Karma Moon—Ghost Hunter

by Melissa Savage

But I think a very important disclaimer needs to be stated here.

  DISCLAIMER: ANYONE COULD HAVE MADE THAT MISTAKE.

  And I mean anyone.

  Because a toilet plunger in the middle of the night, during a séance, in the presence of a Ouija board that moves as if by magic, looks a lot like a razor-sharp sword, is all I’m saying. And Mr. Amblebee is still red in the face about the whole deal the very next morning when we find him on the way to breakfast.

  Arlo Lozano isn’t exactly a big fan either, once he learns about our stealthlike mission to swipe the key card while he was sleeping off his dessert éclairs. But that’s only because becoming interim manager has totally gone to his head and he’s become weirdly possessive of the key cards.

  Despite the disastrous end to our ghostly mission and the sneaky slash semiquestionable activities that led up to them, one very important thing stands true.

  We were not alone.

  Someone poked me.

  Someone blew out those candles.

  And most importantly, someone moved that message indicator.

  Someone…on another plane of existence.

  I don’t know what’s disturbing the Stanley Hotel, but whatever or whoever it is has something very important to say.

  But I’m not sure I want to know what it is.

  We just need a ghost selfie to happen and we’re out of here. And it can’t happen too soon for me. I didn’t sleep a wink last night after all was said and done.

  My what-ifs have set up a bouncy house on my insides and haven’t stopped jumping yet.

  “Good morning,” I call to Ms. Lettie and Mr. Amblebee.

  The pair are huddled together whispering in front of the gift shop door.

  Mr. Amblebee with his stupid toilet plunger still in his grasp and Ms. Lettie with her beanstalk hairdo.

  And I have to say that in the light of day a toilet plunger doesn’t look quite as menacing as it does in the dead of night. But I do have to wonder why he’s always carrying it around with him.

  Dr. Finkelman might be able to help him out with that one. I’m not positive Dr. Finkelman handles plunger obsessions, but he handles a lot of things.

  I wonder if Mr. Amblebee likes playing Uno while he talks about his feelings.

  “Hi,” I call with a wave.

  “Good morning, ladies.” Ms. Lettie eyes us through her cat-eye glasses, held across her nose with her thumb and her index finger while her pinky points straight up in the air.

  I think her hair is even higher than it was yesterday.

  “How are you, Mr. Amblebee?” I ask him.

  He shakes his plunger at us. “Toilet’s broke in 317,” he snaps, and stomps his way up the staircase.

  “Oh, ah…yeah, right…that’s, ah, too bad, so…well…good luck with that,” I call after him.

  “Good luck with that?” Mags asks me.

  “It’s just something you say.”

  “About a broken toilet?” she asks.

  I shrug. “I don’t know.”

  “At least you didn’t rhyme anything this time,” she mumbles.

  “Nothing rhymes with toilet anyway,” I tell her.

  “Uh-huh,” she insists. “Boil it…foil it…soil it…” Then she gasps and grabs my arm. “Wait. Oh my gosh, what if it’s Bloody Mary?”

  “Bloody Mary doesn’t rhyme with toilet at all.”

  “No, what if she’s the one who’s stuck in the toilet in room 317?”

  “I’m guessing it’s more likely a what stuck in the toilet and not a who,” I tell her.

  “I bet she totally got stuck in the plumbing as she traveled to our plane of existence last night,” Mags whispers to me. “I knew we should have done the séance in the bathroom.”

  “I thought you said she appears in the mirror.”

  “She still has to get here somehow,” Mags says. “The mirror can’t be a portal, but toilet plumbing goes on for infinity.”

  Paranormal portal plumbing can’t be good for my what-ifs.

  “Do you think that’s who you conjured up last night?” I ask her. “Bloody Mary? I mean, is that a real thing?”

  “Daisy Chang says it is,” Mags says. “And why would she lie?”

  “Yeah,” I agree. “Why would she lie?”

  “She even said they did Light As a Feather, Stiff As a Board and Destiny Whitaker actually levitated.”

