Just an Average Motel Rat Funeral

When Andi finds a dead rat in her motel room, a chaotic series of events unfolds.

Andi picked at the maroon wallpaper. It had a distinct paisley pattern that irritated her. It’s like motels aren’t even trying. They already know their seedy reputation, so why bother with an interior decorator? she thought.

As an interior decorator, the woman constantly sneered at places like this. After tearing a sizable strip of the offensive wallpaper off the wall, the woman knew it was time to rearrange the hideous and stained furniture. When she pushed the orange block chair and found a lovely surprise, she immediately jumped onto the bed with a loud gasp. She would have screamed, but even if someone were to hear her, they’d probably assume she was simply the tenth murder that month.

Seriously, this motel was the worst.

Under the chair was a rat caught in an old-style trap at least a few days old. Bugs swarmed the corpse. A few scattered from under the light, but most were still enjoying the feast of a lifetime. The woman didn’t know whether to push the chair back in place or not. Someone had placed the trap, so they had to know it was there.

It was time to speak to management.

The wallpaper was terrible enough; a maggot-filled rat was a little over the top. Andi jumped off the bed, landing as close to the door as possible. The horrendous red carpet quieted her irritated footsteps. She didn’t know such an ugly shade of red existed. The click of her kitten heels hitting the faux marble linoleum was unbelievably satisfying. She clicked as loud as she could over to the front desk. Unfortunately, her footfalls drowned in the cries of a young man.

“What do you mean the room is already booked? I said I would be right back with the money!” he cried.

An overworked teenager tried to calm the upset man. “Sir, we have plenty of other fine rooms—”

The man interrupted her, “I need THAT room!”

“Sir—”

“No! I have lived here for four months!” He slammed his palm against the desk for emphasis.

The teenage girl twirled her hair with apparent anxiety; it didn’t look like the situation would end soon.

“Excuse me.” Andi reached over and dinged the bell.

The conversation immediately ceased as both stared at her.

“There is a dead rat in my room.” Andy crossed her arms over her chest.

The man’s eyes widened. “Was he brown and white?”

“Yeah, I guess?” It was hard to tell the color at this point in decomposition.

The man turned stiffly to the girl who had stopped twirling her hair and looked horrified.

“YOU KILLED CHEERIO?” His voice thundered with rage.

“We put some traps in the rooms—”

“Liar! You put a trap in ONE room, MY room!”

“Look, Brandon, you didn’t come ‘right back,’” the girl gestured air quotes with her fingers. “It had been over twenty-four hours, and we couldn’t catch him.”

“But then you didn’t even check the trap before renting out the room,” Andi interjected.

“You would have to ask housekeeping about that.”

“No, I would not because I found the thing!” Andi could hear her voice becoming shrill.

“He isn’t a thing!” Brandon sobbed.

“Whatever. Where is your manager?” This circus show needed to end.

“On break or something. Try out back by the dumpsters.” The girl had returned to twirling her hair, winding it tighter and tighter. She couldn’t be older than sixteen. Probably saving up for a car. Andi rolled her eyes and looked at the man. He had slumped onto the floor, waterfalls pouring down his cheeks. “Well?” she asked.

Brandon sniffled and looked up at her. “Well, what?”

“Well, are you going to help me find the manager to sort this out?”

Brandon wiped his nose on his dirty sleeve. He looked like a child. “Can I see him?”

“The manager? That's where we're going,” she gestured toward the door.

“No, Cheerio!” he cried.

“I don’t think you should. Let’s go.” She grabbed his arm and pulled him up. When she glanced back at the girl, the teenager looked relieved. “Who should we be looking for,” she paused, “by the dumpsters?”

“Todd. He’s in jeans and a black T-shirt. Balding.” She added the last detail to be spiteful.

Andi turned and walked outside, her grip tightening on the young man’s arm as he tripped over himself behind her. They found the dumpsters around the side of the building. “Todd!” she yelled.

A balding man stood up from the other side, smoking a cigarette. “Shit. You’re back?” he asked of the whimpering man. He looked at Andi. “Who are you? His lawyer?”

“I’m the guest who found a dead rat in my room.” Brandon’s wails increased in volume, and Andi rolled her eyes.

“Brandon, calm down,” Todd said. “So, what? You want a refund?” he stubbed out the cigarette on the wall.

“To start.” She paused, and Todd looked at them expectantly. She looked at Brandon, sniveling. “I want this man to have a month’s free rent.” As the words came out of her mouth, she was surprised. Somehow, this tiny man seemed deserving of some sort of compensation, and she felt the urge to fight for it.

Brandon stopped crying and stared at her slack-jawed.

