Lance made a show of looking around the office—heck, you could go ahead and call it a lobby—and then shrugged. “Not what I imagined.”
The girl’s smile was still there, but now it was her turn to shrug and say, “I could say the same thing.”
“About the bar?”
“About you.”
Lance left the door and made his way to the desk. His left sneaker squeaked and nearly slipped out from under him on his first step. He caught his balance before going down, and the girl behind the desk said, “Careful! Again, sorry. I would have put out the wet floor sign, but like I said, I wasn’t expecting anybody at this time of morning.”
Lance carefully stepped across the floor and then rested his hands on the desk, a gesture he hoped would show that he meant her no harm, wasn’t about to pull a gun or blade and demand whatever it was she could offer. Now that he was closer, he could see the girl was his age at the most, maybe a bit younger.
“But I thought you said you were imagining me.”
“I’m sorry?”
“A second ago. You said I wasn’t what you’d imagined. Why were you imagining me if you weren’t expecting me?” And why are you flirting, Lance?
Because I’ve had a really terrible and really long couple of days and it feels good to have a normal conversation with a pretty girl.
He finished justifying himself to himself just in time to hear the girl give off a soft laugh, and watched as her stiff and professional façade crumbled and she visibly relaxed. “I wasn't expecting exactly you, exactly today. I just meant you aren’t exactly the type of guest we usually get.”
“And what type of guest do you think I am … exactly?”
She shrugged. “Normal.”
Well, that’s exactly where you’re wrong, my dear. “How so?” he asked.
She rolled her eyes. “Look around. Do we look like the type of place nice wholesome folks stop for the night? Families on vacation? Businessmen en route to a conference? No. The folks I give keys to are usually weathered and beaten. Down on their luck and satisfied with the first roof they can find over their head for the night before they wake up and head off to wherever else life plans on shitting on them. They drink, they do drugs—sometimes they deal drugs, and trust me when I say I’m not afraid to call the police if I suspect that’s going down. I’ve got a shotgun under the counter and Daddy taught me how to use it when I was ten.”
Lance held her eyes as she spoke. He was entranced by her confidence and honesty.
“Now you,” she said, “you’ve got baggage, I know that. Otherwise you’d have hitched a ride another twenty miles down Route 19 like everyone else and got a room at the Holiday Inn Express or the Motel 6. But whatever your baggage is, you carry it well. You’re clean, you’re handsome, and your clothes aren’t tattered and falling apart. That logo on your backpack means it cost more than most people who stay here probably make in two weeks’ time, so you’ve either got, or had, a steady job. Or somebody gave it to you—because I don’t think you’d steal it. You just don’t have the look. And if somebody gave it to you, it means you’ve got friends. And trust me, the last thing somebody who stays here has is a single friend in the world.”
When she finished speaking, she reached back and tightened the hair tie holding her blond ponytail in place and then adjusted the collar of her black dress shirt. She wore matching black dress pants that were sleek and formfitting. Her makeup was light and simple. Blue eyes that pierced. Lance was impressed with her powers of observation. She wasn’t completely right about him—and honestly, nobody would ever be. Unless there were others like him, which he deep down believed there had to be, the Surfer and the Reverend having all but proven this—but she’d come close.
Instead of confirming or denying any of her analysis of him, he turned and spread his hands out, gesturing at the immaculate and upscale look of the office. “Then why all this, if your guests are of the class you say they are?”
She responded instantly, and almost defensively. As if she’d been asked this question before and was tired of some underlying accusation. “Because if I have the chance to be a bright spot in their otherwise dark days, it’s my responsibility as a respectable human being to be just that. I can make them feel comfortable. I can let them enjoy some nicer things, even if just for an evening. Most of these folks, despite everything I just said about them, at their core, they’re still nice people. The rest of the world has just stopped giving them a chance.”
Lance was floored at the size of this girl’s heart but worried about her potential ignorance to the evil in the world. “And if they’re really not nice at their core?” he asked.
She shrugged. “The shotgun, remember?”
Lance said he did remember, and suddenly he felt very tired. The night-long bus ride—which he’d stayed awake for, staring out the window at nothing but passing cars and expanses of field and trees—was finally catching up to him, and the burst of energy the food from the diner had provided was wearing off. Lance explained this to the girl, not wanting to appear rude and bored with talking to her, and he asked if he could have a room. She said it was twenty dollars a night and gave him the key to room one, which was right next door to the office. He gave her a twenty and thanked her. He turned to leave and then stopped.
This girl was extremely honest and seemed to have an adept ability to read people—and maybe situations. “Hey, listen,” he said, knowing his question was going to sound weird, but also knowing this was his best chance of making his job a little easier. “You live here? In town, I mean.”
She looked at him for a moment, eyes searching for a meaning to his question, before she finally nodded once.
Lance took a breath and said, “Do you think there’s anything bad going on? Like … I don’t know,” (Don’t say it, Lance. Don’t say it.) “Evil?” Then quickly, “I mean, you know, like … anything out of the ordinary been happening lately?”
