Vacancy

by Fredric Shernoff

  Jim felt sick. “I don’t understand what’s going on.”

  “Just come home, Jim. I don’t like how you sound at all.”

  “Okay. I promise I’ll come home soon. You’ll meet me there?”

  “Okay, baby, please drive safely. You’ve really got me concerned.”

  He hung up the phone and started walking toward his car. He picked up the phone to call Nancy, but then looked up and felt another horrible chill pass through him. Clyde’s black BMW was not in the parking spot where he’d seen it less than half an hour earlier. A red Honda Civic was in its place.

  He considered calling Nancy anyway but he suspected he knew what he’d hear. He couldn’t handle any more shocks to his brain. He put the phone back in his pocket, found his silver Acura just where he’d left it, and got in the car. He closed the door and sat back in the seat. The insanity that was happening everywhere he looked seemed to be closing in on him. He felt panic and tugged at the collar of his shirt, allowing for easier breaths.

  Stars swam at the corners of his vision as he gasped for air. He gripped the steering wheel with both hands, squeezing hard. Gradually, his breathing slowed and his vision cleared. He couldn’t understand what was happening, but that didn’t change the fact that it was happening…that something had happened where Clyde was concerned, and he needed to work out his next moves. For that moment, the only things that mattered were getting home without crashing his car, and getting into bed.

  Chapter Five

  Back in the version of the store that only they could access, Emma and Dylan sat on the counter and considered their options. After witnessing the strange addition of the bicycle to the familiar story played out on Butler Avenue, they had retreated to the strange processed air and uncomfortable fluorescent lights of the abandoned pharmacy. Dylan didn’t like the idea that the store felt like a safer option than the world outside. That notion spoke volumes about their predicament.

  “So what do we know?” Emma asked.

  “Huh? What do you mean?”

  “Well, on all these shows on TV, every time some crazy shit happens, people always have to calm down and take stock of what’s going on. You know, look at the facts.”

  He shook his head. “The facts are pretty fucking far out there. I wouldn’t believe a bit of it if I wasn’t stuck in the middle of it.”

  “But we are stuck in the middle of it,” she said. And that’s all the more reason for us to work through it. At the very least we need something planned to get us beyond just wandering the street over and over again.”

  “You’re suggesting that we might be here a while.”

  She dangled her legs in a manner that would have been playfully sexy in a less serious situation. “Well, that’s certainly fact number one. We’re in a store with no windows and only one door. And for whatever reason that one door leads to the same scene over and over again, rather than getting us where we’re supposed to be.”

  Dylan nodded. “Yeah. The same scene except for the part about the bike.”

  “Okay,” Emma said, looking him in the eyes. “So what do we know?”

  “Um… I guess we know we shouldn’t close the door while we are out there. Because something happened to my bicycle. Though that kid didn’t have my bike. It could be a coincidence.”

  “Coincidence or no, and let’s be honest, it’s not likely a coincidence, your bike is gone. So you’re right— no shutting the door when we’re outside. Good. That’s a good start. What else do we know?”

  “The world out there seems to be the 1980’s, I think, based on the cars and assuming, like we said, that the boy with the bike is the exact same Hugo who ends up owning Galaxi’s Collectibles.”

  “You really think that’s him?”

  Dylan shrugged. “The guy who owns the store in the past implied that he knows Hugo well… or I guess that he comes there a lot. It would make sense that if he hung out there that much as a kid he’d end up there later on… I guess. Maybe I’m reaching.”

  “Nah. That’s the read I got on it. So why the 1980’s?”

  “What do you mean? We didn’t exactly have a choice.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I know that. I mean, why did the store bring us there? Why does it keep bringing us there?”

  “How should we know? It’s a fucking trap and we walked right into it, that’s all.”

  “You really don’t think there’s anything more to it than that?” Emma asked. “You really think it’s just a trap to catch people until, what? Until we starve to death? We’ve already figured a way around that. And if other people had been trapped we’d know, wouldn’t we?”

