Route 666 Read online

  The manager nodded. “If I had a car like that, I wouldn’t want to sell it either. So, where you gals headed now?”

  “We thought we’d do a bit of sight seeing here and then head on over to Jacksonville tomorrow.”

  “There’s a few good places to visit around here. Last week I took a tour of the local Frank Lloyd Wright house with my husband. It’s well worth a visit. It’s not in the best condition, not looking new and all the furniture designed for it is gone, but it’s still beautiful. The tours are to raise money to restore it to its full former glory.”

  “Now that sounds interesting and a worthy donation of funds. Where is it?”

  “It’s called Spring House and there’s a website with directions on how to get there. It’s out on Okeeheepkee Road.”

  “Thanks for the info. I think that is definitely on the list if they’re open today. Before I go, I’d like to order us some coffees to go.”

  While waiting for their coffees, Lexie looked up Spring House. Unfortunately, public tours were only every second Sunday and private tours had to be booked twenty-four hours in advance. “We’ll just add it to our ‘come back and see’ list for the return trip home,” she said under her breath. Google suggested some other viable destinations for her and Connie to consider.

  “Here you are,” the manager said, returning with their coffees. “Did you want anything else?”

  “No, that’ll do us for now, thanks.”

  Lexie watched as the manager rang them up, then paid with using her phone app.

  “You ladies have a safe trip,” the manager said to her as she left.

  “What took so long?” Connie grumbled as she came out.

  “Manager felt a little chatty and then they had to make our coffees. It wasn’t that long. Only fifteen minutes or so.” They began walking to the car.

  “Well, it felt like forever with nothing to do,” Nash piped up, peeking out of her purse.

  “Come on then, let’s get in the car and go.”

  “Petsmart and then lunch?” Connie asked, a hopeful note in her voice.

  “From the look on your face, I’m guessing you were looking at places to eat while I was inside.”

  “Yeah, well, you were taking forever and it smelled so good everytime the door opened. Anyways, we looked on Yelp and TripAdvisor and found the cutest sounding place with food that sounds great.”

  “What kind of food?”

  “Oh, it’s a cafe, it sells, you, know cafe food.”

  “Cafes can sell all kinds of different food.” Lexie looked at the guilty expressions all three wore. She sighed. “You just looked at a couple of pictures real quick and saw the overall rating, didn’t you? You picked this place because it had a cutesy name or something.” She unlocked the T-bird’s driver side door, climbed in, and reached across the seat to let Connie in. Connie climbed in and placed their handbags and Nelson on the back seat.

  “Well, it is a cool sounding place,” Nelson defended their choice. “It’s Bada Bean. Like ‘bada bing bada boom, only a bean, right?”

  “Of course it is. Okay, we’ll check it out. Petsmart first.” Connie knew Lexie would have suggested the place first if she'd been the one to spot it, but since she hadn’t, she was going to play it cool.

  “Bada Bean,” Connie heard Lexie giggle softly. “That’s a good one.” She pulled up Google maps to find the nearest Petsmart and set it to give verbal driving directions. “Okay, everybody ready?”

  “Yup,” replied Connie.

  “Mmmhmm,”said Nelson, Nash echoing the sentiment.

  “Alrighty, let’s jam,” she said, turning the ignition. Once she left the parking lot, Connie glanced over at her and asked, “So, are we still on for doing a bit of exploring later today? Take in a museum or something?”

  “Yup, if we’ve got time before they shut. The manager at the cafe suggested one place but they only do tours every other Sunday. I thought you could look at some of the places Google suggested and ones we think sound interesting, we can look at a bit closer when we drop the guys back off at the hotel.”

  “Yeah, we can look at their websites together on my laptop. Or on yours. Whatever.”

  “We can look in the hotel lobby before we go on up, too. They might have brochures for places without a website, plus they might have some Google didn’t list at the top where I could see them. I just looked at top listings on my phone real quick while I waited for the coffee.”

  “We should’ve grabbed some brochures earlier. We could have looked at them and decided over lunch.”

  “Yeah, we should do that next time.” They pulled into the Petsmart parking lot. “Okay, guys, we can take you in this store openly, because it’s a pet store. So you can help us pick out the stuff, okay? Just don’t talk if there’s anyone near enough to hear.”

  “Guys?” Connie prompted when neither of them responded to Lexie.

  “Mmmmf,” she heard.

  “Sorry, sorry,” Nelson said. “Uh, yeah, so we have a bit of a situation here and it is totally not our fault.”

  Lexie pulled into a space. “What do you mean ‘a situation’? What did you two do now?” she asked, putting the car into park and switching off the engine.

