“Yowl!” Ophelia said. Thelma hissed and then ran behind the drapes, with Ophelia close behind. Mrs. Johnson came out of the bathroom and looked around. She then took her pajamas out of the suitcase and laid them on the bed. There was then a knock on the door and Mrs. Johnson answered it.
“Ready to get some dinner before we settle in to get a good night’s sleep, Mrs. Johnson?” Sarah asked.
“Oh yes, I am quite hungry even though it is pretty late. I always like my main meal to be close to my bed time. Otherwise my stomach rattles around and it would never do sitting in a car for a prolonged time.” Mrs. Johnson looked at the number on her door. “This is room 200, which one is your room?” She asked.
Thelma and Ophelia did not hear Sarah’s answer because they shut the door and were on their way to a late dinner. Both cats spun around and Thelma was reaching for the phone even before she stopped spinning. “Hello, this is room 200, could you please send up a large pot of coffee with extra cream, quite a bit extra cream, a chicken dinner and a shrimp dinner as well, if you have it. I am very tired and would appreciate it if you could hurry so we can eat and get some sleep. Put an extra tip on the bill for yourself dear, thank you.”
Thelma hung up and noticed that Ophelia was already in the shower. She noticed an extra hotel room key card on the table and placed it behind the drape where she and Ophelia had just hidden.
“Hurry up, I want to take a hot shower too!” Thelma said. Thelma was in the shower when Ophelia heard a voice outside of their door. “Room Service.” She opened the door and said thank you to the young man and scribbled something on the bill that he handed her. She poured herself a cup of coffee and had drank three of them before she yelled to Thelma to hurry up and eat before Adela came back.
The two cousins shared the meals with each other and drank every drop of both the coffee and the cream. They then pushed the cart with the dirty dishes on it down the hallway and hurried back to the room. They were just closing the door when they heard the ding sound of the elevator indicating that someone was getting on or off on their floor. They turned quickly back into felines and ran behind the drapes.
Mrs. Johnson walked into the room and burped loudly. She then changed into her pajamas and laid on the bed and was snoring within minutes.
“I am tired too, Ophelia. Do you know if Mrs. Johnson is a light sleeper or a heavy one? It wouldn’t do for her to wake up in the middle of the night and catch us here. I wish we knew what time they were all planning to leave in the morning. What if we wake up and they are already gone?”
“Mrs. Johnson is a pretty heavy sleeper, but she sometimes gets up a few times a night to use the bathroom. I have an idea.” Ophelia said. She trotted over to the nightstand and with her paw knocked Mrs. Johnson’s glasses off and then dragged them behind the chair. She then ran back and jumped up to turn on the side light in the bathroom so Mrs. Johnson could find her way in if she woke up during the night.
“Good thinking, she can’t leave without her glasses and won’t be able to see us either. At the same time, we will be able to hear her stumbling around in the morning looking for her glasses, so she will be our alarm clock. I would imagine that Jim wants to get as early of a start as possible, especially after all of the stops and delays today.” Thelma said.
“True, only they will all be extremely exhausted by now, remember Jim had work and the girls had school this morning, so they have been up several hours past any of their bedtimes already. I am just glad we got in a hot shower and an excellent warm meal. We might not get as lucky as far as eating tomorrow.” Ophelia said.
“Good night, Ophelia.”
“Night, Thelma.”
Chapter 15
Things went pretty smoothly during the night. Mrs. Johnson did not notice Thelma or Ophelia and they were able to get a good night’s sleep and still wake up before Adela did. They were able to put her glasses back on the night stand before she noticed they had been missing.
Mrs. Johnson was just finishing dressing and putting her shoes on when the phone rang. “Hello? Oh, hello Jim. Yes, I know they serve free breakfast buffet downstairs, yes, I am ready. Should I have my suitcase ready, or will we be checking out after we eat? Oh, that is fine, I will leave to meet you downstairs now then. Good bye.”
