Chapter 22
The Photo Album
Another day came and went for the coffee shop and with the sunset, it was time to close up. The door was locked and the sign was flipped to “Closed”. Before they got started on the final cleanup of the day, Peggy and Alan were taking a short break at one of the tables which had some leftover baked goods for them to snack on.
Alan, the young, green man with bat wing-shaped ears, let out a sigh while staring gloomily at his red opal-like tea. Peggy understood why he’d have a dark cloud hanging over his head and was sympathetic.
Today was a bit hard for the goblin who had to endure a little berating from an irate customer, an older gentleman with graying hair who had lost patience with him. Most people probably wouldn’t make a big deal of a minute or two delay, but this particular customer criticized Alan strongly for it and even threatened to complain to the manager over getting his valuable time wasted.
“You okay?” Peggy asked.
Alan softly replied, “Yeah.” But despite his answer, he didn’t look okay.
“Still bothered by that guy?” Peggy asked.
Alan just shrugged.
Peggy personally thought that the customer’s treatment of her junior was unfair. But nonetheless she tried to smooth things over by helping Alan apologize to the customer. Her efforts appeared to do nothing to appease the customer, however, and he continued to grumble harsh complaints as he left the shop with what he came here for.
“Hey, don’t worry about it,” Peggy said. “Sure you might have made a mistake, but I think he was unfair to go at you like that.”
“Have you ever had to go through something like that?” Alan asked.
“Oh, loads of times,” Peggy replied. “I still do, in fact. Although it’s not as often as before I moved into this town.”
“How have you dealt with them?” Alan asked.
Peggy sat back and looked up thoughtfully for a bit while going “Hmm,” with her arms crossed.
“Well,” she said after some thinking, “it depends on the situation. Most of the time, I reflect on what I might have done wrong and think about what I should do next time so it doesn’t happen again. But with cases like that customer, sometimes I wished I could just tell them off. There should be a public service announcement commercial for guys like him.”
Alan understood what Peggy was trying to say, although he’s never heard of a commercial before.
Peggy continued. “If it were me, I’d say to them this: Hi, I know that your time is precious, you’re having a bad day, and we might have made a mistake. But for something as small as maybe a little bit longer wait of one or two minutes, please think before yelling at us for wasting your precious time or threaten to go to the manager. It’s unfair, doesn’t help us, and definitely won’t help you.”
As she spoke, Boss came out and took a seat at the table. He popped a cookie in his mouth, and after he swallowed, he said, “It’d be great if people actually listened to an announcement like that.”
And for their own sake, he silently added to himself.
There were a few people among the patrons staring daggers at the overly harsh customer who the vampire recognized as members of the royal guard. That guy’s going to be in for a nasty surprise, but that’s just karma.
“I wouldn’t worry too much about that guy,” the vampire continued. “But I do think that a little self-reflection, like Peggy said, is a good idea. Just keep in mind what you can do better on for next time.”
“Got it,” Alan said, nodding his head. “By the way, what’s with all that rumbling and thumping I’m hearing.”
Boss followed Alan’s gaze up to the ceiling and frowned at the noise coming from above.
“George, Uncle Theo!” the vampire called out at the top of his lungs. “What are you doing up there? You better not be making a mess!”
George, Boss’ young, part-lion son came thundering down the stairs and burst onto the sales floor.
“Hey, hey!” the ten-year-old cub shouted. “Look what I found.”
He held over his head a big, old book bound in red leather. Uncle Theo, the man with a house for a head, followed at the lion cub’s heels carrying more books.
“What’s that you got there?” Peggy asked.
“They’re photo albums,” explained Uncle Theo. “George and I were digging through storage to look for things to donate to his school for something and we found them tucked away at the corner.”
Boss frowned disapprovingly at his family and said, “I wish you’d ask me first before doing that. This place used to be owned by a detective, you know. There could still be stuff left behind that could be dangerous.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that, Nephew,” said Uncle Theo. “The only thing we found that looked like it belonged to the previous owner was a file cabinet filled with folders on past cases that looked like they hold dirt on the kingdom’s most rich and powerful.”
Boss scowled and said, “That’s the very definition of ‘dangerous stuff’!” And then to himself, he muttered, “I can’t believe I never noticed something like that in almost fifteen years. Could it have been cloaked by a magic spell that only just wore off? Either way, I’m going to have to burn it, cabinet and all. No later than tonight. If I don’t, it’ll spark another Shadow Civil War.”
Peggy whispered to Alan, “Let’s pretend we didn’t hear any of that.”
“Agreed,” the young goblin seconded.
“Anyway,” George cut in. “Enough with the boring stuff -!”
“I wouldn’t call a cabinet full of dangerous information, boring,” Peggy muttered.
“-check out these!”
George laid out the red photo album on the table and flipped it open to a random page. There were pictures of a lanky boy with pale blue skin and black hair around George’s age, who smiled and waved at the camera while in the middle of doing different things. In one picture, the boy was building a huge sand castle. In another, he was sitting down while a wedding celebration took place behind him.
Peggy stared at the pictures and then asked, “Are these pictures of Boss when he was a kid!?”