  I put my hands on my hips. “What is with that birthday slumber party anyway?” I ask. “What’s wrong with pillow fights, Truth or Dare and prank phone calls?”

  “The thing is…,” Mags says, “I don’t know for sure who was there with us last night. Even though we asked for Mr. Honeycutt, Nyx said sometimes you get other spirits you don’t ask for. The YouTube people say evil spirits can sneak in and lie to you, and you think it’s who you’re conjuring up when really it isn’t.”

  “How do we really know the YouTube people are reliable?” I ask.

  “They don’t give just anyone their own YouTube channel.”

  “Actually, I think they do. The question is, do they have a badge?”

  “Mmm…no. I didn’t see any badges.” Mags nods. “But you agree with me, right? Something or someone was there last night. Besides us, I mean.”

  “Someone totally poked me,” I say.

  She nods again. “I believe you,” she tells me as we make our way across the lobby to the dining hall. “Do you think all Chef Raphaël’s meals are French?” she asks. “Because I just want a bowl of Froot Loops.”

  Mr. Lozano is already at his seat behind the front desk pretending to read a Stephen King book with a scary-looking red staircase on the cover. Except I can see his glaring eyes following us to the dining hall while the rest of his face stays hidden behind the pages.

  Clearly, he’s still bent out of shape about the whole thing too.

  “Good morning, Mr. Lozano,” I call.

  He just gives a loud “Humph!” and then sticks his nose farther behind the cover.

  Mags gives me an elbow to my side and whispers in my ear, “That’s the book I was telling you about,” she says. “The Shining. See? Red steps, just like this hotel.”

  I stop and face her. “Tell me why it’s worse than Poltergeist.”

  “No way,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest.

  “Please?”

  “Nope.”

  “What if I let you show me five sad pictures of turtles having straws removed from their nose holes.”

  She blinks at me.

  “Ten pictures,” she says. “And I get to tell you about the glaciers melting and what that means for our future on this planet.”

  “Deal,” I say.

  We seal it with our fist bump, fanned fingers and a shimmy-shimmy to the floor.

  She takes a breath and glances around before she leans in close and whispers in my ear. “Remember your whole deal about serial-murdered hotel managers?” she asks.

  “Yeah?” I whisper back.

  “You may not be wrong, is all I’m going to say.”

  I gasp. “Serious?”

  “Totally,” she says.

  “In the first eleven minutes and fifty seconds?”

  She nods.

  “No wonder you shut it off,” I say, glancing at Mr. Lozano.

  Still glaring.

  My cell phone buzzes and I pull it out of my pocket.

  “Oh, man, it’s a text from that Nyx kid,” I tell her.

  “You mean Charlie Brown, don’t you?”

  “Don’t call him that,” I warn.

  “What does he say?” She peeks over my shoulder.

  NYX:

  Please tell me it wasn’t you who bought the board at Toy Mountain.

  I wide-eye Mags. “
How does he know?”

  She shrugs. “Tell him that, thanks to me, we definitely made contact.”

  I type.

  ME:

  Yeah and some weird things definitely happened.

  “Should I add an emoji here?” I ask Mags.

  “Yeah,” she says. “Do a heart.”

  “I’m not doing a heart,” I say. “I hardly know the kid.”

  “Hey, you have to put it out there. Boys don’t get it otherwise.”

  “No way,” I inform her.

  She shrugs. “You asked for my advice and that’s it. Hearts.”

  I type a smiley-face emoji instead and press Send.

  “See?” I say. “Smiley face.”

  “Miiiiiistaaaaake,” she sings.

  Buzz.

  NYX:

  I hope you at least closed the board.

  “Hmm,” I say. “What do you think that means?”

  Mags wrinkles up her nose as she reads it. “Closed the board?” she says. “Like put it in the box?”

  “Does the dumpster out back count?” I wonder.

  “Oh, man, don’t tell him we threw it in the dumpster,” she says.

  “Why not?”