Adela took her purse and room key and left the room. Thelma and Ophelia were full form before she got to the elevator. They took turns in the bathroom and then Ophelia asked how they were going to get something to eat.
“Easy, follow me.” Thelma said as she picked up the spare room key and walked out the door. To anyone who saw them they looked like a normal older lady walking with her younger friend. They found the breakfast buffet and made quick work of getting their coffee and cream and loading up their plates. The Gaunter’s were already there eating their breakfast and Thelma and Ophelia were close enough to hear their conversation.
“I’ll give Donald a call after we eat and have been on the road a while. No offense to anyone, but we are going to get there well before dark today so that means limited stopping.”
“That means you, Suzanne!” Riley told her sister.
“That means all of us.” Sarah told them.
“Including me.” Mrs. Johnson said.
“We are all in agreement then.” Jim said, pouring maple syrup onto Suzanne’s pancakes.
“It hardly seems real that today will be the day that I get to see Don again.” Mrs. Johnson noted. “It has been so very long.” Sarah smiled at her, she was always a sucker for a good love story.
“Well, it is early enough that we can have a good breakfast and then be on our way and be there by late this afternoon sometime you said, Jim?”
“That’s the plan.”
Suzanne had been looking at Thelma and Ophelia intently. Sarah noticed and whispered to her daughter “It is not nice to stare at people, Suzanne.”
“But they have hair all over their clothes.” Suzanne whispered back.
“We have some hairs on our clothes as well, Suzanne, from Cooper, now hurry and finish your breakfast and stop being rude.”
Thelma and Ophelia had just finished eating and were all set to dash back to Mrs. Johnson’s room before she got there when they were stopped in their tracks.
“Hello, my name is Suzanne.” The little girl said, smiling up at Thelma and Ophelia. “Hello, Suzanne, have a beautiful day.” Thelma said, hoping to discourage the child from further conversation. It did not work. “We have a black and white dog named Cooper. He has to stay in the room on account of dogs are not allowed in the breakfast room. Your dog must be all white.”
“Good morning, excuse us, Suzanne, we have to get going now.” Jim said, walking up to Suzanne. Thelma and Ophelia smiled and then walked quickly to the elevator. When they reached their floor they pushed all the buttons for all of the remaining floors to give them more time to get back and ready to go.
Mrs. Johnson had already repacked the items she had taken out the night before so they were safe in that regard. She came into the room, went to the bathroom and then zipped the suitcase up just as Sarah knocked on the door and Jim carried the suitcase for Adela.
They were checking out at the front desk when the clerk told Sarah that they had charges for Mrs. Johnson’s room that they had neglected to pay. “I don’t believe so, I made no calls and never did turn the television on.” Adela said.
The clerk showed her the bill for two dinners and Mrs. Johnson said there must be a mistake, she was only one person and seafood did not agree with her. Jim carried the suitcase out to the van and secured it to the roof again and then the tarp. It took a few extra minutes, but finally Sarah and Mrs. Johnson were able to convince the front desk clerk that there had been some error on their part and they were able to look up the dinner bill that was paid around the same time the night before by Mr. Gaunter for five meals.
Once the vehicle was back on the expressway, Thelma said “Now watch this and learn.” She then picked up a thin piece of
string and was able to pull it just a little bit, but enough to unzip the suitcase zipper and have them crawl through it. Then they unzipped it a bit more in case they wanted to crawl back in quickly or got cold again.
“I wondered what you were doing with that dental floss in the middle of the night.” Ophelia said. “That is quite clever!”
“One episode of us not having enough air to breath was enough for me!” Thelma said, remembering how long it took before Mrs. Johnson unzipped the suitcase when they arrived.
Chapter 16
Jim announced that they were almost to Gertie’s house. Sarah looked at Mrs. Johnson and said “Are you alright, Adela? Any butterflies yet?”
“I am fine, very anxious to see Don, though.”
