Funk's the Chocolate Loving Vamp

by Jamie Ott

  Tatia and Jack paced the house, wondering if they should go on to the swap meet, or find Bruce; even Langley lingered about the room longer than usual, before disappearing.

  “Where do you think he got to?” asked Tatia.

  “I don’t know; I just hope it’s not jail or some city home for kids.”

  “Think we should call the police?”

  “I think we should go to his grandmother’s house, but I don’t know where it is. I never asked. Gosh, I’m so stupid,” he said, and smacked himself in the head.

  After waiting an hour to see if Bruce would show, they pulled out the wheel barrel and hurried to the swap meet without him.

  A few hours went by, and they hardly sold anything.

  “What a terrible day,” said Jack.

  “We’re about $200 away. Don’t give up just yet.”

  The rest of the day was just as dull. By the time the meet closed, they’d managed to sell off the last of the army rations, but they still had most of the old musty clothes.

  “We’re still about $100 away,” said Tatia. “Maybe we should just go to Joey and beg him to take $900.”

  “No, he won’t. Trust me.”

  They threw the last of the clothes into a trash bin, and went back to the house. For hours, they stared, depressed and quietly into the fire. Langley continued to float around the couch.

  At midnight, they were about to call it an evening, and go to bed, when Bruce walked in.

  They turned and gawked at him a moment; Langley stopped his room revolutions.

  Tatia leapt off the couch and shouted, ”Where have you been?”

  Slowly, he walked to the couch and sat.

  “My grandmother died.”

  Surprised, they said nothing.

  “The good thing is I’ve got a thousand bucks.”

  He pulled a wad of cash from out of his pocket.

  ~~~

  They tried to comfort him.

  Jack made him a sandwich and gave him a cup of cocoa.

  “I’ve just been walking around for hours and hours.”

  “I know how you feel. I did the same thing when my father died.”

  Bruce told them everything that’d happened to him, since he’d seen them last: About how he walked in and found her in her chair, still and cold. He, then, called the police, who called some relatives to come and stay with him, in the trailer, until they found a living arrangement.

  “I tried to escape, but they kept a close eye on me. That’s not the worst of it though.

  Hours ago, they sat me down with a city youth attorney. He told me that I was adopted.”

  “Wow,” said Jack. “Do they know who gave you up?”

  “No, they said it’s the law; they can’t tell me who my real parents are.”

  “Wait, so I don’t get it. Why would the woman, who adopted you, go through all that trouble just to leave you?” Tatia asked.

  “Well, I don’t remember much because I was still young, but my parents did fight a lot. One day, my supposed father left. I guess he was tired of it.”

  “And then your mother left, later?” asked Jack.

  “Yeah.”

  “Where did you get all the money though?” he asked.

  “My grandmother left me as sole beneficiary on her life insurance, which wasn’t much money, but it’s something. I can’t touch any of it until I’m eighteen, but the lawyer said my grandmother authorized me a cash advance of $1,000. I guess she really heard me, all those times that I spoke to her; it’s almost as if she knew she was gonna die.”

  “So what, now?” asked Jack.

  “Now, you guys go get your guitar. Me? I’m going to stay here. I just need to be alone.”

  After Bruce went upstairs to wash up, Jack said, “Well, I’m gonna go get my guitar. The auction’s up in a couple days. We haven’t time to waste.”

  “Agreed,” she replied. “Let’s go.”

  They ran out of the house, and down the street at high speed.

  When they made it to the cannery, Jack banged on the door until a kid, he’d never seen before, opened it.

  “I need to see Joey.”

  The kid stepped back and let them in.

  Jack and Tatia followed the kid down the hall, into the large work area that had been turned into a dining area. On the wall, a television show played from a projection on a shelf, at the opposite side of the room.

  A bunch of kids sat in random seats, watching: including Rob and Nick.

  “He’s in there,” said the kid, motioning to the large office on the right side of the room.

  They walked up to the door and knocked.

  Joey opened the door, looking angry. His lips pursed, and his face turned red.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked loudly.

  “I got your money. Now, gimme back my guitar.”

  “Well, I’m sorry,” he said. “But the price is now $10,000.”

  “What? How do you figure that?”

  “That’s where the bids are at. Turns out, the guitar is a real vintage piece. In fact, for others like it, I’ve seen the reserve set at $50,000. So if you can come up with that kind of money, I’ll give you first dibs.”

  “We made a deal, Joey. That guitar means a lot more to me than money.”

  “Then you should have paid me back weeks ago.”

  Just then, Rob and Nick walked in.

  “Now, you both got two minutes to leave, or I’ll have you thrown out.”

  They heard footsteps and the scraping of chairs from behind. Tatia and Jack craned their necks and saw that all the kids, watching the film, had stood up. All at once, they turned and looked at them, leeringly.

