Oliver Crum and the Grim Menagerie

by Chris Cooper

Oliver grabbed Martin by the arm and tried to put together a sentence that didn’t sound insane. “Mom has Izzy locked in her studio, and she’s running around with a knife. She’s not in her right mind, and we need help.”

  “Have a seat, and I’ll give Eric a call,” Martin replied.

  “No, you can’t! We have to leave town. Eric may be in on it too.”

  Martin hesitated. “Let me grab my things. If this is some sort of practical joke…”

  They followed him to the back of the store, where he pulled his coat from the rack and opened one of the desk drawers to grab his car keys.

  A knock at the front door startled them all.

  Eric was standing close to the glass and knocked again as he peered inside.

  “Maybe we should ask Eric himself?” Martin said.

  “Don’t let him in,” Oliver said.

  However, Martin was already halfway up the aisle to the door. Oliver followed, with Asher close behind, and tried to step between him and the door, but Martin shoved him aside.

  “What’s gotten into you?” he asked as he unlatched the door. “Eric, what the hell is going on?”

  Eric seemed calm at first glance, and for a moment, Oliver wondered if he too had been spared. But then he looked at Asher, and his eyebrows flinched. “Sorry to bother you, Martin, but Oliver’s friend here is in a whole heap of trouble. He’ll need to come with me.”

  Asher looked at Oliver but didn’t budge.

  “He’s not going anywhere until you explain,” Oliver said.

  “He needs to come with me now. We’ll take care of him,” Eric replied.

  He stepped toward Asher, but Oliver stepped between them.

  Eric locked eyes with Oliver and cocked his head slightly. “Very well,” he said and took a step back. As Oliver turned to face Asher, Eric cocked his arm and slammed his fist into Oliver’s cheek, sending him tumbling into the side of a heavy wardrobe.

  Martin stood frozen, seemingly unsure of whom to trust at the moment.

  Asher shouted as Eric grabbed him by the collar and pulled him through the door and into the darkness.

  As Oliver pushed himself up to his feet, still reeling from the blow, he stumbled toward the door. He couldn’t see anything beyond the front door—the night was too dark—but he noticed a light switch next to the doorframe and flipped it on. The outside shop lights illuminated the edges of the square, and to Oliver’s horror, a group of townspeople had encircled the front door. They stood in silence, arms at their sides and only swaying slightly in the heavy breeze.

  Eric handed Asher over to several others then turned back toward the storefront, while Martin stepped outside. Oliver didn’t wait to see what happened next but turned and sprinted to the back room of the store. He knew Martin’s shop had a back courtyard and only hoped the townspeople hadn’t surrounded the building.

  He unlatched the heavy metal door to the courtyard and nearly lost his balance and fell as he scaled the wooden privacy fence. At first, he heard shouts from behind, but darkness shrouded the edge of town, and Oliver quickly slipped away into the side streets. He felt sick to his stomach for having left Asher behind, but he’d be of no help if the townsfolk captured him too. He wasn’t sure where to go—the town seemed to have lost its collective mind.

  He headed in the direction of the train station, working his way around the perimeter of the square and sneaking in from the back. The station was eerily quiet. Although the last train had already come through for the evening, the station gate was ajar.

  Oliver sat on a bench under the dim lamplight in the empty station and took a moment to catch his breath. He felt truly and utterly alone. Izzy and Asher had been captured, and Anna wasn’t herself anymore. Clearly, they wanted Asher, but Oliver could only hope they wouldn’t dispose of Izzy once he’d been captured. If they had wanted to kill anyone, though, Bev surely would have done it earlier that evening. She’d chosen to lock them all up instead.

  What do I do now?

  He pulled his wallet from his back pocket and shuffled past a few bills and pulled out the small slip of paper Ruby had given him. The address was in Amberley, but no phone number was listed, and he had no way to get there.

  He spotted a pay phone at the far end of the station and felt a glimmer of hope as he held his breath and reached into the phone-book cubby. In the city, mysterious substances covered what few pay phones still existed, and all the phone books had been either stolen or destroyed. This was Christchurch, however, so he pulled out a crisp phone book.

