Curioddity (24 page)

“
And he is also very rude,
” added SARA.

“Yes, I see what you mean, SARA,” said Dinsdale. “He does get a bit flustered. I think this is all beginning to get to him. Why don't you take a rest? I'll explain it to Wil and you and he can revisit this later?”

“
There is one other item requiring attention—
”

“Later, please,” insisted Dinsdale. “We've all had a very stressful day and I think Wil could use a good cup of coffee right about now.”

“
Of course,
” replied SARA happily, and switched herself off.

Dinsdale looked at Wil in conspiratorial fashion and whispered, “I think you and she probably need to go for a drink later and hash it all out. She's a little quirky but she means well.”

*   *   *

A
T THAT
moment, Wil felt like an Oklahoma farmer emerging from the rubble of a collapsed house, finding a huge tractor on the remains of his front porch, and seeing a tornado heading in the other direction. He'd just been flattened by two things. But it was impossible to determine which of them had done the actual damage. All he knew was that his bad eye was painfully reawakening, and with it a massive headache.

He looked at Dinsdale, incredulous.

“Now,” said the older man, “about the matter of your payment…”

Dinsdale fished inside his pocket and produced a checkbook and pen, whereupon he proceeded to write an inordinately large number promising an inordinately large sum of money. “I hope you'll accept this bonus with my best wishes and eternal gratitude, Wil. I'm sure this won't be the last time we'll cross paths by any stretch of the imagination. But for now I think you should go home and take a rest. You've certainly earned it.”

Wil feebly held out his hand to accept the check. But as it brushed against his hand he thought the better of it and simply allowed it to fall to the ground. This was a year's rent, and he was about to let it slip through his fingers. For yes, Wil Morgan, Private Detective, was determined never to learn from old mistakes. He was going to be honest, and cut himself out of the deal.

“I can't take it, Mr. Dinsdale,” he said as gently as he possibly could.

“I beg your pardon?”

“The check. I can't take it. It wouldn't be right.”

“Well, I can get you cash but it's going to take me a couple of days, Wil.”

“No, you misunderstand. I can't take it because I didn't earn it. All I did was go into an old antique shop and pick up the first thing that looked remotely like the box you described. I didn't do any meaningful research. I'm a fraud. And as much as I appreciate the fact that you're a very nice person and you're a little bit crazy in a good way, you're also a little bit senile and I couldn't live with myself if I took advantage of that. I'm sorry.”

“Nonsense,” said the old man. “You found it because you un-looked for it precisely as I'd instructed. I'm inclined to think that because of the box's extraterrestrial origins it probably found you.”

“Goodbye, Mr. Dinsdale,” said Wil, sadly. And with that, he headed for a date with destiny, which took the form of a now-resentful revolving door.

Mr. Dinsdale looked down at the fallen check. “I'm sorry to hear you feel this way, Wil,” he said.

“Not as sorry as I'm going to be when I leave. But it's okay. I wish you the best with your museum. It's been an interesting week, and I'm grateful for that, but I have to go now because I have a headache.”

Dinsdale put a hand on Wil's arm to prevent him from heading away. “Just a moment, Wil,” he said. “I'm afraid I can't let you go without payment of some kind. Taxes. I'm sure you understand.”

“Yeah. But I can't really accept any more money.”

“But I must pay you—it's the law. I have an idea. Do you have a little money you could lend me?”

“I just gave all the cash I had on me to Marcus James … wait!” With a sudden realization, Wil fished in his pocket and retrieved his lucky penny. He handed it to Dinsdale. “I have this penny, I guess.”

Dinsdale took the coin and examined it. “That'll have to do,” he said. “Here.” And he handed the coin back to Wil.

Wil accepted his lucky penny with a puzzled frown. “I don't get it,” he said. “You borrowed money from me to pay me? So who owes who what?”

“Now I owe you a penny. Which I have just repaid. So we are even!” exclaimed the old man, proudly. “I'll have Mary send you the requisite paperwork at the end of the tax year. Do you have an accountant?”

