For the first time in weeks, I slept like a baby.
Of course, I got caught. I don’t really have the temperament for Machiavellian shenanigans, and I left a trail a mile wide, from the muddy footprints in the Contemporary’s lobby to the wrecking bar thoughtlessly left behind, with my cowl and the storage units from the Hall, forgotten on the back seat of my runabout.
I whistled my personal jazzy uptempo version of “Grim Grinning Ghosts” as I made my way from Costuming, through the utilidor, out to Liberty Square, half an hour before the Park opened.
Standing in front of me were Lil and Debra. Debra was holding my cowl and wrecking bar. Lil held the storage units.
I hadn’t put on my transdermals that morning, and so the emotion I felt was unmuffled, loud and yammering.
I ran.
I ran past them, along the road to Adventureland, past the Tiki Room where I’d been killed, past the Adventureland gate where I’d waded through the moat, down Main Street. I ran and ran, elbowing early guests, trampling flowers, knocking over an apple cart across from the Penny Arcade.
I ran until I reached the main gate, and turned, thinking I’d outrun Lil and Debra and all my problems. I’d thought wrong. They were both there, a step behind me, puffing and red. Debra held my wrecking bar like a weapon, and she brandished it at me.
“You’re a goddamn idiot, you know that?” she said. I think if we’d been alone, she would’ve swung it at me.