Teaser

Whee-hee-hee! It's almost tiiiime!

I have had way too much caffeine today. 2 cups coffee + chocolate covered espresso beans + 1 large cup Irish Breakfast Tea=MUSIC HAS COLORS. Alice in Chains is kinda red, apparently. Like...red clay, sorta?

Anyways, here. Take this sample of November Hotel. Thomas is Wesley's normal friend. He's a precious cinnamon bun and deserves a Friendship Award for putting up with Wes' oddball tendencies. (So do my friends. Thanks, friends!)

" Thomas had not burned down the building, but he had gotten a date. Wesley had to give it to him-he made the impossible task of 'flirting' look effortless.

Though he'd sometimes come to work with a red mark on his cheek, so there was that.

"She's from Paris, Wes. Paris. Oui, please."

"I think what you mean is s'il vous plaît, Thomas."

"It doesn't sound nice when you do it, though." He sighed and pulled a dead leaf from the potted plant. "She's got this breathy voice, just the right tone-"

Rumble-rumble.

"Is that the elevator?"

Great. Either it was acting up or there were people in it...ridiculous...

He pulled the doors open and leaned into the shaft. Yup, there it was, slowly coming down. If there were kids in there fooling around, so help him God...

"Look scary, I think somebody took it for a ride."

The rumbling stopped abruptly and he frowned and looked up. Sure enough, it had stopped dead. It would figure that it would throw a fit when there were people playing with it, jeeze...

"Wes?"

"It's acting up again."

Thomas came out from behind the desk and poked his head into the shaft. A second later there was an earsplitting SCREEEEECH! and Wesley was yanked backwards just as the car plummeted downwards.

It did not crash. It was barely past the opening when it stopped...and came back up, shuddering to a stop where it belonged and remaining quite still, looking as innocent as ever.

"Is somebody in there?"

Nobody answered. Wesley pulled the doors open-they didn't want to move-and peered inside. It was empty.

"My God." Thomas hadn't let go of his jacket and Wesley wondered when it was socially acceptable to make him. "Nearly took your head off!"

"Uh-huh."

"Did you enrage some rival elevator person? Is there an elevator operator assassin's guild?"

"Uh-uh."

"What the hell was that?"

"I don't know." Ghosts. "Thomas, um-"

"Oh. Sorry." But it still took him a minute to let go. "Wes, that thing-"

Wesley shut the doors and put the little 'Out of Order' sign on them. Thomas backed away, dragging Wesley with him.

"It's possessed."

"It's not-"

"It tried. To kill you. On purpose! Ah-dat-dat!" What sort of word was that supposed to be? "Shut up. It did. It did."

"Coincidence."

"Lies!" Thomas gripped his shoulder with one hand and gestured wildly at the elevator with the other. "I know what I saw, and I saw the elevator try to take your head off."

"It-"

"What's all the shouting about?"

Aw, Hell. Maggie. This was just not his day, was it?

"The elevator tried to kill Wesley."

"It didn't-"

"It did! Ignore him, he's in shock."

"I'm not in shock..."

Maggie hid a facepalm behind a small forehead-scratch before holding up a hand.

"Thomas." Finally. Silence. Now he could explain that the wiring had picked a bad time to go out or...or something that would calm everyone down. "What happened. Is anybody hurt?"

"No. Because I saved him."

"Thomas..."

"Shut up, I did."

If ever there were to be a freak earthquake that nessessitated the immediate evacuation of the hotel, now would be a good time.

"What happened?"

"The elevator was acting weird, and when Wes leaned in to see what was going on, it tried to take his head off."

Any time with that earthquake. Really, any time now.

"Wes?"

"The wiring was acting up, this weather-"

He barely dodged Thomas' hand aiming to cover his mouth, but there was no shutting him up.

"No. We thought there was someone in it, right? It was comin' down, and Wes got the doors open to make sure it wasn't stuck or somethin'. And he leaned in, and then it just dropped."

"Did it crash?"

"Nah-uh. Pulled itself up when I yanked him backwards, and now it's just sittin' there. Waiting."

Thomas would have been much better off working at a theatre than at a hotel.

Maggie looked from one to the other, eyebrows raised. Keeping Thomas and his annoying hand in the corner of his eye, Wesley opened his mouth to speak.

"It's probably just wiring. This sort of weather always upsets it. I'll climb up there tomorrow and-"

"Don't." Huh? "Don't. It's out of order now, and that's final."

That was her 'management voice', the same one her father used, and he had no intention of arguing with it. It would only end badly.

"Okay." "

-Lalla