*   *   *

“
I
USED
to,” replied Wil as he despondently turned on his heel and trudged toward the revolving door. “But I think he fired me today.”

 

CHAPTER TEN

T
EN HOURS
later, Wil Morgan sat across from a glass of Korean bubble tea (peach flavored) and sulked in its general vicinity. He'd decided that the semolina bubbles were his mortal enemy, and that peach was the world's worst flavor. Other things working against him at that moment were a bowl of kimchee, which taunted him from the middle of the table, and a particularly obnoxious checkered tablecloth that he didn't trust one bit. It was not a good time to get him started on the subject of chopsticks and Spicy Chicken Buldak.

Across from him sat Lucy looking equal parts gorgeous and perplexed. Despite the conspicuous absence of her three-hundred-pound wrestler boyfriend, the evening had gone sour, and she was attempting to sweeten it a little.

“Bummer,” said Lucy. “Major bummer. So when's he headed back?”

“What?” said Wil, emerging from his invisible black cloud. “Oh, my dad? Sunday morning.”

“Well, why don't you go and talk to him? I'm sure he'd listen.”

“Nope. Trust me. He'll pretend he's listening and his mouth will move in all the right directions while he pushes air out of it in some reasonable facsimile of a reasonable person. But he won't be listening. My dad holds on to grudges like a baboon holds on to a nut.”

“I've never seen a baboon holding a nut,” said Lucy with a little chuckle.

“That's probably because they hold on to them so tightly. Oh, what's the point?” Wil sipped on his bubble tea, hating it. “I'll spend the next ten years trying to get him to forgive me and he'll spend it pretending he already has.”

“If you ask me, when it comes down to it he probably just wants you to be happy, Wil. Besides, I happen to think private detectives are much groovier than accountants.”

“Did you ever meet one before me? Take a good look: this is pretty much it.”

“Looks just fine to me.”

Wil ignored the compliment and stared at his plate of food, trying to find a metaphor hidden in it so that he could stop eating and send it back to the kitchen. Despite his genuine loathing of Korean cuisine he wanted so much to be here with Lucy, to smile and be free of his guilty conscience. But his conflicted emotions seemed to have become vulgar ingredients in an inedible psychic stew prepared by some kind of insane master chef: he could taste a liberal dash of agitation mixed with a state of euphoria, all of which had been served over a hot bed of confusion. From what he could tell, this entire concoction had then been tenderized by something extremely solid. Such as a stainless steel baseball bat.

“I'm sorry I'm not such great company tonight, Lucy,” Wil said, feeling sorry for himself. “I wouldn't blame you if you wanted to go home.”

“Are you crazy? I'm having the time of my life. Look, we can talk about something else, if you like. What would you do if you couldn't be a detective?”

“I could see myself being a mirror inspector.”

“Funny. Ask me.”

“Okay. What would you be if you couldn't be a store owner?”

“I'd be a detective. Like Sherlock Holmes but with a faithful cat that came when I called it.”

“Random. But you'd still be better at it than I am. My powers of deductive reasoning compared to Sherlock Holmes are about the same as a brick compared to the Taj Mahal.”

*   *   *

T
HE MEAL
continued silently for a moment as Lucy seemed to ponder the problem of cheering Wil up. He chewed silently and sullenly while he created a Manifesto of Hatred that listed all the things he didn't like about the décor of the Korean restaurant and the demeanor of its waiters.

“You know what it is?” he suddenly blurted out, even though he hadn't prefaced the statement with any context. “It's me. I can't seem to make sense of anything. It's been a really weird few years for me.”

“How so?”

“Well, every time I leave my apartment, I feel like I'm checking out of a hotel room. I mean I'm sure I've remembered to check every drawer and pack my toothbrush but I always feel like I'm missing something. I fret about leaving my apartment for hours after I leave it. But when I'm in it, it smells like mushrooms even though I don't eat mushrooms.”

“That does sound pretty bananas. But at least you have a job and an apartment. Some of the guys I've dated still live with their grandparents because their parents haven't moved out of their childhood homes yet.”

