"It's like giving blood, the cost of tickets these days!" Creepy Man laughed, signing.
This was getting good!
Ruby swiped his credit card. "And you're not going, sir?" she asked, as he signed his name, trying to pull more info out of him. Way to go, Rubes!
"No, the boy and I will stay behind."
Boy? Was he referring to Gothic Guy? Or did the Sterlings have a child I could baby-sit? I could play hide-and-seek with him in the Mansion.
"The Sterlings have a boy?" Ruby asked.
"He doesn't get out much. Stays in his room listening to loud music. That's what they do at seventeen."
Seventeen? Did I hear him right? Seventeen? He was talking about Gothic Guy. But why wasn't he in school?
"He's always had a tutor. Or as you say in this country, he's been home-schooled," Creepy Man answered, as if he had read my mind. Or he should have said, Mansion-schooled! No one was home- schooled in Dullsville.
"Seventeen?" Ruby repeated, trying to pump more information from his brittle bones.
"Yes, seventeen...going on one hundred." "I know how that is," Ruby interjected. "My girl just turned thirteen, and she thinks she knows everything!"
"He acts like he's lived before, if you know what I mean, with all his grand opinions about the world." Creepy Man laughed a maniacal laugh that sent him into a coughing frenzy.
"Can I get you anything else?"
"I'd like a town map."
"Our town?" she asked, with a laugh. "I'm not sure we even have them."
She turned to Janice, who just shook her head.
"There's the main square and the cornfields," Ruby said, rifling through her desk. "Are you sure you don't want a map of somewhere more exciting?" she asked, offering him a map of Greece.
"This is all the excitement a man of my age can handle, thank you," he said with a grin. "The square reminds me of my village in Europe. It's been centuries since I've seen it."
"Centuries?" Ruby asked, curiously. "Then you hide your age well," she teased.
If anyone could get info on the walking dead, it was Ruby. She could flirt with the best of them.
Creepy Man's face turned from a white wine to a bright burgundy.
"You are so kind, dear," he said, tapping his bald head with a red silk handkerchief. "Thank you for your time," he said, preparing to leave. "It's been lovely, and you have been lovely, too." He grabbed her hand in his bony fingers and smiled a crackling smile.
As he stood up, he looked directly at me and through me like he knew he had seen me before. I could feel his cold stare as I frantically turned around, quickly gathering together the thirteen copies of my hand.
I didn't dare turn back around until I heard the door close. I peered out as he walked past the front window--and he glanced back like he was looking straight through me. I felt a chill go through my body. I loved it.
The rest of the day whizzed by. I hardly noticed it was after six.
I slung my black bag over my shoulder.
"Wow, we'll have to pay you for overtime!" Ruby said, as I got up from the reception desk.
If I couldn't be Elvira or the Bride of Dracula, I'd be Ruby. She was the complete opposite of me in her white-on-white--white go-go boots with a tight white vinyl dress, or a smart white pants suit with white heels. She wore bob-length white-blond hair and always touched up her make-up with a white compact that bore an R made of red rhinestones. She even had a white poodle that she sometimes brought to the agency. She always had boyfriends coming in to visit. They knew she was major class.
I approached her desk, which was covered with white crystals, white angel ornaments, and a smiling thirteen-year-old girl framed in white Lucite.
"Ruby?" I asked as she fiddled with her white leather purse.