  ~~~

  When they got back to the house, they told Bruce all about it.

  “That cheating jerk!” he shouted. “I should have come with you.”

  “It wouldn’t have done any good. All that would have happened is we would have had a fight, and we would have been outnumbered.”

  “So what do we do?” ask Bruce.

  “We need a plan because I’m gonna get my guitar back, one way or another.”

  Just then, there was a knock at the door.

  “What the heck, and at this hour?” he said to the air, annoyed.

  “What if it’s Joey or one of his seconds?” asked Bruce.

  Jack, Tatia, and Bruce walked, quietly, into the kitchen. Bruce and Tatia each grabbed a pan, for self defense, while Jack peered through the window over the sink.

  He turned back and said, “It’s Mira.”

  Relieved, they set down their pans.

  Jack opened the door and asked, “Mira! What happened to you?”

  The dark haired girl from Joey’s warehouse stumbled in, grabbing onto his shoulder for support.

  She had several bruises on her face.

  “Did you get into a fight?”

  “Sort of,” she said as she hopped in on one foot. “Joey said if anyone let either of you into the cannery again, that person would be kicked out. Well, they assumed that I let you in, when you came by with the money. I refused to leave, so they dragged me out.”

  “How did you know we were here?” asked Tatia.

  Jack closed the door.

  “I followed you. I called your names but you didn’t hear, and with my ankle twisted, I couldn’t run to catch up with you.”

  Operation Buchanan

  Chapter 7

  Jack helped Mira to the couch.

  “AAAAGGGGHHH!!!!” she screamed.

  “SHUT UUUUP!” shouted Bruce, Jack, and Tatia at the same time.

  “Do you want the neighbors to call the police? Because we’ll then be sleeping on the streets!” said Jack angrily.

  “What is that??” she asked sounding hysterical, pointing to the man floating in the corner.

  “That’s Langley; this is his house!” said Tatia.

  “What’s that in his mouth?”

  “If I had to guess, I’d say it’
s something to do with the way he died. Probably choked on something, or was suffocated,” she replied.

  “Is he safe?”

  “Of course he’s safe! Just don’t tick him off!” said Bruce annoyed.

  After Mira was calm, they gave her a cup of cocoa, and then discussed how they were gonna steal back the guitar.

  “I know where he keeps it: under his bed. He’s tried to play it a couple of times, but he’s really bad,” said Mira.

  All the while, Langley bounced about the room, silently observing.

  They waited until midnight, the next day, before they left the house and ran back to the warehouse. Mira stayed behind, keeping her foot elevated.

  In the back of the warehouse, Tatia said, “Okay, when I get to the unlocked window, I’ll throw this,” she bent over and picked up a handful of gravel, “letting you know that I’m ready to sneak in. If I go in through the front, even with a diversion, someone will still see me; there’s just too many people living here.”

  “Great, and when I think it’s safe for you to go in, I’ll scream, ‘Langley’s Blues,’” said Jack.

  “Jack, you take off running up the street; Joey and the others will follow you, and I’ll follow them. That way, if they catch up to you and start beating the heck outta you, I can attack from behind, taking them by surprise.” added Bruce.