  “How would we know?”

  She made a broad sweep of her arm, pointing out the room. “There’s nothing here. No sign that anyone has ever been trapped in this room. And no skeletons, which is what you’d expect to find if somebody had starved to death here.”

  Dylan shuddered. He hadn’t considered that before, but now the idea that he could end up a dead body for someone else to find terrified him. “We need to get out of here.” He hopped off the counter and went to the door.

  “You know that doesn’t help, Dylan,” Emma said. “We can’t get out that way.”

  “I don’t care. I need to get out of this fucking room!” He opened the door and stepped out into the bright sun.

  “Just wait for a second, will you?” Emma called. She followed him to the door and made it outside just as Dylan started to cross the street. “Let’s keep talking this through.”

  “Fine,” he called over his shoulder. “But not here. Let’s go find somewhere else to talk.”

  They wandered up Butler and crossed down a side street. Dylan led the way, lost in his own thoughts and fears, and Emma followed behind. In some meta-analytical part of his brain, he wished he could enjoy his time with her, or at least think about what she might be going through. As much as he liked her, the extraordinary circumstances were making it difficult to focus on anything but survival.

  He detoured down toward the town library, and felt mild relief when he saw its familiar shape come into view. The township had added a large addition sometime in the decade that followed the day that held him prisoner, but the rest of the building looked the same as in the present.

  “I didn’t think this place would be here,” he said. “Or maybe, I don’t know, we’d run into a barrier where the world ends. But it just keeps going.”

  “So far, anyway,” Emma agreed. “I wish we had a faster way of getting around so we could really explore.”

  “In here,” Dylan said, and pointed to the library’s entrance.

  They sat down at a table near the children’s section of the library. There were no computers anywhere that Dylan could see, and he realized that even if one of those primitive machines was available, there was no Internet to give him any answers. He doubted even the present-day Google would produce anything to help someone escape from a time trap.

  “Can we talk now?” Emma asked pleadingly. “You won’t freak out on me again?”

  “Sorry,” Dylan said. He kept his voice low out of instinctive respect for the sanctity of the library. “Yeah, we can talk. I’m just scared. I know you must be too.”

  “I am.”

  “Sorry,” he said again.

  “Let’s just figure this thing out, okay?” Emma ran her hand through her hair. “This world seems normal. I get that it’s the past, and I know the weirdness about the bike. But aside from that, we haven’t seen anything that doesn’t fit with a past version of the town.”

  “So what?”

  She gave him a look.

  “Sorry. I didn’t mean it to sound so harsh. I just meant…so what does it imply?” He gave her a thin smile and she returned it with a cheerful one of her own.

  “Good effort, champ,” she said, and patted him on the shoulder. Her touch made him think about how her soft curls had rested against him, and he wished he hadn’t been so quick to run away from her before.


  “What I’m getting at,” she continued, “is that this town seems completely how it should be, if we accept the wacky notion that it should exist at all. So the key to what is happening here has nothing to do with this place, I don’t think.”

  “It has to do with the pharmacy,” Dylan said.

  “Yeah, it seems like it. And not the invisible ghost store in the present. I think it has something to do with the real deal. The one we can see through the windows when we stand on the street but we can’t access.”

  “What if we close the door?” Dylan asked. “Like, what if we shut the magic door, so it goes back to being something we can only access through a video or a reflection. Maybe the real door is behind it and we can get to that like we got to the alley before.”

  “It’s not a bad idea,” she said. “I’m just scared of what that means to close the door when we’re in this world. We saw what happened to the bike.”

  “Hmm. Yeah. That’s a good point,” he conceded. “So we’ve got nothing.”

  “Yeah,” she frowned. “Nothing.”