Jim and Sarah both said a silent prayer that it would be a happy event for Donald as well as for Adela. Neither Sarah nor Jim counted much on Donald’s memory enough to feel safe about this. Adela had insisted they not tell Don ahead of time that she was coming with them. She said she wanted him to have the surprise of his life. For his part, Jim was hoping that all would go so well with the two of them that Mrs. Johnson would just stay there in Tennessee with Don and they could have a restful, do as they damn well felt like, trip back to Michigan. However, he was smart enough not to count on that actually happening.
Adela checked her hair in the van’s mirror and refreshed her make up. “All set” she announced.
They walked to the door and rang the bell. It took a few minutes before Donald opened the door. “Hello Gaunter’s, hope you had a good trip.” He said, “Come in out of the cold. Oh, you brought your dog too, I see:” He said, petting Cooper on the head.
“We brought someone else as well.” Sarah said, smiling widely and stepping to one side so that Donald could see Adela.
“Hello, you rotten son of a bitch!” She said.
Sarah’s mouth flew open, Riley’s eyes got big, Suzanne laughed out loud and Jim bent his head down.
Donald was also taken aback. “Why did you bring that woman to my house?” He barked.
Jim knew that it was probably up to him to say something, anything, but for the life of him he could not come up with one single word that would mean anything at the moment. Sarah recovered first.
“Don, this is Adela Johnson, you two knew each other quite well when you were much younger.”
“I know that!” Donald spat out. He then turned sideways and picked up the urn that had been sitting on a little table by the door. “Here! I gave you the directions on the phone.” He then slammed the door shut.
As if on cue, it started to snow, hard.
They all walked down the long sidewalk back to the van and got inside. Jim then opened the van door and let Cooper out, hoping that Cooper would to do his business on Don’s lawn. Cooper did not disappoint.
“What the hell was that all about?” Jim said, to no one in particular. He waited for Cooper to jump back into the van and then he started the car and drove a couple of blocks and pulled into a gas station and turned off the ignition. Sarah was the first one to speak then.
“Adela, why did you want to come all of this way just to act like that? I thought you wanted to reunite with the love of your life.” She said.
“Love of my life? The man was so attached to the apron strings of his step mommy, not even a real step mommy, just some old lady who kept him around hoping his father would come back. He didn’t have time for me or anyone else. Good ridden to bad garbage!”
“You played us.” Sarah said. “You played on our feelings to get your revenge on Donald.”
“Yeah, well, sorry about that.”
Jim spoke up. “What now? Are you going to stay here in Tennessee or go back home?”
“Oh, I am going back home, Snowball is there waiting for me and she is worth a hundred thousand Dons.” Mrs. Johnson said.
Jim filled the gas tank, had Suzanne and Riley use the restroom and then he got back into the car and studied the map of where he was supposed to take the urn. Sarah asked everyone if they wanted chips or some other snack because they were not planning to stop for lunch. She felt as used and angry as her husband did, more even since she was the one who forced him into this trip, as well as the last one.
When Mrs. Johnson went inside the gas station to use the rest room Jim said “We should take off and just leave her old ass here!”
“I swear I would not blame you if you did.” Sarah said.
“NO! Mommy, Daddy, you can’t do that!” Suzanne screamed.
“Do it!” Riley yelled.
“No one is leaving anyone anywhere.” Jim said. But that is it for accommodating Mrs. Johnson on this trip. To think that we have to live right next door to her too. You know this won’t be the last time she tries to use us.” Jim said.
“Perhaps not, but it will be the last time she gets away with it.” Sarah said, sitting in the front seat next to her husband. “To think we even paid for her room!”
They could tell from the look on Mrs. Johnson’s face when she got back to the van that she expected Sarah to move to the way back seat again. Sarah did not budge. It took a little while for Adela to crawl back to the way back seat, but she had the good sense not to fuss about it. Cooper looked at her and then jumped over the seat to sit in-between Suzanne and Riley.
