlantic Weird.


Source: An email from a friend I will refer to as ‘Chris Redfield.’

Hi Cian,

We’ve been talking a lot recently about the subject of the supernatural, and I know you’re looking for some stories to read on your show. Well, I’ve got at least one story I can share with you that I think would be suitable. I haven’t told it to you before because it’s from a somewhat dark time in my life, and it brings up some bad memories. I don’t know for sure that this is because of the unexplained event that happened to me, but this strange happening and my dark mental state at the time are inextricably linked for me.

You may remember that about 2009, an enormous, new hotel built right next to the river Lee on the Western edge of Cork City, flooded. I’m sure any listeners who are familiar with the city will know which hotel I’m referring to. One of the ironic things about this story is that the setting is a brand-new building, on the face of it a not-at-all scary place, while directly across the river from it is an old abandoned Victorian asylum – surely a more likely spot for a spooky encounter. Oh well, such is life.

The 2009 flooding was catastrophic. The entire basement and ground floor of the building were ruined, and every car in the underground car park was destroyed. The company paid out millions in insurance, and the hotel shut down for two whole years while refurbishments were taking place. I took a job as one of the night watchmen during those two years.

Every night, I started my rounds in the lobby. The lobby had been refurbished first, and all the facilities there were working fine. There were glass doors looking out into the blackness, a walnut desk, and a bank of phones that connected with each of the guest rooms. Early in the night, I had to shoo away junkies who tended to hang out at the back of the building, where the hotel backed onto the river and some scrubby woodland. After that, I was alone in the building for the night.

Now I’ve said that the building was new, and not particularly spooky-looking. But it was still and enormous, three-wing, five-story building, and being in an empty place like this all night can do things to your mind. The lighting in most of the corridors still didn’t work, so I did my rounds with a flashlight shaking in my hands. All the usual empty-house noises made an appearance – dripping taps, mice scurrying, that sort of thing, and I scared myself silly a few times, but never came across anything really scary.

Until the third night, and room 106.

As I approached the room at about 2.30am, a tinny sound filled the empty hall. A telephone ring. It was coming from room 106. I buzzed the lock with my skeleton card and entered the room. It was, of course identical to every other room on the floor, and empty. The phone was ringing. I picked up the handset. A bizarre, distorted dial tone buzzed in my ear. After about a minute, it died. I returned to the lobby and thought no more about it that night. The phones mostly worked, but there were still a lot of problems with the electronics in the hotel, so it wasn’t that surprising that they might behave oddly sometimes.

The next night, the memory of the phone came back into my head as I began my checks of the first floor. I passed room 106, closer to 1am this time, and wondered if it would freak me out to hear the phone again.

As I passed by, the phone rang. Again I entered, again I got the strange dial tone, louder this time.

I sat in the lobby, trying to figure out the mystery. The phones were only connected to the lobby phones. There was literally no other way to call them – not even a mobile could do it. And if there was some kind of programming error that made the phone go off every night, wouldn’t it happen at the same time each night?

On the third night, I was so spooked, I started doing my checks from the top floor and making my way down. Again, the phone rang as I approached, at 2.50 this time. I ran straight down to the lobby to catch whoever it was was pranking me. The lobby was empty.

As I stood, panting, the lobby phone rang. Shaking, I approached the desk to read the green LCD screen that showed which room was calling.

Room 106.

Soon after that, I began to drink heavily while on the job. I didn’t care. I needed the job, it was easy, and 99% of the time nothing happened, so it didn’t matter if I was drunk. I carried a bottle of vodka around with me on my rounds, I yelled loudly to warn anyone – or anything – that might have been in that empty building with me – that I was coming. But I never saw anyone. And the phone continued to ring. Sometimes I’d get a night or two of reprieve. But it would always come back. I played loud music – heavy metal – down in the lobby, terrified that in the seconds of silence between the songs, I would hear the tinny wail of the phone in room 106. But, of course, it only rang when it knew I was nearby.

So that’s my story, Cian. I’m sure there’s any number of explanations for it, but for me, none of them quite fit, and by the end of two years on the job, I was a wreck. The hotel is now long back in business, and I’ve never heard that anyone had anything to say about Room 106. All I’ve got is a memory I wish I didn’t have.