Victrus dreamed of blue and red ghosts high on sweets, careening around the creaky hallways and chasing him like he'd become trapped in a game of Pac Man. Eating instruments polished as if they'd been mass produced for a superstore, no tone or soul to speak of. Why Pac Man, he couldn't say. It wasn't as if he'd ever allowed his brain cells to be eaten by a machine, and even his cell phone lacked the apps with which so many his age chose to while away their productive moments.
Sweat drenched the quilt he'd pulled over himself, the sheets underneath he couldn't remember putting there either, the pillowcase, his hastily pulled-on silky bedclothes. Leaving sugar out for invisible beings was hard work. He untangled himself from the mass of covers and headed for the bathroom, barely noting the odd grains here and there underfoot. With nowhere to be for another day and lesson plans filling his head, the shower ran so long the deliciously cold water became lukewarm.
A river of wet soaked the bathroom floor, creeping into crevices along the tub and wall and dotting footprints down the hallway. Vic noticed, but only because he almost slipped, and he put a bathmat on his mental shopping list. Such an exercise was forgotten when he returned to his room.
The floor...was sticky. He braced himself against the wall and picked up one wet foot, then the other, then scrubbed a hand over its sole. "Blast. The sugar." But it wasn't in a neat, obvious mound around his bed, not now. He set his foot down and eyed the floor with suspicion.
Surely the house itself hadn't attempted to devour it; the few grains he had discovered were only caught in the floorboards.
Perhaps the army of ants had come after all, the sugar too much to carry in one night.
Still.
This might have been good news.
He pulled on jeans and a black tee, hopping awkwardly down the stairs. "It's gone! All of it!" Room after room that he'd dosed with the sweet treat had been tidied, the receptacles missing. He found those in the kitchen, put away and scrubbed clean. Vic picked up an empty butter container and tapped it against his hip. "Guess I'm buying that too."
But there was only one way to know for sure if it had worked, beyond feeding whoever had chosen to torture his strings. Each violin, viola, cello, all were inspected thoroughly, and though a few still needed a second pass to fix the earlier polishing machinations, nothing new had been hurt. No new strings had been strung, no fingerboards mauled. The next time he played the voices would be properly mournful, properly sounding as old, weathered things with long, wretched lives should sound.
He couldn't have hoped for a better outcome.
He still didn't quite believe he wasn't dreaming.
But then, finally, the piano.
Approaching the grand like one might approach a wild animal, Vic slid his fingers over the high C, the scuffed rim of the board. It didn't shine. It didn't gleam. He opened it up and check the tension, tugging on one string just so, snapping it across the bridge. He pulled the string free and coiled it around one palm, patting the side of the great wooden instrument.
"Shhh," he said, "it'll be okay now. It'll all be okay."
There was something to this sugar thing after all, sugar he would be running out to pick up in bulk just as soon as he closed the--"What...what the devil is that?"
His pen lay cradled on the music stand, the paper he'd left by way of final notice to whoever insisted on playing the hideous games with his motley of musical brethren flipped over.
Neat as a mortician's makeup job sat tiny, tiny letters, looped and curled along the top of one of the staves. He blinked, unbelieving, scrubbed momentarily at his eyes and then stared again. After another long moment, Vic set the paper down and returned to the kitchen.
Two brandy glasses later--one per shot--he returned. And stared.
"The iron," he muttered. "An odd thing to be concerned with, considering your penchant for polishing wood."
This, he would have to look into. Something niggled at the back of his mind about ghosts and iron and oh. Perhaps the invisible polisher couldn't leave the house with the doors blocked by traps. He shrugged. Then wrote in the same four-beat scrawl, "Quite like decor. Heirlooms offend? Tomorrow then. Today shopping. For more sugar. No polishing. Very good Ghostie. Vic Rosenburg. PS Butter? Maybe ice cream?"