The snow kept coming down harder and no one was talking in the van. The radio was not even on. It was hard for Jim to see where they were going at times, but he was more than determined to do what was expected of him and get his family back home, safely, as well as quickly.
Thelma and Ophelia tried peeking out of the tarp, but the snow and wind were whipping their fur and making their eyes sting. They knew that the urn was in the van, but did not hear anything that went on at Donald’s house. Not that they cared, for they each felt very lucky that they did not have to find a way to sneak into yet another hotel room that night. There was not one among the group that was not ready to have this little adventure of theirs end.
Jim pulled over to the side of the expressway and got out, telling everyone else to stay inside. He looked around and checked his map. He fooled around with his cell phone for a moment and then got back into the car and drove another 20 feet and then stopped the car again. “This is it.” He announced.
Sarah and Jim got out of the van, told the girls to stay inside and then Sarah asked Mrs. Johnson if she felt the need to stretch her legs or anything. Adela said “Just throw the old witch away and I will be ready to go home.”
Cooper jumped out of the car and Thelma and Ophelia slid out of the tarp and down the backside of the van to the ground.
“I guess we should say some words, Jim.” Sarah said.
“Oh trust me, I have plenty of words to say about this trip!” Jim said, putting down the urn with the ashes in it on a rock.
“But still, it is not Gertie’s fault, well, yeah, maybe it is, making us guardians of first the trunk and then the ashes. Why didn’t Donald give us the urn when we were here the first time? Why wait until weeks later and then make us come back here for the urn?” Sarah asked, pulling her coat up around her ears to ward off some of the heavy snow which was coming down hard.
“I asked Donald that when I talked to him yesterday morning on the phone. He said that is the way Gertie told him to do it. I know she was a nice lady, Sarah, and I know that the girls really liked her, but apparently she was batshit crazy!”
“She was one hundred and three years old, Jim, we will be a bit confused ourselves if we get to live that long.”
It was then that everything seemed to happen at once. The sun was shining brightly although the snow was coming down hard. A horrible gust of wind came out of nowhere and Jim grabbed Sarah and held her head to his chest to ward off the strong wind and biting ice rain. Everything looked blue and then for a second Jim thought he saw a flash of red. Sarah and Jim closed their eyes tightly. In the van, Mrs. Johnson had fallen asleep and Riley had put her earphones on her head and was playing a video gam
e on her kindle. Only Suzanne was watching everything that was taking place outside the van.
The boulders opened and Thelma and Ophelia, in human form now, ran for the opening. Cooper barked and when Thelma turned around to make sure he did not follow them, Cooper nudged the urn hard with his nose and knocked it off of the rock, making it roll down the hill, right to Thelma’s feet. She smiled and waved and then the scene changed as suddenly as it had when the gust of wind first started blowing.
Jim guided Sarah back to the van and Cooper jumped in. The temperature outside of the van had made them so cold that all they could think about was to put their hands up to the warmth of the heater.
Riley finally looked up from her video game. “Can we go home now?” she asked.
“Most definitely!” Sarah and Jim said in unison; neither one even thinking about how they had just left the urn on the rock. They were totally exhausted and their new and only mission now was to get home safely.
Only Cooper and Suzanne were looking out the window at the area they were now leaving. Suzanne had a little tear in her eye and as she looked at her little puppy, she could see one on his cheek as well. “Bye-bye” she said.
I thank you for spending this time with my favorite characters. I also hope you have enjoyed reading Ghost Cat and will leave a review on Amazon or where purchased.
If this is the first of the series that you have read, you might enjoy the books where we meet the characters and how they evolved to meet each other.
Ghost House – where we first meet Suzanne and her family
Ghost Granny – where we first meet Thelma and her sister Luna
Miss Enchanted – Ophelia’s Story – Thelma and Ophelia make it home to Enchanted
Gertie’s Choice – Go back in time to see how Thelma, Luna and others came to be in Enchanted.
Ghost Cat - Thelma's Dilemma Page 9