  The taxi promised to arrive in ten minutes or so, but ten minutes came and went as Oliver waited conspicuously in the station. He debated whether to take his chances on the dark road out of town. He was a sitting duck in the station, and surely someone from the town would wander up in this direction if he waited too long.

  Then Oliver saw headlights coming down the road, and the knot in the pit of his stomach dissipated. He approached the yellow cab and climbed into the back seat.

  Chapter Twelve

  Oliver held his breath around the twists and turns leading to Amberley. As the taxi’s headlights illuminated the darkness smothering each curve, Oliver expected the mob to greet him.

  The taxi driver pulled down a narrow street and parked in front of an old apartment complex.

  “Sure this is the place?” Oliver asked.

  “This is the address you gave me,” the driver replied. “Cash or charge, bud?”

  Oliver pulled out his wallet and slipped the driver two crisp bills. A fine mist fell from the sky, causing the complex’s cement stairs to glisten as Oliver hurried to the front door. He pulled on the handle, but the entrance was locked tight.

  A buzzer system hung on the wall next to him. Ruby had only given him the address and hadn’t bothered to tell him the room number.

  This can’t be right.

  Oliver descended the front steps and stood in front of the building once more, mist slowly seeping through his jacket’s fabric. Somehow, he’d missed a small set of stairs nestled under the main entrance. He followed them down to a sturdy black door, gripping a wrought-iron handrail as he approached. He tried to peer inside, but the small diamond window in the door had been covered.

  He pulled the door open and had to duck through the doorway to avoid hitting his head. The ceilings were low and lined with faded copper paneling. The place was styled like an Irish pub, but it lacked the jovial atmosphere. In stereotypical fashion, a bartender stood against a backlit bar, drying a glass with a towel.

  “Help you?” he asked, looking out over the glasses resting on the tip of his nose.

  “I’m looking for Ruby,” Oliver replied.

  The statement caught the attention of a stringy-haired man sitting in the corner of the bar. He looked over at the bartender then back down at his half-empty pint.

  “Name?” the bartender asked.

  “Oliver.”

  He set the glass down and reached underneath the bar. “Broom closet next to the men’s room. And don’t forget to hit the switch when you’re on the other side.”

  Oliver furrowed his brow but thanked the man and followed the hallway to the restrooms. He pulled open the door to the broom closet to look inside. The broom closet was typical, with a mop and bucket and several shelves of cleaning supplies. However, this broom closet had no back. A dark hallway sat on the other side, lined with paneling and dimly lit by flickering wall sconces.

  When he stepped through the back of the closet and into the hallway beyond, he found the switch on the wall and pressed it as the bartender had asked. The missing wall shot up in front of him, sealing him inside the mysterious hallway. He walked cautiously toward a doorway at the end of the hall and heard chatter coming from around the corner. He found himself in another bar, much like the one he’d just been through, except this one was full of people.

  Oliver received several stares as he crossed the bar and approached the bartender. The man was identical to the one he’d just met o
n the other side of the wall.

  Twins? “I’m looking for Ruby,” he said.

  The bartender didn’t respond with words but rather nodded to his left.

  Ruby sat tucked into a booth along the far wall. It was raised from the floor slightly and hidden within a wood-paneled cubby. She was in deep conversation with a man across the table, leaning in so as not to be overheard. When she saw Oliver, she did a double take, and a look of panic washed over her face. As he approached, she signaled for the other man to leave, and he slid out of the booth, nodding at Oliver as he returned to his friends across the room.

  “What are you doing here?” Ruby asked. “Is Asher all right?”

  “They’ve taken him,” Oliver replied.

  “Shit,” she said under her breath as she rubbed her temples. “Have a seat.”

  “We have to go back to Christchurch. He’s in danger.”

  “It won’t do much good without a plan. Drink?” she asked, tilting her glass in his direction.

