*This is a work of fiction. Feedback will be greatly appreciated.
*
Family vacation places suck. They suck balls. Especially if you're a single guy with no family. But, if you know where to look, they can be fun.
A couple of months ago, I had to go to one of these vacation places, alone. The place was in North India, a little lake near Nainital, with a big resort to stay. Of course, I was supposed to be going with my family. Unfortunately, my father passed away suddenly, so my family wasn't in the mood for vacation, but my doctor forced me to go on one, before I died of a heart attack or something. I didn't want to go alone, but my friends were busy, and well, no one gives a shit about going to the fucking mountains.
Either way, I eventually got there after a 2 hour long flight from Delhi, a 7 hour wait for the train, an overnight journey with a hippie raving on about how beautiful the light in the train was,, and finally a 3 hour long drive.
As I settled in, I realized that the resort was occupied by basically two types of people: People on honeymoon who were busy fucking, or people on family vacations who wished they, or their parents, hadn't fucked. Either way, the place was an island, 1 km from the nearest village, eight from the nearest town, and 20 km from the closest big tourist attraction.
The first day I was there, I slept like a log. In the evening, I went out for a bit, checking out the town. When I returned, I saw four chicks go into a room.
This was odd. An anomaly. Unless there was someone here who had four daughters and brought them on vacation, I was not the only single person in the resort.
The next day was a bit more eventful. In the morning, I set out with a small backpack for the 8km trek to the nearest town and enjoyed the scenery. There, someone told me about another interesting trek I could take.
When I returned to the resort, I saw the four chicks clicking pictures in the lawn. I smelled of sweat and had muck on my clothes. I decided not to go talk to them just yet. The receptionist gave me my keys and told me that I was 'welcome to come for the hotel's complimentary evening entertainment'.
The complimentary evening entertainment actually resembled some sort of medieval torture. Families stood together, unsure of what to do, with hotel staff trying to make them take part in games. The 'ice-breakers' created more ice than they broke. The housie made people want to kill the hotel staff for their pronunciations. Finally, they decided to chill and put up a Karaoke machine.
To the Japanese, the people who invented Karoke, it is a delightful pastime. To other people, it can come across as the Japanese revenge for Hiroshima. A bald dad crooned into the microphone, pointing at the machine - which clearly did not know music from torture - while mom cheered him on with the pre-teen daughter and the uncomfortable acne-ridden son. I stood quietly in the corner, thinking of ways to leave, while checking out the room.
The four chicks I had seen earlier were there too. Three of them wore obvious signs of discomfort and pain, while the last one was intent in texting. I checked out the last one. She was sitting, but I had seen her before, and was about 5'2 or 5'3, with black hair and an interesting face. Around my age (early twenties) her body was a bit on the heavier side of fit, but I didn't really mind, because she was bent forward in her chair, and I could see the most marvellous cleavage I had seen in months.
I turned my attention to the crowd again, before she realized that I had been checking her out. Now the father was coaxing the uncomfortable teenage son to sing while zooming in on his son with the camcorder. If singing in a breaking voice wasn't bad enough, a lifelong memory of acne in 8x zoom is.
"Are you really enjoying this?" asked a voice behind me.
I turned around to see who it was. Pleasantly, it was the cute chick I had been checking out earlier.
"No, I am trying to decide whether to use the mic to club the father to death or shove it up his ass and videotape it."
"Ah. I'm Sarah."
We shook hands. I gave her my name.
She told me she was from Delhi and had been conned into going for this vacation by her friend, something I hadn't managed to do with my friends. Her friends were bored too, but had decided to stick to their room and have some sort of extended sleepover while watching TV. It was odd.
"What about you? You doing anything apart from hiking?"
"I actually go hiking."
"Where?"
"In the mountains that surround us."
"I got that, but where to?"
We got talking, and then we began to flirt. Eventually her friends called her and she left for her room, and I crashed in mine.
The next morning, while I was reading news about places I didn't know existed while eating breakfast, Sarah inturrupted me.
"Please tell me you are doing something today."
"How are you concerned?"
"I need to do something. Anything."
"You could cab it to Nainital and go shopping."
"We did the day we got here. It's not that great."
"Ok."
"What are you doing? I need some company?"
"Today? I'm thinking of staying in, actually."
"Damn."
"I am going for a night trek. Not your thing, don't worry."
"What? Tell me!"
"Well, there is this lake up in the hills from here. You have to walk there. It's a three hour long trek."
"But why night?"
"Well, it's uninhabited at night. And supposed to be haunted."
"You want to be alone near a lake, in the middle of the night, with ghosts?"
"Told you it wasn't your thing. I understand."
"I didn't say I wasn't going."
"You'll need gear. And the will to work out."