Hidden Things (10 page)

She brushed her hair back. “Yeah,” she agreed. “A drink would be good.” She smiled. “Anything you can rec—”

“We're not staying that long,” Vikous interrupted.

Calliope paused, gave a tight smile that didn't expose her teeth, and pivoted slowly on her heel to face Vikous. “I'm thirsty.”

“No,” replied Vikous. “You're not. Not here.”

“What—”

“We're fine, thanks,” Vikous said, leaning out in his chair to speak around her.

“The lady . . .” her pretty waiter protested.

“Is with me,” Vikous growled. “And I know how long we'll be here for.”

Tension hummed in the air around Calliope. “As you say,” the man replied. Calliope could almost imagine an accompanying bow to go with his obsequious tone. Then he was gone; Calliope could feel him leave, as though a source of heat had been removed from behind her.

Vikous looked up at her from his chair, his black eyes unblinking. Calliope met his gaze until her eyes began to feel dry, then walked past him, approached the lane, threw her ball into the gutter, and stepped back to wait by the ball return.

 

“Twenty gutter balls in a row.” Vikous led the way out of the bowling alley, pivoting on his heel to hold the door open for Calliope, who stalked by, the muscles in her jaw working. “That's a pretty impressive temper you've got.” He let go of the door and rubbed at the side of his face. “I should have guessed that from the first time we met, but—”

“What the hell is your
problem
?” Calliope whirled on him, continuing to walk backward across the lot. “I've never—” She stopped, and stopped walking, a deep crease between her raised eyebrows.

Without turning her head, Calliope took in the bright lights illuminating the dark lot, still mostly deserted, and the garish neon that lit up the bowling alley's sign. Her eyes came back to Vikous. “What did you do?”

Vikous lifted a hand to his chest, fingers splayed, and struck an affronted pose. “Me?” His hood swayed back and forth in denial. “I didn't do anything.”

“We got here at four in the afternoon.” She pointed behind her, toward her Jeep, as though indicating proof of their arrival. “I bowled one game—”

“I dunno if you could really call that bowling,” Vikous interjected.

“Shut up,” Calliope barked. “It was daylight out, and now it's . . .” She looked up, waving her hand at the dark-but-never-starlit sky of the city.

“Probably around eight. Eight fifteen, maybe.” Vikous's smile showed teeth, visible even within the shadows of his hood.

Calliope's eyes narrowed. “Explain.”

He raised his eyebrows at her. “Really?”

“Explain.”

He raised his hands in surrender, then dropped them into his pockets, watching her, his head slightly tilted within his hood. Finally, he asked, “You ever noticed that there's no windows in a bowling alley?” Calliope held her scowl and didn't reply. He nodded as though she had and strolled past her toward the Jeep. “There's a reason for that, sometimes, and it's not to cut down on sun glare.” He turned once he reached the Jeep and rested his elbows on the hood, looking back at the bowling alley. Calliope had followed him, but at a distance, and stayed on the other side of the vehicle.

Still looking at the neon lights of the sign, Vikous said, “There are a lot of stories you tell each other that are almost-but-not-quite right, you know?”

He looked at Calliope, who gave her head a short shake and looked away. “No, I don't.”

“Sure you do.” He flipped his hand up, as though throwing trash into the air. “The three little pigs were the good guys. The bears forgave Goldilocks. Only one prince hooked up with Rapunzel. Sleeping Beauty was put in a hundred-year coma for
no reason.
”

Calliope shook the distractions away. “What's that got to do with this?”

He paused. “Once upon a time,” he said, “there was a story about a guy who met some mountain elves while they were bowling, and the next thing he knew, twenty years had gone by.”

Calliope's eyes narrowed in thought, then widened as she looked back at the alley. “He drank something of theirs.”

“That definitely didn't help,” Vikous allowed. “But mostly, I think it was the bowling.”

She glared at him. “You knew this would happen.”

“Of course I did. I was counting on it.”

“You did it to me.”

“I did it to
both
of us,” he pointed out. “And I didn't
do
it.”

“Bullshit.”

He crossed his arms across his chest, a ghost of his former good humor still clinging to his features. “If I say ‘let's go stand out in that big river', and we do that, and our shoes get wet,
I
didn't make our shoes wet: the water did. It's what water
does
.”

“You knew it would
happen,
” Calliope snapped. “And you didn't tell me. You
stole
from me.”

“I
hid
us,” Vikous growled. “I took us both
entirely
off the map until we needed to meet Gluen.”

“Without explaining it or even asking me,” Calliope countered. “Johnson could have called again.
Josh
could have called again.”

“Oh, please.” Vikous's face twisted in annoyance. “We both know
that's
not going to happen.” His voice lost force as he spoke the last word. He looked at Calliope, who was staring down at the pavement, her jaw clenched.

Vikous cleared his throat. “Sorry.”

“I'm going to the appointment,” Calliope said. Her voice was tight and quiet. She walked to the Jeep, her boots rapping on the pavement, and unlocked the door.

“I should go with you,” he said.

“Fuck off,” she replied, in the same hard tone. “Walk.” She swung into the vehicle, slammed the door, started the engine, and left.