  “Not sure this is a good time—”

  Before he could finish, Ruby snapped her fingers, grabbing the attention of the bartender. She held up two fingers, and he nodded then turned to the taps behind him.

  “Trust me. We’re not going anywhere tonight,” she said.

  “But they’ve taken him. The whole town has gone mad. Izzy’s locked up in the house, and my mother pulled a kitchen knife on me. How can you be so calm about this?”

  Ruby looked up at Oliver, her bloodshot eyes meeting his. “Make no mistake—I am not calm. I am hanging by a thread. But panic will get us nowhere. If they’ve taken the town, we need a plan. I should have known they would find him. I was foolish for sending him to stay with you.”

  The bartender set two frosted pint glasses in front of them. “Who’s your friend?” he asked.

  “This is Oliver,” she replied, “the one I’ve been telling you about.”

  “Oh. Pleased to meet you.” He extended his hand, which Oliver shook. “Drink’s on the house, then. Enjoy.” The bartender pulled a rag from his back pocket and crossed the room to clear a dirty table.

  “On the house?” Oliver asked.

  “You’re a celebrity around here,” Ruby replied.

  “A celebrity? For what?”

  “For saving Asher last year. I’ve been digging, trying to find out who’s behind the attacks. When people heard what you did for him… Well, it’s rare someone of your… normalness would do something like that for one of us. Word always seems to travel fast among the Unnaturals.”

  “So what is this place, then?”

  “What does it look like? A reprieve from the oppressive world we live in. Everyone in this place is an Unnatural of some sort, except for you, I guess. It’s why I came. I have friends here who can help.”

  “What about that guy?” Oliver pointed at the bartender.

  “Charlie? Seems like he was in two places at once, doesn’t it? Front bar and back bar?”

  “I thought he seemed familiar. Just figured he was a twin.”

  “Ha! Lord help us if there were two of him. No, he can be in two places at once. Tried three places once but managed to split himself in half, and he took nearly a week to find his second set of legs. Still, he saves the owner a ton on labor costs.”

  “So what did you find? It’s the woman with the violin, isn’t it?”

  Ruby nodded and leaned in close, holding her fist closed as if the secret were pressed into her palm. Oliver leaned in, and she opened her hand with a dramatic flourish, revealing nothing.

  “Squat,” she said. “No one’s seen a thing. Sure, a few know Fred, but that’s about it.” Her eyes watered. “It’s exasperating.”

  Oliver perked up. “I’ve seen her. She played her violin at the music night in Christchurch. Thank God I didn’t stay for the performance, but I can at least give you a description. She’s got dreadlocks, tattoos, and really pale skin. It’s the violin playing, I think. It’s like she hypnotized everyone.”

  Ruby took another swig of her drink and seemed to mull over the description.

  “So what do we do now? Should we ask around?”

  “How old was she?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe in her twenties.”

  Ruby wiped the corners of her eyes. “She doesn’t sound familiar, but I may know someone who can help.”

  Oliver stood from the booth. “What are we waiting for, then? Let’s go.”

  “Charlie, two black coffees.” Ruby gestured for the bartender. “Told you I’m in no state to save the world tonight. I’m sure she’s fast asleep, anyway.”

  “But what about Izzy? We can’t just leave her. What if they try to hurt her?”

  “If what you’re saying is true, it makes no sense to kill someone when you can flip their will. I’ll have Charlie set you up with a room tonight, and we’ll leave first thing—” Ruby looked at her watch. “Er, second thing in the morning.”

  Charlie led them down a narrow hallway with skinny doors on either side. The scene reminded Oliver of the rooms at The Horseman, if he’d been looking at the hallway through a fun-house mirror.

  “You lucked out,” Charlie said. “This is our last free room, and it’s one of the nicest.”

  He pulled a key from his pocket and slid it into the latch. For a moment, Oliver swore the room was as narrow as the doorway, with a cot nearly touching both walls and its headboard bumped up against a large metal water heater.

  “Spacious,” he said, trying to make light of the situation.