  “Because then he’ll know he was right.” She starts toward the dining hall again.

  “So?” I follow after her.

  “So…that would be awkward,” she tells me. “Everyone knows that you never, ever tell boys they’re right or they’ll never let you hear the end of it. That’s just the way the world works.”

  “Oh,” I say.

  But I’m not so sure she knows what she’s talking about.

  When we make it inside the dining hall, we find Dad, Big John, The Faz and T. S. Phoenix at their assigned table drinking coffee after a long night of investigating Mr. Plum’s hotel room.

  Tally must be asleep already. Being a sensitive probably takes a lot out of you. I catch my spirit guide, Luna Shadow, napping on the job all the time when she should be busy telling me which direction to go.

  I give Dad a hug around the back of his shoulders, and he pats my arms under his neck.

  “Did you get anything on film last night?” I ask him.

  “Unfortunately, it was a pretty quiet night,” he tells me. “T.S. is going to analyze the audio of the video footage we shot later this morning and delete the background noise to determine if we caught any orbs of light or EVP. But nothing stood out.”

  “What’s EVP again?” I ask.

  “Electronic Voice Phenomenon,” T.S. explains. “It takes a great deal of energy for spirits to actually reach our plane of existence, so sometimes we have to listen especially close. I can upload the audio to my computer and then remove all background noise to determine if there has been an attempted communication by a spirit.”

  “Whoa, that’s really cool,” I say. “So then, if you hear a ghost on the audio, is that good enough for the Netflix people?”

  Dad shakes his head and yawns a long up-all-night-investigating-ghosts yawn behind his hand.

  “No, Snooks,” he says. “They want at least one image on film.”

  “Is an orb of light the same as a ghost?” I ask.

  “I’ll take an orb of light,” Dad says. “I’ll take anything if it’s on-camera.”

  “What if you don’t get an image or an orb of light?” I wonder.

  “We’ll get it. You get some sleep after last night’s escapade?” he asks me, shaking a sugar packet for his coffee.

  “Good work getting access to room 217.” Big John gives me the thumbs-up.

  Me and Mags exchange glances. “Yeah, so…we may not have had official permission,” I say. “It was more of a…a…um…” I look to Mags for help.

  “A, um…a sort of borrowing arrangement where, ah, one party is unaware of the arrangement altogether,” she says.

  They all sit there blinking at us.

  “A what?” Dad asks.

  “We snuck the key card,” I tell him.

  “You stole it?” he asks.

  A big fat “Ha!” escapes Big John’s lips and then turns into a fake cough after Dad gives him an elbow in the side.

  “Not exactly,” I tell Dad. “Because we were planning on returning it when we were done, so, technically…it was a sneak, not a steal.”

  Big John and The Faz give us another thumbs-up when Dad’s not looking.

  “That must have been what I overheard Mr. Lozano grumbling about this morning,” The Faz tells Big John. “I couldn’t figure out what he was so upset about.”

  Dad sprinkles sugar in his cup, takes a careful sip at the rim and says, “You know what I’m going to say, right?”

  I sigh. “Yes,” I say. “We didn’t get proper permission and that was wrong.”

  “And?” he asks.

  “We owe Father O’Leary a confession over it,” I say.

  “Don’t worry,” Mags tells him. “We’re making him a list.”

  Dad smiles. “And an apology wouldn’t be out of the question.” He takes another sip.

  “Okay,” I mumble.

  “Now that we got that out of the way.” He sets his cup down and leans forward. “What’d you find out?”

  “Get this,” I say. “Some weird stuff definitely happened.”

  “Definitely,” Mags adds.

  “I mean, before Mr. Amblebee busted in with his plunger and everything, it got legit weird.”

  “Legit,” Mags adds.

  “Weird like how?” The Faz asks.

  “Ah…only a breeze on the inside with the window shut.”

  “Blew the candles right out,” Mags adds.

  “And there was a freaky shadow on the drapes,” I say.

  “Alfred Hitchcock barked until he peed,” Mags adds.

