The Morning After
No one could remember how they fell asleep; only that they awoke in an empty, dusty house. The entire R.S.A. was present and accounted for, Sarah acted as if nothing had happened the whole time. Marco was more shaken than the rest of the group, this being his second time here. After everyone had wiped the sleep from their eyes and woken up enough to leave, Tracy opened the front door. Brian pushed past everyone and stood in the door frame, “It’s the Hauntch Shop!” “How did we?” Grady turned to Marco. “I don’t know.” Marco stared at the Hauntch Store, that stood across the street and to the right of the doorway they were exiting. After crossing the street Marco glanced around to make sure C.P. was not watching them, she was nowhere to be found though. He grabbed the brass doorknob and deeply wished it was yesterday, because they would never be allowed outside again after last night. Marco closed his eyes and turned the doorknob, with his head bowed he walked in the door. I glanced at the clock on the wall it read four in the afternoon, “Well, you’re back early.” I glanced at them and back at the clock, “There must not be much to report.” “You’ve got to be joking!” Paul shouted out over everyone else’s rumblings. The R.S.A. poured in and sat down by the fire and ate the warm cinnamon rolls and drank the ginger tea, that no one even questions anymore. And began to recant the entire tale of everything that happened. Gregory, of course, was cued by Marco to re-tell the whole event after everyone else had said their perspective. Just as he was in the middle of his tale, Tracy’s watch alarm began going off. It was five o’clock. Everyone felt a slight chill pass over them. “I need to get home.”Tracy stood up. “When do we get paid? At the end of the week? Do we have to come every day?” “What?!?” Grady jumped to his feet, “Who said YOU get paid?” “You all get paid.” I said standing up, and I reached in my pocket pulling out some bills I had gotten from running the shop. “Everyone gets ten dollars, for the day.” I started explaining, “but tomorrow, when you come back. You’ll only make 5 and stay here half the day discussing everything you saw and what it might mean. If we can make any meaning of it at all, and I may have to send you back out there to learn more. We’ll just have to be better prepared and not have anymore surprises, like the watch thing.” I handed them their money as they filed out the back door one by one. I smiled a little when I thought about C.P. watching the store, but the rest of it was puzzling. The doors on the shop locked up tight and I began to wonder out loud, for the shop to hear. “I wonder if it might be possible to have the shop closed for a day, like a day off. I mean I do run this shop don’t I? There should be a way to close it for one day, I sure would like to know how that works.” I reached for the hallway door, and walked back inside my house.
Tabitha sat waiting for me in the hallway with a stern look on her face. “You sent those children out there, didn’t you?” “Yes I did.” I said without regret as I closed the door behind me. “But how did you…” Tabitha cut me off by pointing above the door to the air vent. Halfway up the stairs and at the steps’ base, the vent was conveniently located. “You do realize that poor boy is now scared out of his mind?” she continued her scolding. “This is the second time he’s been locked over there for a night.” she was becoming slightly more agitated as she continued. “How much more do you think a boy of his age can take? Are you trying to drive him mad?” The center of her eyes were mere slits and her eyelids were beginning to narrow. “Now look here Tabitha,” I held up a hand in surrender as I backed away from her. “They shouldn’t have taken the job if it was too much for them.” “They truussssssssted yooouuuuuu.” her tone began to become a low growl. Then suddenly she became shrill as she screamed out, “YOU are the ADULT here. YOU are the one Bradock TRUSTED for their WELL being.” She began to low growl again, “You should not even be trusted with their lives, if you are going to be so careless with them.” “I wouldn’t have known about the watch.” “You ttthhhhhhink that’s an excusssssse?” Tabitha looked as if she was fixing to take a swipe at me with her claws. “You never, never, take children somewhere you haven’t researched fully first.” “Tabitha,” I let out a short breath. “Don’t you think you’re over reacting a little bit?” “One of them could have not even come back!” she howled in her high tone. “Do you not even heed the warnings? These people do not want you in their land. I KNOW you were warned.” Tabitha’s eyes began to watch me as if I was an escaped mouse, “I heard them laughing.” “What?” I looked at her shocked. Tabitha’s features began to relax, “You are no Gileda are you.” She began to lick her paw and straighten out the fur on her face as she continued, “I’ll just spell it out for you. That door… no more importantly, that brass doorknob, is a portal to another time. Or dimension. Time and dimension has also been discussed. Of THAT we aren’t really sure.” “We?” I sat down in the hallway chair. “Your great Aunt and I.” Tabitha sat and continued her tale. “At any rate, the portal seems to go both ways, one way in the day and the other at night. So Miss Prissy Pants over there who wants to get you chucked out, will never be able to prove a thing. Because at night over there the Hauntch Store is little more than a vacant store front.” “But over here…” my mind began to race at the thought of it. “Correct! All the ghosts you’ve accumulated over all the years come out. And I know for a fact they kicked you out.” She again pointed to the air vent. “And I must say it gave myself and the rest of the staff a good chuckle as well.”
“Right.” I glared at her.