“Thang you. Thang you vera much.”
“You’re kidding, right?” She lifted her feet and let them drop again.
“Thang you. Thang you vera much.”
It seemed to have a limited vocabulary. “Why would Augustus Smythe waste power, even seepage, on something like you?” Unless. She chewed thoughtfully. “You don’t sing, do…”
Her last word got lost under the opening bars of “Jailhouse Rock.”
“Stop.”
“Thang you. Thang you vera much.”
“Sing.”
A few bars of “Blue Suede Shoes.”
“Stop.”
“Thang you. Thang you vera much.”
“Sing.”
“Heartbreak Hotel.” The opening bars of “Heartbreak Hotel.”
“That’s more like it” Claire had another cookie and prepared to wallow. From this point on, the future stretched out unchanging because to hope for change was to hope for disaster and to hope for disaster would strengthen Hell. She supposed she should call her mother, let her know how things had worked out—or rather how they hadn’t worked out—but she didn’t feel up to hearing even the most diplomatic version of “I told you so.”
And if Diana was home…
The ten-year difference in their ages and a childhood spent being rescued by Claire from toddler enthusiasm meant that Diana had always lumped Claire in with the rest of the old people. She wouldn’t be at all surprised to find Claire stuck running the hotel. It was what old Keepers did, after all.
Moving down to the second layer of cookies, Claire knew she couldn’t trust herself to listen to that. Better not to call until Friday evening when she always called.
“You do know Elvis is running on seepage.”
Claire sighed, exhaling a fine mist of cookie crumbs. “He’s using a tiny fraction of what’s readily available. He’s not pulling from the pit.”
“I wonder if that was the first excuse Augustus Smythe made.” Austin jumped up onto the back of the sofa and gingerly stretched out along the top edge of the cushion.
“I doubt it.” The song ended and Elvis thanked his audience before she could actually do anything.
“There is a bright side, you know. If Augustus Smythe hadn’t been a sufficient monitor for all the years he was here, he would have been replaced. Since you’re here now, obviously there’s a better chance than there’s ever been that something will go wrong.”
Claire turned just enough to glare at the cat. “And I’m supposed to feel good about that?” But she reached out to see that the power loop remained secure.
YOU WERE DISAPPOINTED!
Get out of my head. She ate another three cookies so fast she almost took the end off a finger.
“You should cheer up,” Austin told her.
“I don’t want to cheer up.”
“Then you should answer the door.”
“There’s nobody…” A tentative knocking cut her off. She glared at the cat as she called out, “What?”
“It’s Dean. You haven’t eaten yet today, so I made you some breakfast.”
“It’s almost noon.”
“It’s an omelet.”
Names have power. Claire could smell it now: butter, eggs, mushrooms, cheese. All of a sudden she was ravenous. Half a bag of cookies hadn’t even blunted the edge. When she opened the door, she found he’d brought a thermal carafe of coffee and a glass of orange juice as well. She held out her hands, but he didn’t seem to want to relinquish the tray.
“You’ve, um, probably forgotten, but it’s Thanksgiving today.”
She hadn’t so much forgotten as hadn’t realized. A quick glance over at Miss October did indicate that it was, indeed the second Monday. And that she should replace Augustus Smythe’s calendars. “Thank you. I’ll call home.”
“Yeah. Well, it’s just that I was kind of invited to a friend’s house for dinner.”
“Kind of invited?”
“She’s from back home, too, and we all made plans to get together and…” His voice trailed off.
“Go. Be happy. Eat turkey. Watch football.” Claire reached over the omelet, grabbed the edge of the tray closest to his body and yanked it toward her, leaving him no choice but to let go or to go with it.
He let go.
“You’ve certainly earned a night off,” she said, smiling tightly up at him. “Thank you for the food. Now go away, I haven’t finished wallowing yet.” Stepping back, she closed the door in his face.
“That was rude,” Austin chided.
“Do you want some of this or not?”
It was enough, as she’d known it would be, for him to keep further opinions to himself.
Out in the office, Dean shook his head, brow creased with concern. “I don’t know what I should do,” he confessed to Jacques.
“Do what she says,” the ghost told him. “Be with your friends. Eat the turkey, watch the football. There is nothing you can do here. She will come out when she is come to terms with this.”
“Has come to terms with this. You could go in.”
“I think not. What was it you said?” He started to fade and by the time he finished talking his words hung in the air by themselves. “I am pretty smart for a dead guy.”
The interior of the refrigerator was as spotless as the rest of the kitchen. In Claire’s experience, most crispers held two moldy tomatoes and a head of mushy lettuce but not Dean’s. The vegetables were not only fresh, they’d been cleaned. She thought about making a salad and decided not to bother. Considered making a sandwich from the leftover pot roast and decided it was too much work. Reached for a plastic container of stroganoff to reheat and let her hand fall back by her side.
In the end, she stepped away from the fridge empty-handed.
The familiar clomp of work boots turned her around.
“You’re back early.”
“It’s almost nine. Not that early.” Dean set a bulging bag down on the table and began removing foil wrapped packages. “We ate, did the dishes, had a cuffer—swapped stories,”