  “Okay, but meet me back at the window ledge after you’re done. If I try to leave through the door, I’ll surely be seen. This means I have to leave through the window, and there’s no way I can walk the ledge with that enormous guitar case. I might drop it.”

  Once they were agreed, Tatia jumped onto the large green dumpster. She reached up and pulled the fire escape stairs down.

  She climbed up to the fourth set of stairs, stepped out onto the wide cement ledge, and disappeared around the side of the building.

  Keeping her back against the wall, and trying to stay calm, she quickly edged her way to the window with the broken latch.

  Once she reached it, she tossed the little rocks back out toward the lot.

  The next thing she heard was Jack banging, hard, on the door.

  “Get Joey down here. It’s him and me, now!” she heard him shout.

  When he said the safe words, she immediately crawled through the window.

  Quietly, she lowered herself down to the floor of the long hall.

  She walked, fast, across the aluminum floor, trying not to make too many clopping noises with her feet.

  Sitting at the steps was a young boy she’d never seen before.

  Silently, she contemplated what to do.

  When nothing came to mind, she decided to act natural.

  She walked toward him, and said, “Hi.”

  The kid said “Hi” back. He hardly seemed to care whether she belonged there or not.

  So she ran down the steps without another thought.

  A girl she knew sat, watching the projection on the wall. They weren’t friends, but she hated Joey just as much as Tatia did.

  The girl looked up at the sound of her approach, and motioned, with her hand, toward Joey’s room; then simply went back to watching the projection on the wall.

  From her pocket, she pulled out the automatic screw driver that Bruce had given her, before they left the house.

  Easily, she removed the door knob. She ran across the room and grabbed the guitar case from under Joey’s bed.

  Her heart almost beat out of her chest, as the sound of voices echoed from down the hall.

  Some of the guys were already coming back.

  As she pounded her way back up the stairs, the voices of Rob and Nick floated through the air.

  Tatia ducked in the room that used to be Mira’s. She stashed herself and the guitar under the bed.

  Several people came into the lounge and hung out, and resumed watching television.

  Joey came back, cursing and yelling angrily.

  Tatia snuck out from under the bed and peered out of the office door’s window.

  Below, she saw Joey and the others talking and making angry motions with their hands. He hadn’t, yet, noticed that his door had been broken into.

  She was really sweating, and didn’t know how she was going to get out of there.

  Bruce or Jack must have realized she was still inside because, all of the sudden, loud ringing noises blasted from the walls.

  The fire alarm had been set off.

  A bunch of doors above and below opened. The sounds of a hundred feet pounding the aluminum stairwell bounced off all the walls.

  She hid back under the bed until it got really quiet, and then she opened the door and peered over the rail.

  “Tatia! “ whispered Bruce, making her jump.

  “I’m coming,” she whispered back.

  She ran up the steps and found Bruce hanging in the window.

  Tatia handed him the guitar. He walked the ledge and handed it to Jack, who was in the fire escape.

  Sirens and lights blasted from the front of the warehouse.

  They ran across the empty back parking lot, as fast as they could.

  “What happened to everyone?” she asked breathlessly.

  “They left because they didn’t want to be caught by the fire department.”

 

  Buchanan’s Back

  Chapter 8

  Back at the house, they celebrated over soda and a frozen pizza. Even Langley was in high spirits, as he floated dizzyingly fast around the couch, wailing, occasionally.

  “We did it, we did it, we did it!” said Tatia. “Wow, I never felt such an adrenaline rush as I did tonight, haha,” she laughed.

  “YOU did it, Tatia!” shouted Jack.

  “Cheers!” said Bruce, who held up his soda cup.

  “Why don’t you play something?” asked Mira who was still resting her ankle.

  Jack sat with his back to the fire. He opened the guitar case, and pulled out the little battery operated amplifier.

  He plugged the amp cord into the guitar and played the Crossroads Blues, as he remembered it from his father’s radio.

  “Wow, such a dreamy sound,” said Tatia.

  “My father said that’s what the telecaster is known for: its sound.”