She didn’t move, just stared at him for what felt like an hour. Then she finally reached behind the desk and (Oh God, she’s going to pull the shotgun on me) brought out a newspaper. She held it out to him. “I almost forgot, all guests receive a complimentary paper at check-in.” Lance stepped forward and reached for it, and when his hand touched it, she leaned forward and whispered, “Come back here tonight at eight. Daddy works graveyard, so he won’t make a surprise visit. We can talk then.” Then she stood, straightened her shirt and said, “I hope you enjoy your stay.”
Lance took the paper and was still processing the girl’s words as he made his way to the door. He turned back. “Hey, what’s your name?”
“Leah,” she said.
“I’m Lance,” he said, then walked through the door and out onto the sidewalk.
He’d taken two steps when he stopped dead and sucked in a quick, deep breath. He staggered back a step. He closed his eyes and concentrated hard as the cold feeling tried to bury itself in his chest. It didn’t last long, but the gloomy feeling that accompanied the moment lingered in the air. Lance opened his eyes and looked around at the parking lot, then out to the road. Turned his head up and looked to the sky, still bright and clear.
It knew he was in town. It knew what he was.
3
The elegance and upkeep from the motel’s office didn’t make its way to the guest rooms, but it was still better than Lance was expecting. Not that he really would have cared either way, but still, being comfortable never hurt.
The room was small, and dark because of the heavy curtain drawn across the window. Some sunlight shining in would have helped to erase the gloomy feel, but Lance planned on sleeping some if he could, and he definitely didn’t want any peering eyes looking in on him. A double bed was centered on the left wall, its headboard plain and chipped. The bed was neatly made, and the comforter, though worn and faded and thin, appeared clean enough. The carpet had been vacuumed recently, because the tracks were still visible, and either the small nightstand and TV table had been wi
ped down in the past few days, or the room was oddly devoid of dust. The television was a small, unimpressive flat-screen—something off the clearance rack at a discount electronics store, or a Black Friday special used to reduce some dead inventory—and beneath it was a basic satellite receiver, an ominous blue circle glowing from its center. The devices looked like something brought back from the future compared to the rest of the room’s décor.
Lance gently set his backpack on the bed and checked the bathroom, switching on the light from outside the door and peeking in. The fixtures were old and chipped and had stopped shining years ago, but he could smell disinfectant and bleach and didn’t see any visible signs of soap scum or mildew or, well … urine or feces. It was always good not to see urine or feces. They could dampen a mood really quick.
He used the toilet and then washed his hands, unwrapping the mini bar of soap next to the hot water knob and finding that it had nearly no smell at all. But it would clean—that was soap’s job, after all. Smelling nice was just a bonus. He avoided looking at himself in the mirror, not ready to face how terrible he might look after the past couple days.
Hey, Leah said you were handsome.
Yeah, but she also thought I was normal.
He went back to the bedroom and double-checked that the door was locked and then secured the chain. He stole a quick glance out the window, finding only the same parking lot with the same cars, and then pulled the curtain shut tight and lay down on the bed. The pillow was soft and smelled like detergent—something off-brand, bought in bulk for cheap, but better than nothing. He closed his eyes, took two big, heavy breaths, and tried to drift off to sleep.
He couldn’t.
How could he?
His past few days had been a whirlwind that had resulted in him having to flee the town where he’d been born and raised, the town he’d loved his whole life. And his mother … tragedy seemed too weak a word. He tried to push out the images of their last few moments together, but it was impossible. With the realization she was gone surfacing once again, and the sadness filling him from the inside out—his own sadness this time, not the looming threat of an outside presence—Lance clasped his hands behind his head and looked around the tiny dark motel room, feeling more alone than he’d ever imagined was possible. Alone and carrying a burden that even now he still didn’t fully understand.
He missed her. Loved her.
But still, he did not cry.
He closed his eyes again and tried to focus. Tried to concentrate on the one thing he could right now that would keep his mind busy and dispel—if only temporarily—his sorrow.
The dead didn’t show themselves to him for friendly social visits. He’d yet to have one appear and invite him to a barbecue or tell him that his hair looked nice. They came with a purpose. Lance suspected that showing themselves to him required a great deal of energy—whatever great unseen force somehow governed their celestial world—and they would not go to such efforts without sufficient cause. They usually came for two reasons: to warn him, or to ask for help. Though Lance supposed the two usually went hand in hand, as the warnings in turn required him to take action.
Annabelle Winters’s appearance was no different.
He’d felt it when he’d gotten off the bus. After he’d crossed the terminal’s parking lot and stood on the sidewalk trying to figure out which way he wanted to go, he’d felt that ping of evil. There was no other way to explain it. Evil could not remain undetected by those attuned to the frequencies along which it traveled, and Lance, despite his best wishes, was more attuned than most. There was something bad lurking in this town, something that had taken root and would continue to blacken what it touched until there was no more to feed on, or until somebody stopped it.
Lance sighed heavily on the bed, adjusted the pillow beneath his head. Most of his friends from high school had gone off to college, graduated, and were in the beginning stages of starting a family. Nice jobs in big cities. Friday nights on the town with new friends. Golfing and running 5Ks and spending lazy mornings on the couch with girlfriends and fiancées on the weekends. And here he was, by himself in a dingy motel in a forgotten sleepy town, getting ready to try and “crack the case,” as they say, battle the forces of evil, and probably end up getting himself killed in the process.
