The luscious scents of fresh coffee and frying bread twined sinuously up the back stairs and through the transom into her room. The aromas tickled her nose and woke her from a disturbing dream where she was having to explain to a senior editor that the initial publication of Penguin Times was being held up because the so-called writers were too busy installing Red Hat over SuSE to actually write any articles. The senior editor seethed with rage and just when Elizabeth feared his head would explode, leaving her with yet another mess to clean up, her eyes opened and she sat up in bed.
Disoriented by the smell of coffee already brewing when she hadn't been up to make it, she leaned back against the pillows and blinked up at the pink damask canopy, striped with dark wooden slats. She was sleepy from a night made restless by the unfamiliar creaks and sighs of the house, and pangs of anxiety about her new job at the bookstore that jabbed her every time she dropped off. Her eyelids drifted downwards and she snuggled deeper under the covers until the rumbling of her stomach finally propelled her out of bed, into a thick robe, and down the stairs.
Dirk was at the chipped enameled stove and greeted her with a cheery wave of a spatula which she returned with a somnambulistic grunt. A fluffy black and white cat sat on the table, alternately grooming his whiskers and reaching out a paw to guide the sandwich in Alice's hand to his own mouth.
"Cut it out, Rififi," Alice said, waggling her fingers in the cat's face.
Tossing his head, the cat turned its back to her. He lashed his tail and occasionally threw a baleful green glare over his shoulder.
Elizabeth got her steel mug, one of the few nonliterary items unpacked the night before, and filled it with thick black coffee. A few sips made her blood flow a little faster and she was able to greet the others more civilly. She sat down at the table and hunched over the mug.
Alice took another bite of her sandwich and washed it down with some coffee. Rififi twitched his tail and sniffed dismissively.
"What are you eating?"
Alice grinned. "Grilled peanut butter and 'nanner sandwich. Dirk is channeling the King this morning."
"That is the most disgusting thing I've ever heard of." Elizabeth began. Alice jammed the other half of the sandwich into her mouth before she could continue. In spite of herself, Elizabeth bit down and then munched thoughtfully. "That's actually not bad," she admitted.
She started to take another bite, but Alice retrieved the sandwich. "Get your own," she said.
"You want this one?" Dirk slid a golden square from his frying pan onto a plate and sliced it into two neat triangles. "I'll make another. Here, welcome to the house." He placed the sandwich before her. She thanked him and was halfway through the first triangle while he was still mashing banana for his own sandwich.
"Speaking of the King," he said, pointing a banana-smeared fork at Alice. "Someone took the Velvis down again last night and dumped it on the floor. I know it's you."
"No way. I never touch the thing. I think you probably take it down yourself, just so you have something to complain about. Or maybe it was Bob?"
"Or maybe the poltergeist got tired of leaving the TVs on and decided to rearrange the pictures instead?" Dirk asked sarcastically. "Bob was on the night shift anyway."
"Maybe Elvis doesn't like being in the music room," Elizabeth put in. "Maybe he's trying to get to the dining room."
"Ha ha. Very funny," said Dirk.
"The dining room," said Alice. "That's perfect! It is a mid-to-late Elvis, he must want his carbohydrates."
"The dining room gets too much light. He'll fade," said Dirk.
"Oh, for heaven's sake. I'll move him myself." Alice popped the last of her sandwich into her mouth and bounded out of the room, the sash of her robe flapping behind her and her improbable slippers, shaped like gorilla feet, slapping on the floor.
Dirk inspected the bottom side of his sandwich. "Your sister is crazy."
"Mmm," Elizabeth agreed through a mouthful of peanut butter and warm mashed banana. "We have a poltergeist too?"
"We have TVs and lights getting left on, stuff getting moved around, and no one admits to it. Since the electricity is included in the rent, it's not that big a deal, but still."
She sucked down some more coffee, and said, "Tell me, do you know why this house is so cheap to live in? and how come all this valuable stuff, like the books in the library and the furniture, is left out in a group house? It ought to be under lock and key or in a museum somewhere."
"Let's just say this is a 'don't ask, don't know' kind of place. It's too good a deal to mess up by asking questions." Dirk flipped his sandwich.
Somewhere in the house a clock chimed the quarter hour.
Alice returned. "It's late, we've got to get going," she said to her sister and to Dirk, "I hung him over the ebony sideboard. It brings out the black velvet nicely and it doesn't get any direct sunlight, so there." She stuck out her tongue.
A short time later, dressed in their respective ideas of what was appropriate for a casual workplace, the girls were pounding down the front stairs like the men the day before. Elizabeth had pulled on soft black leather boots, a long knit skirt, and her prized cashmere sweater. Leaning towards the mirror in the front hall, she tucked her shoulder length hair behind her ears and rubbed a dab of lipstick onto her mouth, then stood back to survey herself. She and her sister had the same wide blue eyes, straight blond hair, and round cheeks that suggested naivetéexcept for the obvious stubbornness at the jaw), but people never had trouble telling them apart.
Alice was dressed in a swinging poodle skirt with a pink twin set and matching pumps. She had even managed to coax a flip into the end of her long, honey-colored ponytail. Her eyebrows were darkened and drawn into sweeping curves of surprise and her lips were painted in a whorish red Joan Crawford bow. Elizabeth wanted to ask if she had run out of blue eye shadow, but held her tongue.
Alice looked at Elizabeth's conservative ensemble, selected to suggest employability, and shrugged. "You're going to be working in the storeroom upstairs, you can wear whatever you want."
Grabbing a coat from the tree, a navy blue pea coat this time, Alice slipped it on. Elizabeth couldn't find hers.
"Take whichever one you want," Alice told her. "Nobody's going to mind, most of these coats came with the house anyway."
"But I want mine," Elizabeth said as she continued to rummage among the layered garments. An aviator helmet, which had to date back to the '20s, dislodged from the pocket of a duster and fell to the floor beneath the coat tree.
"Maybe it's over there." Alice pointed to a pile of coats that had migrated over to Elizabeth's futon, not yet removed to the basement.
Elizabeth lifted a coat from the pile and the pile twitched with a sudden spasm. Bob's face appeared, creased from sleep and the coats on which it had rested. His red curls were mashed flat on one side of his head. Rubbing his eyes, he blearily asked, "What time is it?"
Alice checked her watch. "Nine."
"What?" Bob sat bolt upright in alarm. "Nine? a.m. or p.m.?" He grabbed at Elizabeth's knees, the only part of her he could reach, and shook her. "a.m. or p.m.?" he repeated.
"a.m."
"Oh, that's okay then. I have twelve more hours." He lay down and pulled Elizabeth's long red coat, the one she had been looking for, back over his head. She took it away and muffled his protests with a Mao jacket.