“Absolutely not! I don’t want him here at all. In fact, we were all hoping he’d gone and OD’ed somewhere else.”

Andi looked down at Brandon. The man was pathetic. Then again, she wasn’t catching him on a good day. “Sir. You have killed his pet. I am sure we could find someone to shut you down based on our combined experiences here.”

“A week, but then he finds somewhere else!”

“Three weeks and he’s gone.”

Todd stared hard at Andi. She didn’t blink. “Fine. No more pets, though!”

“Shouldn’t be an issue,” Andi replied, dragging Brandon back inside.

“Can I see him now?” he asked, staring at her.

Andi pinched the bridge of her nose. “Yeah, hold on.” She pulled out her phone and texted quickly: Something came up, can’t make it. “Let’s go,” she said to Brandon.

“Who were you texting?” Brandon asked, and Andi ignored him.

During the walk to the room, Andi tried to figure out how to show Brandon his dead, maggot-covered pet. Ultimately, all she said was, “He’s been gone awhile, be prepared.” She chose to wait outside the room, not only to give him privacy but also because, to be honest, he was unpredictable. All she knew about him was he was a drug addict and had a pet rat named Cheerio. Inside, she heard the tortured wail usually reserved for parents of lost children. Her feet ached, but she refused to sit on the sticky carpet. After about a half hour, the door burst open, causing Andi to jump. Brandon was holding the corpse. “Brandon! Put it down!” Her eyes widened in horror.

“He isn’t an it!” He choked back sobs and closed his eyes for a minute. Finally, he asked, “Will you help me give him a funeral?” Then, he slowly opened his eyes, his face becoming a puppy dog pout. A maggot crept up his pinky as he held out the rat corpse as if it were an offering.

The whole scene was so utterly unbelievable that she started laughing. It started as a giggle and morphed into a full belly laugh with tears in her eyes. Brandon stared at her, his own tears rolling down his cheeks. “Well?” he asked again.

Andi abruptly stopped laughing and wiped her eyes. She assumed from her black fingertips that she’d ruined her perfect cat-eye eyeliner. “Sure, why not? I have nothing else going on.”

Brandon stood up while continuing to hold the rat in front of him.

“Just keep it—“Andi held up a finger to stop Brandon from protesting, “him away from me.”

The two looked down at Cheerio’s decomposing body. “What do we do?” Brandon asked, breaking the silence.

“I don’t know! I’ve never attended a rat funeral!” Andi took a deep breath. “What would Cheerio have wanted?”

Brandon looked at Cheerio with a furrowed brow. “He loved Cheez-Its.”

“Okay…. Where should we bury him?” Andi crossed her arms over her chest. This would take the rest of the evening and most likely the night as well.

“In the dumpster. He used to love to rummage.” Brandon sniffed hard at the thought of his furry friend.

Andi remained silent as he continued thinking. We’re just going to throw it into the dumpster, aren’t we? she thought.

“We can put him in a Cheez-It box!” Brandon exclaimed as if his idea was genius.

“Okay, do you have one?” she asked.

Brandon looked down, ”No,” he mumbled. “I don’t have enough money.”

Andi sighed, “We’ll go to that small grocery store down the block, but you have to leave that in the room.” She gestured toward the rat in his hands.

“But—” Brandon started, his eyes filling with tears.

Andi wanted to point out that if anyone found Cheerio, they would throw him in the dumpster just like they were planning to do, but she refrained. “We won’t be gone long,” she said, sliding her key into the lock and opening the door. “We can’t bring a dead rat into a grocery store.”

“I’ll wait outside!” Brandon exclaimed.

Andi stared at him, her hand still holding the door open. “Just… stay here,” she grumbled.

Brandon’s eyes were fixed on Cheerio as if he was worried he'd drop him. Andi rolled her eyes and released the door so that it gently shut behind him. I could leave and never come back, she considered, yet the man was clearly having a rough day. She sighed so heavily that her body slumped forward. “Let's get some Cheez-Its," she muttered to herself. The air was brisk as the sun slowly set. Andi pulled her sweater tighter around her as she walked down the block. Two young men stood outside the store. They were jittery, and their eyes were bloodshot. “Hey, we're stranded. Could you spare a few dollars for the bus?”

Andi looked behind him at the other man. He had his arms crossed around himself and was avoiding her look.

“I only have plastic, sorry.” She did, in fact, have some cash, but her limit was helping one drug addict a day. Inside, the store was empty. She went to the snack section and scanned for Cheez-Its. Unable to find the brand name, she grabbed the closest generic brand and brought it to the counter. The older man behind the counter smiled at her, revealing his almost toothless mouth.