“No doubt about it,” said Uncle Theo. “Those are pictures of Nephew during his youth! Oh, look! Here’s one of his baby pictures!”
He pointed to a photo of a pale blue baby lying on his back while pulling his teeny-tiny feet to his mouth.
“Aw,” went Peggy. “You used to be so cute, Boss!”
"Yeah, yeah, baby pictures and all that,” Boss mumbled impatiently. “Let’s move on to the next page, please.”
George flipped the page again and exclaimed, "Oh! This is an interesting one.”
“What is it?” Peggy asked.
Curious about the “interesting” photo, she and Alan looked over the lion cub’s shoulders. Their eyes fell on a particular photo the lion cub pointed to of a boy dressed in a tuxedo, cape and top hat, flashing the peace sign next to an opened treasure vault door that covered an entire wall. Beyond the door was the glow of shining gold and glittering jewels. Judging by the angle of the shot and his arm extending out of frame, the photo was a selfie that the boy took himself. Although the boy’s face was covered by a smiling theater mask, his blue, triangle-shaped ears exposed his vampire nature.
In one swift motion, the present-day vampire man reached down and removed the photo from the album before tucking it away in his shirt pocket.
“What?” he asked when everyone looked at him.
Peggy asked, “Boss, was that you next to an opened vault full of treasure?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Peggy,” Boss said. “Oh, look! More photos from my childhood.”
George flipped a page and then cried out, “Oh, hey! Here's another of Dad's baby pics. This one's of him potty-!"
Boss snapped his fingers and there was a flash of light.
George blinked. Confused, he asked, "What was I going to say again?"
Peggy shrugged and replied, "I've no idea. But what's with the weird gap in this page? It looks like there used to be a picture here, but it's gone now."
"Huh, that's weird," went George. "I wonder what happened to it."
Uncle Theo suggested, "Perhaps there was never anything there."
No one noticed something burning in the trash can right beneath the bar counter. Quite a lot of somethings that match the number of unusual free spaces in an album that should be full already.
"Oh well," George shrugged. "Onto the next page."
He flipped to another page and then George exclaimed, “Oh, hey! Is that Mom?”
George jabbed his finger over the picture of a lion cub in a blue sundress. She looked no older than George was now and had a rather sassy smile on her face. And she was not alone. Standing at the lion girl’s right was another lion cub wearing a white shirt, blue bow tie and suspender shorts. At the lion girl’s left was Boss. They were joined by a werewolf, a human girl with dark ebony skin, and another human girl that sort of resembled the Head Magus.
"Who's the other lion cub?" Alan asked.
George answered, "Oh, that's my uncle Gabe. He's Mom's twin brother. He's usually super busy with work, but he visits us now and then."
The same gang of kids showed in in many more pictures, taken in different places during different seasons. There was a picture of them next to an igloo on a snow-covered plain. Another picture had the gang swimming at the lake during a sunny, summer day. And then there was a picture of them having a picnic in a forest surrounded by a shower of autumn-colored leaves.
“Wow, it looks like you guys used to do everything together,” Peggy said.
“That we did,” said Boss. Peggy noticed how the vampire’s eyes softened with a hint of sadness in them.
"Did? You don't anymore?" Alan asked.
Boss chuckled dryly.
"Of course not," he said. "One of the sad things about getting older is that you end up doing less things with the friends you used to do everything together. It just naturally slows until you stop altogether."
Didn't seem all that naturally slow to me, though, thought Peggy.
Once George turned a page, many of Boss’ friends suddenly disappeared. During the Boss’ teen years, only the werewolf and two new faces showed up. One of the new faces was a girl who was a vampire like Boss, and the other was an Asian human boy, who also happened to be Boss’ stepbrother.
“My parents separated when I was around ten,” Boss explained. “A few years later, Dad remarried and that was how I got a new brother. I’d say we got along fairly well.”
Peggy wondered what happened to Boss' missing friends, but she didn't have the guts to ask. She could tell that it was just one of those things that was better left alone.
After George flipped through a few more pages, something caught Peggy’s eyes.
“Say, what’s up with this photo?” she asked, pointing to the one at the top right corner of the right page. “It’s completely white.”
“Huh?” went Boss. He glanced at the white square that had Peggy’s finger on it, and his face instantly lit up in alarm. “Wait, Peggy! Don’t touch that!”
But his warning came too late. The moment Peggy touched the photo, there was a flash of light.
“Ah!” she cried out. “My eyes!”
That light was really bright and momentarily blinded Peggy.
“What was that, Boss?” she asked.
There was no answer.
“Boss?”
There was still no answer.
“George? Alan? Uncle Theo?”
Not a peep.
“Ha ha, very funny, guys,” Peggy said. “Come on, say something. Are you even there?”
Slowly, she opened her eyes. Colorful spots clouded her vision, but they soon disappeared and she could really see again. And when she could see again, she saw that she was no longer in the coffee shop. Instead, she was standing in a field of snow with only a few dead trees for company.
There was only one thing for Peggy to say at a time like this:
"Did I just get dropped in somewhere weird again?"