  “And somebody poked me and Mags crossed her heart it wasn’t her.”

  “I’d cross it again if I had to,” Mags adds.

  “And…,” I say. “Last but not least…the Ouija board answered us.”

  “It totally said yes,” Mags adds.

  “You used a Ouija board?” T. S. Phoenix asks.

  I nod.

  “Those can be very dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing,” he says.

  “This kid Nyx at Fun City told us that. But this one”—I throw a thumb in Mags’s direction—“doesn’t heed anything.”

  “I don’t heed,” Mags adds.

  Dad smiles again. “Well, that’s some amazing research,” he says. “Wait, um…let me say first…wrong of you to sneak the key, and, um…you know, the whole confession thing…but still, awesome job.” He throws his arm around my waist and pulls me in for a kiss on my cheek. “I think you might be looking at another promotion soon enough, Snooks.”

  “What about me?” Mags stands tall. “We wouldn’t have made contact if I’d heeded anything.”

  He laughs. “You too,” he says. “Good job to you both. But let’s not have any more situations of, what did you call it? A borrowing arrangement where one party is unaware of the arrangement altogether? We need to respect how they want us to do things while we’re here.”

  “I say you do what you have to do,” Big John says, crossing his arms over his barrel chest. “Nice investigative work, girls.”

  “Hey,” Dad says to him. “At Totally Rad everything is on the up-and-up. We follow the rules. Deal?” He holds out a fist for me to bump.

  Big John groans an exaggerated sigh and The Faz rolls his eyes.

  I bump Dad’s fist. “Deal,” I agree.

  “That goes for everyone.” Dad points a finger at the guys.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Big John mumbles.

  “Hey, Dad,” I say. “Have you ever seen The Shining?”

  He blows air out
of his mouth and leans back in his chair. “How do you know about that?” he asks me.

  I point a thumb in Mags’s direction.

  “Mags,” Dad says.

  She throws her arms out. “She dragged it out of me,” she tells him.

  “No more of that.” Dad gives her a warning finger.

  “What about Poltergeist?” I ask him.

  Dad gives Mags another look, and that’s when she twists an invisible key to lock her lips up tight and then throws it to the wind. But that’s just fine by me. Mags’s lip lock is an easy one to pick on account of the true blue.

  “Petit déjeuner, jeunes filles?” Chef Raphaël sings at us as he floats into the dining hall with a coffeepot to fill cups. “Would you lovely young ladies like some breakfast?” he asks.

  “Yes,” I say. “One Egg on a Roll with a hot Apple Betty, please.”

  Chef Raphaël tilts his head in confusion. “Egg. On. A. Roll?” he repeats, trying to imitate my American accent.

  “I order Egg on a Roll at Toby’s every single morning,” I tell him. “It’s the coffee shop we go to in the West Village. It’s my favorite.”

  “And I usually just have Froot Loops, eighty-six the green ones,” Mags tells him. “I don’t eat green foods.”

  “Mon Dieu! Non non non non non, mes chéries.” He shakes his tall chef hat at us. “This morning I have created a Baked Caramel Brûlée French Toast lightly drizzled with a crème anglaise atop a pour of a fresh strawberry sauce.”

  “Huh, so you don’t have any eggs or rolls?” I ask.

  “I think you’ll be surprised at how good it is,” Dad tells me. “It was phenomenal. Chef Raphaël, you’re a genius.”

  “I highly doubt anything is better than Egg on a Roll,” I say.

  “I accept your challenge, ma chérie.” Chef Raphaël nods at me. “I promise to dazzle you away from your Egg and Roll and your Loops of Froot.”

  “Ah…it’s Egg on a Roll?” I correct him.

  “No Apple Jacks, either?” Mags asks.

  Mags is just like me and Dad when it comes to being creatures of habit. But it’s right then that I realize the haunted spirits stuck in the in-between are too. They don’t seem to want to give up their past and move on, and in some ways neither do we. I guess people and ghosts are a lot alike.