“Just this,” she said. She caught her reflection in the cigarette case behind him. She looked like a drug addict herself, her makeup was smeared, and she just looked… tired. Wordlessly, the man scanned the box and slid it across the counter toward her as he kept smiling. She sneered back and ran her card. The minute it chirped that she could remove the card, she grabbed the crackers and walked as fast as possible out of the store, wondering if that man had blinked during the entire transaction.

Back at the motel, a tall man in a gray peacoat and dress slacks was leaning against her car. “I thought something came up?” His voice was deep and icy.

“Rat funeral,” she said, holding up the box of generic cheese-flavored crackers.

The man bounced off the car, standing up straight enough to add a few more inches to his height. “What?”

“Mark, that's been my whole day,” she said.

There was a heavy silence as Andi struggled to find a way to condense the past hour or so into a few sentences. “Oh, just come with me,” she said.

“Why?” Mark asked.

“Because I have to get this box back to the room to put a dead rat in it.” She grabbed his arm before he could protest and dragged him into the hotel.

As her cold fingers fumbled with the key, Mark tried again to comprehend the situation. “Are you into something weird? What's in there?”

The key finally clicked, and she opened the door. Brandon was sitting on the bed, still holding the rat out before him. “Mark, this is Brandon,” she pointed to the corpse, “and Cheerio.”

“What the hell, Andrea?” He knew she hated being addressed by her full name.

“I told you something came up. This is something.”

“Your name is Andrea?” Brandon asked.

“Why does that matter?” she asked.

“I don't know,” Brandon paused. “It's a nice name.”

Mark cleared his throat so aggressively that he coughed. “Anyway, my question still stands: what the hell?”

Andi considered how to answer his question. The events leading up to this moment had seemed bizarre as they were happening, but as she tried to phrase them, they sounded more and more insane.

“Andrea?” Brandon asked.

“What?” she asked in exasperation, not bothering to correct her name.

“Can I have the Cheez-It box?” he was staring at the cracker box with both hands still holding Cheerio.

She looked at the box. “They didn't have actual Cheez-Its, but this generic brand instead.” She held out the box.

Brandon sniffled once before wailing, “WHY DOESN’T ANYONE CARE?”

Andi got so close to Brandon that their noses were almost touching. In a low voice, she growled, “Brandon, it is the same damn thing.”

“Oh yeah?” Brandon replied, “Try one.”

Andi rolled her eyes as she opened the box. She popped one cheesy square into her mouth and grimaced. She reluctantly swallowed the cracker. “Oh my God. It is like cardboard.”

“I rest my case,” Brandon said with a pout.

Mark looked between the two and threw up his hands. “What is going on?”

Andi threw the box of cheese-flavored cardboard across the room. “Where is the closest place I can get actual Cheez-Its?” she asked Mark.

“How am I supposed to know?” His eyes were bulging with a mix of anger and confusion.

“Forget it!” Brandon wailed. “Cheerio would have hated this negativity!”

“Is Cheerio the rat?” Mark asked, and Brandon nodded. “Then he wouldn't have cared because he is a rat!” He walked across the room and grabbed the box.

“No, really, Mark, those things are nasty.” At Mark's questioning look, she folded her arms over her chest. “Try one.”

Mark sighed heavily. He pulled a cracker out of the box and held it up in a dramatic ‘happy now?’ expression. He threw the cracker in his mouth, and his eyes grew wide as he spit it onto the floor. “How are these legal?”

After a lengthy silence punctuated by Brandon's sobs, Mark again threw up his hands. “I think there is a proper grocery store a few blocks away; let's go.”

“What do I do with Cheerio?” Brandon stood up.

“No. You stay here.” Mark pointed to the bed as if commanding a dog.

Brandon nodded and sat back on the bed, with Cheerio still held before him.

Andi followed Mark out to his car. “Do you have all your things?” Mark asked, unlocking the car doors with a cheery chirp.

“I don't know, why?” Andi looked at Mark's stern face. “Oh, no! No, I am not abandoning that poor man.”

Mark growled, “Why do you care? He's just some weird drug addict with a dead rat.”

“I think that rat is all he had.”

Mark rolled his eyes and opened the car door for her. “So? Are you coming or not?”

“No. Go home to your wife, Mark.” Andi slammed the car door closed. She turned to her own vehicle and climbed inside. She peeled out before Mark could say anything else. But his question echoed in her mind: Why do I care? I will never see this guy again. She tapped the steering wheel in thought. The only answer she could think of was her overwhelming pity towards him. After a few minutes, she found a chain grocery store.

She arrived back with the proper kind of cheese crackers.

“Now what?” she asked, placing the box beside Brandon on the bed.