  Dylan drifted off in his thoughts. He imagined the front of the unusual little convenience store and drug store combo. He hadn’t spent much time gazing through the windows, but he had seen people in there, and a fully operational store. But how to get to that image in the window? He sat up straight. “The window. We can get access to the people in the store through the window.”

  “You think people would talk to us if we break the window and barge in?”

  “No, no, you’re right. But what if we knock on the window? Get someone’s attention and bring them out to us?”

  She grinned. “That might actually work! Worth a try at any rate.” She pulled out her phone. “It’s getting late by our time, Dylan. And I’m feeling every bit of the hours we’ve been on the go. If we’re going to do this let’s get our butts in gear.”

  They walked back to the store. A few hours had passed since they had last stood in front of it and the scene was different. Dylan found that made for a nice change. He looked in the window of the pharmacy and saw a man cleaning the counter with a white rag. Dylan looked at Emma, who nodded her approval. He reached up and knocked on the window.

  The man behind the counter raised his head and looked through the window.

  “Can you come out and talk to us for a second?” Dylan yelled. He didn’t know if the man could hear him or not. It was impossible to tell if the store’s door was open with the magic version blocking his view. The man shook his head and beckoned for Dylan to come inside.

  “I can’t!” he called. “I really just need to talk to you outside.” As he said the words, Dylan realized how ridiculous that sounded. From the man’s perspective, it probably seemed like a very poorly acted plan to mug him.

  “It’s not going to work,” he said to Emma. “Not like this, anyway. We have to catch a customer coming out, and I don’t think there’s anybody in there right now.”

  “Okay, well, what about the comic store?” she asked. “We can go into that one. That or Helen’s.”

  “All right. Let’s start with the comics.” They walked inside. Dylan had to remind himself that he’d never actually interacted with the shop owner. That one exchange had been multiple resets earlier.

  They walked inside the comic book store. The store owner sat on a stool in the corner of the room. His short, wide structure was unusual when standing, but seeing him in a seated position, Dylan thought it was a wonder the man didn’t topple off the stool.

  “Good day, young man,” the owner said. There was a slight wheeze to his speech that Dylan hadn’t picked up on earlier. Asthma, he thought. Or maybe just related to the guy’s poor health.

  “How’s it going?” Dylan said. Emma gave the man a little wave.

  “Looking for anything in particular?” the man asked.

  “Actually, we’re not from around here and we were curious about this street,” Emma said.

  “History buffs?” the man said, and laughed. His laugh was far wheezier than his speech.

  “I don’t know about that,” she replied, “but this is an interesting place. How long have you been working here? Or do you own the store?”

  “You’re damn right I own the store,” the man said with a grin and obvious pride. “Name’s Roland, like the gunslinger in Stephen King’s story. You read that one?”

  They both shook their heads.

  “Ah, well, my name’s still Roland, whether you’ve read the book or not.” Another wheezy laugh.

  “I’m Emma,” she said, “and this is Dylan.”

  “Pleasure’s all mine. I haven’t been here all that long, to be honest with you. This December will be…let’s see…four years already. Time flies.”

  “It sure does,” Dylan said, trying to match Emma’s friendly banter. “What do you know about the place next door?”

  “Oh that? It’s like the sign says. Got prescription drugs and all sorts of little things people might need in there. It’s a weird place, to be sure, and between you, me, and the wall, I’m not sure how he stays in business with Thrift Drug and 7-Eleven right down the street. I’m sure they’ve picked apart business to some extent. Hell, I guess there’s always somebody else in town to eat your lunch. Somehow he survives.”

  “You said ‘he,’” Emma began. “The guy working at the counter there? He’s the owner?”

  “Owner and pharmacist, yeah,” Roland said. “His name’s Mike Caruso. Dr. Mike is what most of us who work on the street call him. He’s an odd duck, Dr. Mike.”

  “Odd how?” Dylan asked.