And nobody would ever know or care.
He sighed again and rolled over onto his side, stared at the locked door and wondered what was outside, what was waiting for him. He longed for golfing and 5Ks. Longed for a taste of normalcy.
Instead, he feared a fresh, unknown evil. Was terrified to look out the window and find a Volkswagen bus the color of a Creamsicle waiting for him.
He glanced at the newspaper he’d set on the nightstand, was about to reach for it and stopped. Through the paper-thin wall behind him came a soft singing. A slow tune that sounded both beautiful and sad, soothing.
Leah, he thought. She thinks I’m handsome.
She continued on with the song, this girl who thought he was normal, her voice imperfect but sweet. Lance didn’t know how long she went on, because he finally drifted off to sleep.
4
Go, Lance. It's only what’s right. I love you.
Lance gasped and jumped up from the bed, his mother’s last words to him still echoing faintly in his mind as the dream faded and the room took shape before him. He’d dreamed of that night, the one so fresh it was still cooling, the one where he’d lost his mother and had fled. The night that had ultimately brought him here. Bob’s Place.
Leah.
He listened, trying to pick up any signs of her. The singing that had lulled him to sleep was gone, as were all other noises from the other side of the wall. The motel room was darker, the sun having shifted across and beyond his window, leaving only a dim strip of gray light to come through the crack between curtain and wall.
Come back here tonight at eight, Leah had told him. Daddy works graveyard.
The fact there was still light outside at all told Lance he’d not missed his deadline, but he had no idea how long he’d slept. He unzipped the side pocket of his backpack and retrieved the pay-as-you-go cell phone he’d had for years. A black plastic flip phone, the device had been a gift from his mother. She’d purchased one for herself as well, a matching one that they often had gotten mixed up, and her number was one of only a handful Lance had programmed into his phone’s memory. As he flipped open the screen, he suddenly had two very conflicting thoughts collide in terms of what he should do with her stored number. Part of him, the first part to show its face, said to delete it. It was of no use to him anymore and would only be a painful reminder of her absence every time he scrolled past it. The second part, the one a split second slower to reach him but carrying a seemingly more powerful suggestion, told Lance to call the number. Let it ring the four rings that would go unanswered before switching to voicemail and letting Lance hear his mother’s voice again.
(Hi! It seems our paths weren’t meant to cross right now. I can’t wait to talk to you soon!)
Lance’s mother hadn’t asked people to leave a message. She had always been of the mindset that information reached her when it was meant to reach her, and that if she’d missed somebody’s phone call, the conversation—and thus the information—could wait. Lance had told her this was ridiculous—as he’d said of a lot of the things she’d suggested over the years—but the tenet had never seemed to cause any trouble for her or him, so … what did Lance know?
(I can’t wait to talk to you soon!)
Lance would never talk to her again.
Conflicted, and with the wound still open, he did nothing with his mother’s number and simply checked the time. It was almost seven o’clock. He knew that he’d been tired—the long sleepless night catching up with him—but he was surprised he’d managed to sleep the whole day. The way he was feeling, he wouldn’t have been surprised to discover he’d never get a full night’s rest again.
He was hungry, but with only an hour
to spare, he decided to investigate the (what he guessed to be) one clue Leah had so subtly given him. He’d been nearly out of the motel’s office when he’d questioned her thoughts on any bad happenings in town, and her response had been to hand him a newspaper. She had told him to come back to the office at eight, but she could have done that without the newspaper. Lance glanced at it, sitting neatly on the nightstand next to him. There’s something in there, he thought. There’s something in there that’ll help me.
He revisited the bathroom, washed his hands, and then turned on the small lamp on the nightstand. The bulb gave off a quick, loud buzz and then died. Lance sighed. He didn’t want to switch on the main overhead light. Call it paranoia, but a light that bright would be more visible from the outside. Say, to somebody across the street looking for signs of life in one of Bob’s Place’s rented rooms. And though he had nothing to go on except that feeling he’d been hit with upon first exiting the motel’s office hours ago, Lance was almost positive somebody would, eventually, start looking for him. Join the club, he thought.
Lance walked across the room, the outside light fading quickly, and unscrewed one of the three bare bulbs installed in the light fixture above the bathroom sink. He used it to replace the fried bulb in the lamp, then pulled the pillowcase off one of the bed’s two pillows and draped it over the lampshade to further dampen the light. Satisfied, he sat with his back against the cheap headboard and picked up the paper. The first thing he noticed was the date. It was from last week. He started reading the first headline.
Forty-five minutes later, he’d finished the paper. He’d read the whole thing, front to back, then neatly refolded each section and reassembled the paper to the extent that it looked as if it’d never been read at all. He stared down at the front page again, his eyes darting all over the headlines and the smaller text beneath each, picking out words and phrases and desperately searching for something he might have missed.
Lance Brody Omnibus Page 10