  Charlie shot a sarcastic glance at Ruby. He pushed Oliver aside and twisted the water heater’s pressure dial. The whole body of the water heater twisted around, revealing a door that had been cut out of the metal on the other side.

  “We take security seriously around here,” Charlie said. “Some influential Unnaturals have stayed in this very room.”

  “I’ll be across the hall,” Ruby said. “Expect a knock tomorrow morning.” She grabbed Oliver’s arm as he turned toward his room. “Because of you, we’ve got a shot at figuring this thing out.”

  Oliver stepped through the small portal in the water heater and pressed a switch inside the metal tube. The cylinder spun around faster than he’d expected, revealing a large room on the other side. He stepped through the cutout, and heat from a roaring fire hit the right side of his body. The room was two or three times the size of his bedroom at home. Portraits hung over the headboard of a four-poster bed, and a velvet sofa sat in front of the fireplace.

  He picked up a business card from a stack on the table next to the entryway. Marv’s Unnatural Bar was spelled out in gold letters. Oliver slid the card into his pocket and plopped down on the velvet couch in front of the fireplace.

  His head spun as he tried to process the events of the day. Over the course of twenty-four hours, an entire town had turned on him, and Izzy and Asher had been taken. He hoped Ruby was right, that this violinist—whoever she was—would stay put and wouldn’t harm Izzy. Asher still had the coin that cleared the way to Briarwood. If the woman discovered it and forced him to cross over, the odds were good that Oliver would never see him again.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Oliver awoke at a knock on the door. He’d fallen asleep on the couch with his face pressed against the soft velvet, and a pool of drool had collected at the side of his mouth.

  The fire was still burning brightly, although he’d done nothing to keep the flame alive.

  He stepped inside the water heater and pressed the switch, this time bracing himself for the sudden spin to the other side.

  “Took you long enough,” Ruby said. “Might want to fix your hair. Looks like you’ve just gotten out of bed.”

  “Off the couch, actually,” Oliver said.

  Ruby had transformed overnight. Her bloodshot eyes were bright and cheery, and she’d replaced the smudged eyeliner with crisp new wings. Her wavy hair bounced against the shoulders of her black sweater, the sleeves of which covered up the tattoos
she typically showed off so freely.

  “Looks like you’re taking me to meet your parents,” he said.

  “Close enough,” she replied. “Haven’t seen her for a while and don’t want her to think my life is in complete shambles.”

  After a quick breakfast at the bar, the two headed out for the mysterious destination and climbed the staircase up to the street.

  “Okay to walk? It’s not too far away,” she said.

  Oliver nodded.

  As they walked, Oliver asked a question that had been lingering in his head for some time. “I’ve been thinking about this Unnatural thing. Asher has the key that clears the way to Briarwood. How does the key work? No one’s creating an illusion. The power seems bound to the object itself.”

  “Magic left behind,” she replied.

  “What?”

  “Most Unnaturals can leave pieces of themselves behind. It’s expensive if you pay someone to do it for you.”

  “You mean people pay for it?”

  “Leave too many pieces of yourself behind, and soon there’s nothing left to leave. Ought to cost a pretty penny, don’t you think?”

  “So someone must have made the key.”

  “Perhaps one of Simon’s ancestors.”

  They came to a church, which Oliver immediately recognized as the same one that had led Anna and him to The Parlor.

  “Thought we’d make a pit stop and check up on the place,” she said.

  The wrought-iron gate in front hung open, creaking in the breeze.

  “You locked up before you left, didn’t you?” Oliver asked.

  “I did. Why?”

  “Look.” He pointed at the front door, which also sat open with a large gash between the door latch and frame.

  They walked up the front steps, and Oliver carefully pushed the door open. The place had been ransacked. The large bone chandelier lay in shambles on the floor, femurs and rib bones scattered across the first floor as if the creation had exploded. Displays and bookshelves had been toppled and pictures ripped from the walls.

  Ruby knelt in the entryway and picked up a busted picture frame. The image inside appeared to be a historic picture of The Parlor, taken when the streets were still dirt, capturing a horse midstride.