  Langley liked the subtle dreaminess of the chords he played. His eyes were hazily fixed on Jack’s guitar.

  Though the place had no electricity, the lights flickered on and off. From Langley’s memory, they heard musical accompaniments and someone’s strange voice singing along.

  ~~~

  They didn’t get to bed until the sun had been up for several hours.

  Mira slept on the couch. Although Langley was no longer a threat, Tatia, Bruce and Jack, still slept in the living room because it was the warmest place in the house.

  Neither of them heard when or how Joey and his seconds got into the house.

  “AAAAAAAaaaaahhhhh!!!”

  Jack shot up, violently, while still wrapped in his sleeping bag.

  Tatia rolled over and said, “Mira, the ghost is friendly.”

  “That wasn’t me,” she said.

  “Bruce, wake up,” Jack said as he slapped his arm.

  The whited out form of Langley floated, wailing, into the room.

  “What is it, Langley?” asked Tatia.

  He floated around the couch, quickly, with more sludge in his mouth than unusual.

  Then there was a banging noise coming from the entrance hall.

  BAM BAM BAM!

  They all got out of there sleeping bags, as the banging continued.

  Jack tip toed to kitchen, and ran back into the living room, a moment later.

  “It’s Joey and his idiots,” he said.

  The banging continued.

  Jack picked up the guitar and put it back in the case. “You guys hide upstairs in the attic,” he said, and then shoved the case into Tatia’s hands. “I’ll go for help, through the front door.”

  But then they heard the sound of
the kitchen door bursting open, and banging against the wall.

  Tatia ran up the stairs.

  “Stop her!” cried Joey.

  Nick ran up the stairs after her.

  Bruce made to go after Nick, but Rob tackled him, pinning him to the ground with his shoulders. He punched at the sides of his head, but Rob didn’t seem to feel anything.

  Just as Jack was gonna go for Rob, Joey pulled out a switchblade knife.

  “You’re gonna get me the guitar, now, or I’m gonna kill you.”

  WAAAAAHHHH! Wailed the ghost, making Joey jump.

  The fire flickered.

  “You don’t scare me!” he shouted at Langley, who levitated around his head.

  Bruce groaned as he struggled with Rob, on the floor.

  From upstairs came a loud thumping noise, and a scream.

  “Tatia,” yelled Bruce. “If he hurts her, I’ll kill all of you!”

  Langley disappeared from the room.

  A second later, Nick floated down the stairs, arms and legs flailing, as he screamed.

  They heard the kitchen door slam shut. Nick banged on the door, and then all went silent.

  Surprised by what he saw, Rob slackened his grip. Bruce pushed his forehead back and punched him in the neck, making him fall breathlessly on top of him.

  Bruce pushed him to the side.

  As he stood up, Joey grabbed Bruce by the hair, yanking back his neck, and pointing the knife at his jugular.

  Jack leapt to Bruce’s defense by grabbing the knife in Joey’s hand and forcing it upward, past his scalp.

  From behind, Rob had gotten his breath back, and was, now, choking Jack by the neck, and trying to drag him away from Joey.

  Langley returned. He steam whistled noisily, and threw wood chairs aimlessly through the air.

  They all struggled a moment in each other’s grips; then there was the loud sound of something breaking, followed by Rob falling into Jack. Under the weight of Rob, Jack was pushed, heavily, into Joey, making him stumble and put pressure on his arm.

  The pressure forced Joey to relinquish the knife, as he cried out in pain.

  Jack stumbled forward, a few steps past Rob. When he got his balance back, he then turned and saw that Mira had smashed Rob in the back with one of the chairs, causing the chain reaction they’d just had.

  Distracted by the pain from having his arm bent backward by Jack, Joey loosened his grip on Bruce’s hair.

  Bruce wrenched his head out of Joey’s grip. He turned and punched him in the face, sending Joey back into the staircase.

  “Come on,” said Jack, who ran to Mira and helped her hop up the stairs, followed by Bruce.