  “He tinkers with stuff in the back room, or so the rumors go,” Roland said. “Like some kinda mad scientist. Mixing things around.” He leaned forward and his voice dropped low. “Some people around here think he’s trying to cure cancer or some such without oversight of the FDA. But that’s other people. Dr. Mike’s always been friendly to me.”

  Dylan wondered why the notion of Dr. Mike’s friendliness and the question of his illegal activities were mutually exclusive, but he pressed on. “People think he’s testing drugs on sick people?”

  “Details are scarce,” Roland said. “He’s developing something, I believe that much. Whether he’s testing anything on anyone, that I don’t know.” He sat back up as if to indicate he felt that particular topic had been addressed. “You guys want to look around the store at all, be my guest. I have to get some paperwork done, but let me know if you need any assistance.”

  “Thank you,” Emma said. “You’ve been a big help.”

  They moved over to a rack of new arrivals. Emma sidled up next to Dylan and whispered. “We aren’t going to get any more out of him, I don’t think. Want to try Helen’s?”

  Dylan shook his head. “All signs are pointing to Dr. Mike, but if we can’t get him to come out of the store, I’m not sure what we can do. Want to give it another go?”

  “Sure,” she said, and yawned. “Why not?”

  They said a quick goodbye to Roland and left the store. Dylan wondered what it would take to get Dr. Mike to leave the store and come out with them. It wasn’t nearly as late as it felt to him and Emma, but maybe if they waited out the day they could catch the pharmacist as he left work.

  “Hey kids, kids, please,” said a voice. Dylan looked in the direction of the sound and saw the bum walking in a stuttery shuffle toward them. “Kids, please. Help. Change.”

  Dylan looked in the man’s eyes. He’d assumed the bum was drunk, but that didn’t appear to be the case. Instead, he saw a hint of madness that made him take a step back without realizing he was going to do it. He grabbed Emma’s hand and squeezed gently but firmly. She squeezed back.

  “I’m sorry,” Dylan said. “We don’t have any change.” He almost added, “We’ve told you this before,” but remembered at the last second.

  “No change,” the bum said. His face fell in a deep pout. Dylan thought the man might cry. “Never any change.”

  Suddenly, the
man turned and darted into the street.

  “Wait!” Emma called out.

  A horn blared and Dylan turned away, pulling Emma’s head to his chest as he heard a sickening crunch.

  “Inside!” he said, and ran for the door to the magic room, still holding her hand. They entered the empty space and Emma slammed the door shut behind them, instantly cutting off the noise of commotion that had sprouted in the immediate aftermath of the accident.

  They slumped against the wall. Emma began to cry. It started as sniffles, and she wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. Then her shoulders began to shake and heave and the tears poured freely. Dylan held her to him, placing his face against her hair. “It’s okay,” he whispered. “It’s okay.”

  “It’s not okay!” she cried. “That man, he committed suicide right in front of us!”

  “We don’t know what happened,” Dylan said, though he thought she was totally right. “Maybe it was just an accident.”

  “Who was he? Is that what happens every time the day gets to that point? Or are we somehow responsible?”

  He looked into her face. “Listen to me,” he started. “We didn’t ask for this. We don’t know anything about that man or what his life was like. Maybe his death has something to do with all of this and maybe not, but this isn’t on us. And it doesn’t matter anyway.”

  “How doesn’t it matter?” Her voice was panic-stricken and hoarse from crying. “We saw him die!”

  Dylan got up. He ran to the door and opened it. He heard the sound of birds and a couple motors in the distance. Nothing else. He looked outside and watched as the cars went by. “It’s gone,” he said. “There’s the blue Mustang coming down the street.” He closed the door and turned back to Emma. “It’s gone, okay?”

  She sniffed. “Okay. Okay. God! This is so fucking hard to wrap my brain around! I’m so sorry I dragged you into this, Dylan.”

  He came back to her and hugged her again. “I came along willingly. Who wouldn’t want to see something magical with…somebody equally magical?”