Bad Karma

she was exhausted.

It’s this room, she tried to convince herself. It’s not me. It’s this creepy room.

She got out of bed and slipped on her sandals. Without bothering to brush her hair or teeth, still wearing the knee-length gray tank top she’d slept in, she left the room and marched to the lobby, where she rang the bell until her buddy from the day before showed up, a jelly doughnut in his hand and in his teeth.

“I want another room.” He wasn’t the only one with an attitude.

His eyebrows lifted in surprise. “You got the best room in the place.”

“I want a different room. There’s something wrong with the one I’m in.”

“What? What’s wrong with it?”

“It’s too orange.”

“They’re all orange.” Nevertheless, he checked the keys that hung on the pegboard behind the counter. “Lemme see…that’s storage. That’s storage. Ceiling fell in on that one. That room’s got a standing reservation. That leaves us with number three. It’s got a broken air conditioner. Number eight’s got a broken toilet.”

“What about nine or ten?”

“Remodeling them. Tearing out the wall between the two rooms to make one deluxe suite with a Jacuzzi. How’s that sound?”

“Like I’ll be staying in number six.” She didn’t even want to know about the room with the standing reservation. “Is there anyplace to get something to eat around here?” she asked, resigned to the fact that she wouldn’t be moving anytime soon.

“Gas station two blocks down the street. Got pop and juice. Here.” He shoved a box of doughnuts at her. “Knock yourself out.”

Amidst the jelly and powdered sugar, she found a plain doughnut. She took it. “Thanks.” And went back to room six.

She couldn’t remain there another night. She had to leave. She would tell the chief of police she couldn’t stay.

What excuse could she give? That the motel gave her the creeps? And how could she leave? She’d spent her last dime getting to Egypt, Missouri. Adrian had been right. She shouldn’t have come.

She found herself staring at the barn pictures she’d cut out the previous night. Perhaps it was slightly obsessive-compulsive, but she wanted the pictures out of her sight. And not only out of her sight, but hidden. She finally shoved them between the mattress and box-spring and immediately felt better. Not great, but better.

At 9:00 a.m. sharp a knock sounded on the motel room door, bringing Cleo back to her immediate problem- Police Chief Josephine Bennett and Cleo’s psychic commitment.

Chief Bennett pretty much fit the mental image Cleo had gotten while speaking to her over the phone. Her hair was short, gray, and tightly permed. She was large around the middle-not fat, but a shape that sometimes went with menopause. Unlike Daniel Sinclair and his civilian clothes, Josephine appeared to be regulation, from her tie to her holstered gun and her shiny black oxfords. On the pocket of her crisply pressed shirt was a silver badge that read Chief of Police.

For a moment, Cleo recalled when she and her brother, Adrian, had gotten badges like that out of a cereal box. They were shaped just like the one in front of her, and they could have been real if you didn’t look too closely.

Josephine stuck out her hand and introduced herself, insisting Cleo call her Jo. “Everybody calls me Jo.” She had one of those voices that fell somewhere between male and female. Not surprisingly, her grasp was warm and strong. “Have you eaten breakfast?” Jo asked.

Cleo nodded. She’d been able to get half the doughnut down before it began to taste like moldy grout. The last thing she wanted was for Jo to swing by some greasy spoon where they could both load up on bacon and undercooked eggs. “Stuffed,” she said, grabbing her bag and closing the door, the smell of the room following her.

“Ignore the mess,” Jo said as they got into the squad car.

That was a little hard when the floor under Cleo’s feet was littered with paper and unopened mail.

“Coke?” Jo flipped the lid on a small cooler that sat on the seat between them.

“No, thanks.” What was she doing here?

Tell her you have to leave. Tell her you got an emergency call and you have to leave, urged part of her mind. But another part of her countered, Don’t be a baby.

Cleo rolled down the window and took a deep breath. It seemed as if she couldn’t get away from the smell of the motel room. She sniffed her hair. It was in her hair. And on her hands. Even her hands smelled like some stranger’s body odor.

“So, what do you think of our little town?” Jo popped open the Coke, took a long swallow, then settled the container in the weighted cup holder on the dash. “I run on these things. If I don’t have my third Coke by nine-thirty I get a killer headache.”

“It’s nice,” Cleo said, answering Jo’s question.

“It was ranked one of the best places of its size to live and raise kids. Safest town in the country.”

Cleo wanted to believe that. But she didn’t. Small towns were never as innocuous as they appeared.

“Do you like calliope music?” Jo picked up a CD. “Come on. Be honest.”

Cleo felt too many things were being thrown at her at once. “I always thought there was something a little sinister about music that’s so perky.”

Jo let out a laugh and refrained from pushing the CD in the player.

On the way to the police station, she filled Cleo in on what she knew about the loss of the key, going into a little more depth than she had over the phone. “There’s only one master key, of course. It unlocks every public building in town-the schools, the courthouse, the police station, the fire station. The fire chief’s been after me to let him have the key. Says it’s more important for him to have it. And he has a point. But what if there’s a break-in in progress? The police department needs that master. So after two years of debating the issue, I decided to let Harvey have his way, but when I went to get the key, it wasn’t there.”

“Do you have any idea how long it’s been gone?” Cleo asked.

“Could have been weeks. Could have been months.” Jo smoothly executed a turn. “That’s the thing about a master key. It’s not something you use every day. We’ve never had a situation come up where we needed the master. But you never know. A town’s gotta have a master key.”

It had all seemed so easy in Portland. A missing key. What could be less threatening?

“I think that sneak fire chief took it and won’t admit it. He acted funny when I told him he could have it. Looked like a little kid with his hand caught in the cookie jar. ‘Don’t trouble yourself to get it now,’ he told me. And I said, ‘Better get it before I change my mind.’ And then, of course, it wasn’t even there.”

“Why wouldn’t he come forward if he had the key?” The whole thing was ridiculous. Cleo had landed herself in the middle of some petty little squabble. They needed a negotiator, not a psychic.

“Because Harvey Jamison is spineless and doesn’t want anybody to know he took it, that’s why. He’d rather the city pay a hundred thousand bucks to have all new locks put in than admit he took it in the first place. That’s the kind of person he is.”

“So you basically want me to prove that Harvey Jamison took the key?”

“That’s right. I tried myself. You know, clairvoyant stuff.” Jo waved her hand at the unseen. “But I couldn’t come up with anything. Guess I just don’t have it. I’ve been taking correspondence courses on reading runes and on telepathy. I know I can learn everything there is to learn, but if a person doesn’t have a sixth sense the way you do, it doesn’t mean anything.”

“Sometimes even with it you can’t find an answer.” Cleo needed to clarify that right away. “I’m not promising you anything.”

“Oh, I know. I may not have what it takes, but all the same I just had a feeling about you after I read what you did in California.” She took a long sip of Coke then settled the can back in the holder. “When did you first realize you were able to do things most people couldn’t do?”

A simple question. A straightforward question. One Cleo should have been able to answer. Should she tell her that she’d first studied psychic phenomena because she wanted to prove to herself that she had no ability? Because