“Oh yeah, my glamorous life. I'm living the dream. Sadly, it's the one where I forgot to put on my pants and only realized it when I got onto the subway.”

Lucy giggled that oh-so-cute giggle of hers, so that her nose scrunched up and her bracelet chimed like a little bell. Wil found he could get used to that sound, and he could most definitely get used to the sight of Lucy across the table from him. Here was a beautiful, confident, free-spirited woman—someone his mom would certainly have approved of, if not so much his dad—and he was missing the moment by feeling sorry for himself.

Wil realized he was seriously messing this up. But if the God of All Things Random was playing checkers with him again, then he was at least going to enjoy playing the game. He decided to un-mess things, hoping that this might be a little bit like un-looking for things.

“You know, you're right, Lucy,” he conceded. “We should talk about something else. I guess I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and a bit underwhelmed today. I just want to be whelmed for a couple of hours and enjoy our dinner.”

“Our dinner date,” she said, pointedly.

“Right. Our date. Though why you'd want to go out to dinner with a guy acting like a selfish idiot as opposed to attending a red carpet event with a three-hundred-pound wrestler is beyond me. I don't even own a tuxedo.”

“Because you're clever. And you're scruffy chic.”

“I'm out-punting my coverage, is what I am,” said Will, feeling morose.

“Fair enough, Eeyore. So tell me more about this Curioddity Museum. It sounds incredible. I'm surprised I've never heard of it.”

“Well, it's definitely incredible in an ‘I can't believe it' kind of way but not in a ‘how do they do that?' kind of way. A lot of the exhibits are a bit suspect.”

“Oh. Bummer. Are they fake?”

“They're not well constructed enough to be fake.”

Wil told Lucy about the lightning catcher and the Perpetual Emotion machine, and about the strange crates in the Curioddity Museum's hallways and lobby. Strangely, she seemed excited about the prospect of visiting it.

“Oh, I love all that stuff!” she exclaimed so loudly that it drew the attention of half the restaurant's Thursday-night patrons. Feeling happily self-conscious, Lucy rearranged her chair and waited for the murmur to die down. “I love that stuff,” she repeated with an excited hiss. “I'm really into the paranormal. I've got a lot of theories about magic. And aliens!”

“How do you feel about magic aliens?”

“That's what I keep telling people! What if they're not from space but from underwater? Wouldn't it be so cool if they were from Atlantis?”

“Well, that certainly is an interesting theory.”

“Did you know the British royal family is supposedly made up of reptiles from another galaxy?”

Wil gulped; this was the type of thinking he'd been encouraged to follow in his formative years but that he'd been avoiding ever since he'd lost his mother. There were so many things he'd wanted to talk about over the years with random strangers, such as the weird markings he'd heard about on the floor of the Denver airport, or the strange, spherical balls that had been found all across the world with the aid of dousing rods. He'd heard that at least five U.S. presidents had had six fingers on each hand, and that the CIA had once conducted experiments on kangaroos to replace their marsupial brains with human brains. But whenever he'd had an opportunity to let loose creatively, all he could hear was an inner voice that sounded much like his father's warning him not to stray too far from the path of human understanding in case he lost his footing and fell down the side of a mountain of illogic. Nowadays, the only people he interacted with were Mr. Whatley—who could be relied upon only for conversations about the weather and sporting results from the night before—and his addled landlady, Mrs. Chappell.

Despite Wil's genuine desire to relax and let the evening take him wherever it felt like taking him, he had been thinking about a certain subject he'd wanted to broach with Lucy Price ever since the first time she'd hit him over the head with a book. Now seemed as good a time as any. After all, what did he have to lose but the respect of a beautiful, charming girl who seemed smitten with him for reasons unknown?

“How do you feel about ghosts?” Wil asked. “You said you thought you'd seen one in your store.”

“Oh! What? Yeah! Wow!” exclaimed Lucy, unable to pick a suitable interjection and stick with it. “My store's definitely haunted. Definitely. No doubt about it.”

“So you've seen people back near the books at the far wall? What do they look like?”