Alexie Aaron - Checking Out

“Perhaps we should leave them to become reacquainted,” Mia suggested.

Burt opened the door to his room and looked up and down the hall before stepping out. Mia and Murphy followed him, and the three of them ventured down the hall towards the stairs.

“Millie seems to be a ghost, but the other one is something else,” Burt warned. “I wouldn’t be surprised to see her toss the two of you out, so be careful.”

Burt stopped at the upper landing of the stairs. “Last time I tried to descend, the stairs disappeared.”

Mia nodded to Murphy who started down the stairs first, stopped and turned around.

“Go ahead. If the stairs disappear, he’ll catch you,” Mia promised.

Burt tentatively touched the tread with one foot, and it held. He proceeded down the steps one at a time with Mia watching his back.

They successfully navigated the stairs when Mrs. Brewster appeared.

“Can I help you?”

“My wife and I were hoping you would have a vacancy for this evening,” Murphy said quickly.

Burt moved into the parlor, hoping against hope that Mrs. Brewster did not see him.

Mia pushed back her hood which morphed into a cloak and smiled as she patted her hair into place.

Mrs. Brewster looked them up and down and asked, “Where is your luggage? I’ll not have any of that hanky-panky in my inn!”

“We left it on the porch,” Mia said sweetly. “After all, it would be bad manners to assume you had a vacancy this late in the day.”

Mia could see the innkeeper fighting with the inn itself for understanding of how the couple appeared in her lobby when the door had been locked.

“A young woman, Millie I believe, met us on the porch. She didn’t think you had an empty room but suggested that we check with you. You are Mrs. Brewster?” Mia asked, letting her words draw out a little, giving them an air of snobbery.

“Yes, I’m Amelia Brewster. Let me check the calendar.”

Mia ever so subtly morphed her clothing to a dress of quality. She chose Chanel as it was in fashion no matter when it was made or worn. She mentally thanked her godfather Ralph for his constant chatter about fashion. Some of it sunk in.

“I don’t understand what you’re telling me!” Millie said, bursting into tears. “I’m not dead. You’re not dead. That Mr. Hicks has used hypnotism on you! Mother said he was a person to be wary of. He is always lying.”

“Millie, the Dew Drop Inn disappeared over forty years ago. I died not long after you did. We’re dead. I’ve come to collect you so we can meet our maker together.”

“What about mother?”

“She can come too. We have to leave the Dew Drop together. You and I don’t belong here. We have to also help Mr. Hicks to his freedom. He’s of flesh and blood, and staying here is killing him.”

Millie paled and confessed, “I have noticed that he seems rather cold, and he is hungry right after I feed him.”

“Humans can’t live on pure energy. They need to ingest it and turn it into something they can live on,” he explained. “Mia explained it to me. Their friend, Burt… Mr. Hicks is dying, and they need our help.”

“This is so much to take in,” Millie said, pushing her hands through her hair again and again in nervous frustration.

Paul caught her by the wrists and gently pulled them away from her. “Can you please take a leap of faith and believe me?”

She looked at her handsome husband standing there with five o’clock shadow in his funeral suit and considered the tale he told her. She nodded her head and let herself be pulled into his arms. She laid her head on his strong shoulder and listened to the plan the PEEPs team had come up with.

Mike tested out his mic several times for Cid. Audrey filled the outer pockets of the fur with water and granola bars. The deep inner pockets held mini cameras and other recording devices. They would carry a valise into the B&B that was filled with food, water and blankets to keep them and Burt alive if they too became prisoners of the Fata Morgana.

“It’s funny how real bits of the paranormal are exposed through fiction,” Audrey commented. “For example there’s a lot of information to be gleaned from Walter Moers’s character Professor Abdullah Nightingale and his writings about Fata Morganas. Even though it’s fiction, the writer must have pulled the information from something real.”

Mike looked over at her. “I’m not following you.”

“It’s as if the writer is connected to the ether in some way,” she explained. “The explanation of these mirages varies from culture to culture, but the fact that many seem to have similar stories of FMs is telling. There are other things too. Take salt and ghosts for instance; how’d we figure that one out?”

“Salt?” Mike questioned and then answered himself, “Ah, like how we know about ghosts being hurt by salt. I’m sure somewhere it was used successfully, and it was recorded. Perhaps a writer picked up on it. Either the writer read about it somewhere or had a memory of it being mentioned by someone.”

“You, sir, are a realist, like Ted and Cid,” Audrey claimed.

“And for a good Catholic, you are awfully happy with superstition.”

Audrey gave him a wry look. “Superstition goes hand-in-hand with most religions. We have to suspend belief and have faith. I’m comfortable with my faith and believing in magic.”

“You’re a unique woman, Audrey,” Mike said. “Now, let’s get out there and rescue Burt. Cid, we are ready when you are.”

Cid, who had been listening in on their conversation, responded. “According to Burt’s calculations, the inn should appear within a fifty foot radius on the north side of the road any time now.”

Mike put the van into gear and began driving slowly.

Audrey gazed out of the window. “I see a light up ahead.” She pointed. “There!”

The light became many lights, and as they approached, a beautifully painted sign on the edge of the road declared, Dew Drop Inn.

Mike pulled into a gravel lot and parked his car beside a 1970 Chevrolet Impala. Playing the role of the attentive husband, he got out and walked around to open the door for Audrey. The two of them took a moment and looked at the two story clapboard inn. Yellow light poured from the windows on both stories. As they approached, the front door opened.

Maggie’s head lifted, and she sniffed the air. Cid looked at her and asked, “What is it? Tell me, what do you smell?”

“If that dog talks, I’m going to look for accommodations at Belleview,” Ted announced.

“She does talk. You just have to be smart enough to interpret it,” Cid argued.

The speakers crackled, bringing the two techs back to task. Mike reported, “The door is open. We’re going in. Wish us luck.”

“Go ahead, but don’t break your cover whatever you do,” Cid warned. “If this thing swallowed Burt, it wasn’t for his good looks. It was because it smelled a rat.”

“Understood,” Mike said.

Maggie got up and lifted her head and sniffed the air again. It was just at the edges of her scent cone, but she smelled the chubby man they called Burt. She also smelled bacon. The truck had driven past several farmhouses before they stopped, and her nose told her that someone inside of one of them was having a late night snack of bacon. Given her choice, Maggie would rather smell bacon than Burt, but the cooking man and the tinkering man were insistent.

Mike grabbed Audrey’s hand. She squeezed his to tell him that she was ready. They climbed the stairs together. The wooden steps were free of snow, and they radiated an unexpected warmth. It was as if they had been bathed in sunlight. Audrey admired the sparkling panes of glass that reflected their images as they passed by the windows on the way to the open door. She saw snatches of a beautiful, if not dated, interior. The inn emitted an air of comfort and welcome that she found appealing.