Ice cream, perhaps, he'd leave that instead of the butter he intended to use for his own cooking. He narrowed his eyes. Why in all that was tarnished had he added that, considered it at all? The last thing he needed to do was encourage the thing to stay away from his instruments by paying it off in some kind of confection-funded protection racket.
Sweat drenched the quilt he'd pulled over himself, the sheets underneath he couldn't remember putting there either, the pillowcase, his hastily pulled-on silky bedclothes. Leaving sugar out for invisible beings was hard work. He untangled himself from the mass of covers and headed for the bathroom, barely noting the odd grains here and there underfoot. With nowhere to be for another day and lesson plans filling his head, the shower ran so long the deliciously cold water became lukewarm.
A river of wet soaked the bathroom floor, creeping into crevices along the tub and wall and dotting footprints down the hallway. Vic noticed, but only because he almost slipped, and he put a bathmat on his mental shopping list. Such an exercise was forgotten when he returned to his room.
The floor...was sticky. He braced himself against the wall and picked up one wet foot, then the other, then scrubbed a hand over its sole. "Blast. The sugar." But it wasn't in a neat, obvious mound around his bed, not now. He set his foot down and eyed the floor with suspicion.
Surely the house itself hadn't attempted to devour it; the few grains he had discovered were only caught in the floorboards.
Perhaps the army of ants had come after all, the sugar too much to carry in one night.
Still.
This might have been good news.
He pulled on jeans and a black tee, hopping awkwardly down the stairs. "It's gone! All of it!" Room after room that he'd dosed with the sweet treat had been tidied, the receptacles missing. He found those in the kitchen, put away and scrubbed clean. Vic picked up an empty butter container and tapped it against his hip. "Guess I'm buying that too."
But there was only one way to know for sure if it had worked, beyond feeding whoever had chosen to torture his strings. Each violin, viola, cello, all were inspected thoroughly, and though a few still needed a second pass to fix the earlier polishing machinations, nothing new had been hurt. No new strings had been strung, no fingerboards mauled. The next time he played the voices would be properly mournful, properly sounding as old, weathered things with long, wretched lives should sound.
He couldn't have hoped for a better outcome.
He still didn't quite believe he wasn't dreaming.
But then, finally, the piano.
Approaching the grand like one might approach a wild animal, Vic slid his fingers over the high C, the scuffed rim of the board. It didn't shine. It didn't gleam. He opened it up and check the tension, tugging on one string just so, snapping it across the bridge. He pulled the string free and coiled it around one palm, patting the side of the great wooden instrument.
"Shhh," he said, "it'll be okay now. It'll all be okay."
There was something to this sugar thing after all, sugar he would be running out to pick up in bulk just as soon as he closed the--"What...what the devil is that?"
His pen lay cradled on the music stand, the paper he'd left by way of final notice to whoever insisted on playing the hideous games with his motley of musical brethren flipped over.
Neat as a mortician's makeup job sat tiny, tiny letters, looped and curled along the top of one of the staves. He blinked, unbelieving, scrubbed momentarily at his eyes and then stared again. After another long moment, Vic set the paper down and returned to the kitchen.
Two brandy glasses later--one per shot--he returned. And stared.
"The iron," he muttered. "An odd thing to be concerned with, considering your penchant for polishing wood."
This, he would have to look into. Something niggled at the back of his mind about ghosts and iron and oh. Perhaps the invisible polisher couldn't leave the house with the doors blocked by traps. He shrugged. Then wrote in the same four-beat scrawl, "Quite like decor. Heirlooms offend? Tomorrow then. Today shopping. For more sugar. No polishing. Very good Ghostie. Vic Rosenburg. PS Butter? Maybe ice cream?"
Ice cream, perhaps, he'd leave that instead of the butter he intended to use for his own cooking. He narrowed his eyes. Why in all that was tarnished had he added that, considered it at all? The last thing he needed to do was encourage the thing to stay away from his instruments by paying it off in some kind of confection-funded protection racket.
Dreams come in a size too big so we can grow into them.
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