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Part 2-2: Parlor
My middle finger curled in the clock door’s hasp. Persi’s arm wrapped around my waist, and thoughts of my own friends’ health and safety steeled my resolve. I was angry at myself for hiding away and trying to forget the incident in the park. Had we been more proactive, Willy might still be alive. Hesitation was death.
I took a deep breath.
“Bon voyage. Stay safe,” said Deluxe.
“See you on the other side,” I said, and pulled.
I caught a quick glimpse of the inside: nothing but white light. As I yanked, it ripped shut again, forcing my balled fist into a jerking punch. It friggin’ hurt.
“Yeah, eat it!” I said, like I’d meant to do it.
“Alena,” said Persi.
“I guess that d—” I said, turning and shutting up. The abandoned office was gone. Deluxe and Fergus were gone. Persi and I stood in the corner of a lavish, posh room. It wasn’t the like the warped world I’d experienced back in the park. There, I could feel and sense from both the Alena in the normal world, as well as the ghostly version of myself that can wander around independently. It’s a trip. Here, it felt like only a single me.
“Ring a bell?” I whispered.
“I don’t think so. I’ve not been to this place, that I can remember. But I feel as if…”
She pointed at a table, and an expensive-looking paperweight wobbled, lifted up, and clonked back down.
“Whoah,” I said. When we first met her, Persi could do all sorts of weird voodoo inside the office building, like make lights come on or you know, teleport people. It seemed like some of her spirit powers remained, even after being freed.
“I can’t do it outside, back home,” she said, avoiding my goggled stare. “This place is… not there.”
I resisted a sarcastic reply and instead surveyed the scene. Plush red carpet lined the floor, and a silly little part of me felt self conscious about standing on it with my running shoes. The walls were all made of large, blocky stones. Ornate bookcases and china cabinets patrolled the borders. On the wall opposite us, an unlit fireplace. A golden chandelier hung low over the center, presiding over a horseshoe-shaped arrangement of fat couches and recliners.
Two people sat on one of the couches. They were dressed in very expensive clothes and were still and slumped, as if sleeping. I sucked my lip, unconvinced that these folks were here taking a siesta.
The clock was the same. The numbers were all still backwards and time stood steady at two to midnight, but at least it looked somewhat at home among all the fancy furnishings. I gave its door a cursory pull. It did not budge.
“Who are they?” Persi asked, pointing toward our hosts.
“Zombies, probably,” I said. “Or maybe mummies. Let’s ask.”
She frowned and quirked an eyebrow at me.
“Hello!” I shouted. “Hey, couch potatoes! We came in from the clock, don’t mind us.”
Silence swallowed my words. No echoes. I waited, expecting their heads to creak towards us or maybe for them to get up and start shuffling in our direction. I already had my eye on a short vase stand that looked like it’d be serviceable in a fight. I also patted my pockets, considering using my precious phone as a weapon. But it wasn’t there.
“Nothing,” said Persi.
“How about: wifi!” I said. Last time, saying ‘wifi’ had set all sorts of bad things in motion.
The sound stricken space ignored us.
We looked at each other, then moved closer, keeping to the side of the room. Along the way I removed the vase and took the stand with me, holding it out like a lion tamer with a chair. As we circled, I saw that the room had a big wooden door. There were metal bands and rivets built in. It had a big iron hoop instead of a handle. I also noticed that there were no windows. There were also no lights. It had that same, strange artificial vibe from the room in the office. We could see everything, but the ‘light’ was flat and sourceless. I shook the stand, testing its weight. Now that I was thinking about it, it did seem a little light.
“Fake?” asked Persi.
“I think so.”
“Here, let me see?” She held up her palm.
I made to hand over the stand, but it floated out of my hand and hovered in the air. Persi flicked her wrist and it went flying across the room, right into one of the glass-fronted china cabinets. The same part of me that wanted to take off my shoes cringed, but the vase stand bopped off the cabinet as if it were a ping pong ball. It fell to the floor, bouncing too high, then was still. Nothing inside the cabinet so much as rattled.
“Fake indeed. What about the zombs?” I said.
Persi squinted at the pair on the couch for a moment, then shook her head. “I don’t know. They’re different from the furniture; I can’t move them. Can you feel anything?”
At this point, I was barely a novice in my otherworldly talents, and all I could really feel was the ache in my knuckles from the unintentional clock assault. I said as much, and we approached the pristine bodies.
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