The same security guard from the night before sat behind the lobby desk. “Hey,” Calliope said, nodding at him with her chin and settling her arms on the counter in front of him. “I'm back.”

The guard didn't rise from his chair. “I'm sorry, ma'am,” he said. “There are no visitors allowed after seven.”

She gestured at the elevators. “I was here way after that last night, and you sent me right up.”

He looked up at her, narrowing his eyes as though he were trying to make out a small object at a distance. “I'm sorry, but I don't remember that.”

“I was wearing a fedora and a gray suit coat for a costume?”

He thought for a moment and shook his head.

Calliope pursed her lips, unwilling to play her trump card, but finally relented with an annoyed sigh. “I was here with the clown.”

“Oh.” The man's eyes widened—not as much as they had the night before, but more than necessary. “
Oh
. The party.”

“Yes.” Calliope nodded like a teacher urging along one of her slower readers. “I was here for the party last night, and now I'm back.”

The guard leaned out to look behind her, his brow creased. “Just you?”

“Just me,” Calliope assured him, noting the flash of relief on his face, mixed with an awkward kind of discomfort.

“I'm sorry,” he repeated, “but the party was a special occasion.”

“But I have an appointment,” Calliope persisted. “Same guy, same floor, same everything.”

He made a show of checking his ledger, though even reading it upside down Calliope could see her name was not on the page. “No one mentioned it to us. I'm sorry.”

Calliope's head sagged under the weight of the conversation. “Listen,” she said. “Have you met this fat bastard I'm here to see?”

“Mr. Gluen?” Again, a brief look of panic skimmed his features. “I mean, not that he's . . . I didn't mean to say he's—” He cut himself off with a cleared throat. “No, I've never seen it. Met him, that is.”

Calliope smirked. “But you've heard.” She leaned forward a bit. “So, based on what you've heard, do you actually think you're doing me a favor by letting me go up there?” She shook her head, keeping her eyes on him. “It's the last thing in the world I want to do. I hate his guts and, believe me, that is a
lot
of hate.”

He glanced down at the registry again, eyes darting over the blank lines, then back up to her. “I could call up.”

“
Would
you?” Calliope settled back on her heels.

He picked up the handset and dialed. Calliope waited. Seconds continued to tick by, marked off by the nervous
takking
of the guard's fingernail against the desktop. After about thirty seconds, he covered the mouthpiece with his hand and said, “It doesn't seem like anyone's answering.”

“Mmm.” Calliope nodded, trying to keep her face from showing her growing anger. She was already at a slow boil after the fight with Vikous—getting stood up like this was going to permanently damage her mood.

“You know what?” she blurted out. “I can wait.” She waved the guard's phone away. “Go ahead and hang up.”

He pulled the phone away from his head, hesitating. “Are you sure?”

“As long as you don't mind me using one of those chairs over there.” She indicated the lobby furniture nearby.

“Doesn't bother me, but . . .” He hung up the phone and leaned toward her on his elbows. “I'm on shift all night, so you won't be able to wait me out and get someone nicer.” He smiled, and she returned it, letting him relax.

“I wouldn't dream of it,” she assured him, turning toward the chairs but keeping her eyes on him, over her shoulder, as she walked. “I just want to sit down until my friend gets here.” She dropped into an overstuffed leather armchair and let out a sigh that was entirely unfeigned.

The silence following that sigh stretched on for long enough Calliope began to wonder if the guard had caught her last words, but before she could figure out how to continue, his chair creaked and he stood, speaking to her over the tall counter. “Your friend?”

“Mmm,” Calliope nodded, her head resting against the back of the chair. She closed her eyes and concealed a small smile. “He'll get everything straightened out.”

“The c—” The guard paused. “Your friend from last night?” The tone of his voice—like a boy who found out Mommy was going to tell Daddy what he did—almost made Calliope relent.

Almost.

“Yup.” She nodded, then chuckled. “The funny part is, he was supposed to be here with me right now, but I drove off without him.”

“Really.” The guard's tone had graduated to a deeper level of despair.

She sat up, as though eager to share the punch line. “Yeah, we got in this
huge
argument, and I got in my car and took off. I told him to walk.” She laughed again, shaking her head. “He is going to be So. Pissed.” She leaned back into the chair again.

More silence. The guard dropped back into his seat. Calliope began a slow count from one.

She'd gotten to four when he stood back up. “You know what?” he said. “Go on up.”

She turned her head toward him, letting a confused yet hopeful look spread across her face. “Really?”

“Sure.” The guard nodded, swallowing. “It'll be—” He paused, then nodded again, more emphatically, his eyes on the empty ledger. “I'm sure it will be fine.”

Calliope leaned forward and stood. “I know it will be,” she assured him, starting toward him and heading around his desk to the bank of elevators. “I can't thank you enough.”

“It's no problem,” he replied, as he pushed the secured elevator call button at his station. She gave him one more smile, and he added, “I'll send your friend up too, when he gets here.”

“Excellent,” she said, and stepped into the elevator. The door slid shut with a muffled, heavy thump.

“I'll send him right on through,” the guard whispered, his eyes looking at nothing at all.