He stared at the box and looked back up at Andi. “What?” she asked, feeling at her absolute wit's end.

“Where is Mark?” he asked.

“Don't know, don't care. Put the rat in the box, and let's go.”

“I can't just plop him in the box as if I don't care!” he cried.

This stinking rat is going in the dumpster, so why does it matter? She was starting to regret not taking Mark's offer. “What do you want?”

“Can't you make it look more… nice?” Brandon said, gesturing at the box.

“You want me to decorate a Cheez-It box so we can put a dead rat in it and throw it in the dumpster?”

“Yes.”

“Oh my God.” Andi snatched the box and left the room. She was about to arts and crafts a coffin out of a Cheez-It box. Luckily, the teenager at the desk was finally useful for something when she handed over a glue stick and scissors. Carefully, Andi cut a square out of the front of the box and dumped out the crackers. She glued the top shut and glued crackers all over the front around the square cut-out. She looked around and grabbed a box of tissues. She stuffed them inside to make a fluffy bed and even added a Sweet’N Low pillow. As a final touch, she collected a small bunch of yellow dandelions and glued them around the hole. As a professional interior decorator, she was appalled, but as a tired woman throwing a rat a funeral at a motel, it looked pretty good.

When she presented it to Brandon, he simply said, “It'll do.” He gently placed Cheerio inside as Andi restrained herself from strangling him.

The duo approached the dumpster. Todd was either back or had never left. The sun had finished setting, and the outside lights flickered on with a pop.

“What now?” Todd whined.

“Chill, we're just throwing something out,” Andi said, trying to block the box with Cheerio in Brandon’s hands with her body.

“We. Are. Having. A. Funeral.” Brandon enunciated in between sobs.

“What?” Todd asked. He squinted at the box. “What on Earth is that?”

“The beautiful soul you murdered.” Brandon scowled at him.

Andi sidestepped in front of Brandon to block Todd’s view of the Cheez-It coffin. “We are just doing what you would have done, but... fancier.”

“No.” Todd blew a cloud of smoke towards her.

She waved it away. “Excuse me?”

“Don't throw your filthy vermin in my dumpster.”

Andi put up a hand before Brandon could protest to Cheerio being referred to as vermin. “Okay, so, where to start? It's a freaking dumpster. But not just any dumpster, a motel dumpster.”

“My dumpster, my rules,” Todd smirked.

Andi had never contemplated murder more in her life. “So what were you going to do with it?”

“Him!” Brandon yelled.

“Shut up,” she snapped.

“Throw it in the other motel’s dumpster,” Todd said.

“Why does it matter?”

“Principles.” Todd grinned.

Andi rolled her eyes and looked at the dumpster in question. She scanned the trash as her mind ran through all the events that brought her to this very moment. She turned to Brandon. “Does it have to be this dumpster?” He nodded. “Of course it does.” She looked at Todd, and without breaking eye contact, she said, “Brandon, put Cheerio in the dumpster.”

“But what about a ceremony?” Brandon asked.

“We will have a wake in the room.” She nudged him toward the dumpster.

“Don't you dare, I'll call the cops,” Todd started.

“And tell them we are throwing away trash?” Andi returned his smirk.

“He isn't trash!” Brandon yelled.

“BRANDON, PUT HIM IN THE DUMPSTER, OR I WILL, AND I CAN BET IT WON'T BE AS NICELY AS YOU WOULD LIKE.”

Brandon kissed Cheerio and lowered the Cheez-It coffin into the dumpster.

“What if I take him out and move him after you two leave?” Todd asked.

Andi lowered her voice, “If you do it after we leave, we'll never know,” she said as she gently grabbed Brandon’s shoulders and turned him away.

They headed to the room, the only noise being Brandon’s soft crying. Andi looked at the shuddering husk of a man and felt something other than pity, sadness. She snapped her head away and looked at the grimy carpet instead.

When they got back to the room, she grabbed her suitcase. “I’ll be right back; I’m going to put this in the car.” Brandon didn’t even acknowledge she’d said a word.

Downstairs, her heels clicked her way to the front desk once again. “Can you please charge my card for my room for the next month in advance?” Hopefully, that would make up for her skipping out on Cheerio’s wake.

The teenage girl nodded and silently typed away at the computer. Andi gave a curt nod and headed out to her car. Once in the car, she pulled out her phone and scrolled through her contacts until she got to the M’s. She opened Mark’s contact and hit the “block” button, hesitating only a second when it asked if she was sure. She started the car and headed home, feeling different than when she’d arrived at the motel. Exhaustion crept into her bones, and she thought, Next time, I need to mind my own business. She also had a sudden and severe craving for Cheez-Its.