  “Well, you know that peanut butter jar we’ve been eating out of? Well, Nash kinda got himself stuck. I just got him out, so it’s all good except for the part where he has p.b. all over him and he’s kinda glued his eyes and mouth shut. I licked his nose, though, so no need to panic cuz he can breathe real good now.”

  Connie took off her seatbelt and twisted around to look. “Oh my gawd! Nelson, you have it all over your face and paws, and goodness, it’s on your chest and all over the seat, too!”

  Lexie pinched the bridge of her nose. “We’ll have to see if they can do a groom, I guess. And get some wipes and wipe down Nash and the seat.”

  “Maybe they’ll clean Nash, too,” Connie said.

  “Ugh, I’m not carrying him. I’ll get that shit all over me. That’s a nope.”

  “I’ve got some napkins in my purse. Nash, I’m going to wrap you in one of the napkins like it’s a towel, okay? Then put you in my purse. Don’t tear the paper or do anything else to get that stuff all over the inside of my purse, okay?”

  “Mmmf,” Nash replied, bobbing his head up and down.

  Lexie got out of the car and let Nelson out. “Now, you stay right next to me, and walk at heel. Connie, pass me one of those napkins. I can at least wipe off the bottom of his feet some.”

  Once the two bounty hunters were ready, the two sisters carried them into the store. They made a beeline to the grooming counter.

  “Yes, hello,” Connie said. “Is it possible to book an emergency groom?”

  “It’ll be at least a couple of hours before they’d be ready,” the assistant groomer replied.

  “Oh, that’s fine,” Connie replied. Lexie lifted Nelson up onto the counter. “He and his buddy got into an argument with a jar of peanut butter and lost. We’d like to have them both groomed.”

  The assistant pushed over two pieces of paper. “Just fill this in and sign please.”

  Lexie took the paper and began to fill them in using the provided pen on the counter. Once completed, she pushed them across the counter.

  The assistant nodded as she looked to see every line was complete. “Okay, so a chihuahua and a rat terrier.”

  Connie took Nash out of her handbag. “Umm, no, Ben,” she said, reading the assistant’s name tag. “Nash is an actual rat.”

  Ben started, wide-eyed. “We groom dogs and we groom cats. I am not sure we are allowed to groom...rodents.”

  Lexie sighed but Connie wasn’t having it. “This store sells rabbits, hamsters, mice, and rats, and the vet here sees to them all. But you’re telling me that you won’t groom my Nash? Your grooming service is prejudiced against him because he’s a rodent and not a puppy or a kitty?” her voice became louder with each word she spoke.

  Ben swallowed. “Let me just
go ask the manager.” He hurried away, eager to get away from Connie.

  “There’s no need to be irate with him” Lexie said in a low voice. “He can’t help it if those are the rules.”

  “If they can wash a kitten, they can wash a damned rat,” Connie insisted. “Especially as they sell them to folks as pets.”

  “Hi, I’m Tom Jones, the manager. Ben tells me you ladies bought a rat from us and have brought it into today with your dog to be groomed.”

  “Yes! See, we came in to buy Nash, that’s our sweet little rat guy, a new habitat and he got loose in the car and got into a jar of peanut butter that was in a bag on the back seat. And our dog smelled the peanut butter and decided he should get some too, and well, look at them.”

  Tom looked at them. “You’re buying a new habitat today?”

  “Oh my, yes! A big one. He needs one with lots of room to play and sleep.” Connie laid it on thick.

  “And a new harness and leash for Nelson,” Lexie added for good measure.

  “That’s our chi,” Connie explained, inclining her head to indicate him. “He also needs a sweater, and a car seat and seat belt.”

  Tom nodded. “We don’t usually groom animals other than cats and dogs, but I can see you’re in need. We’ll make an exception this time.” He turned to face Ben. “Take Nash and Nelson on back.” Ben nodded and picked up Nash first. “We’ll text you when they’re ready.”

  “Thank you so much,” Lexie said.

  “Yes, thank you, we really appreciate it,” Connie agreed. “We’ll just leave them in your capable hands.” She turned to Lexie. “Come on, let’s go get their stuff, load it into the car, and wipe the seat down.”

  Over a hundred dollars later, the two sisters had their task complete.

  “Well, they’ve not texted us yet, so why don’t we go ahead and go eat?” Connie suggested.

  Lexie took another wet wipe out of the packet and gave the back seat a final wipe. “I think...whoa, is that Ben?”

  “Alieeeens! They’re aliens!” he screamed as he ran across the parking lot, eyes wide with terror.

  “Oh shit,” Connie said just as both of their phones began to blow up with text messages from the store.

  The sisters hurried inside to pandemonium. Tom ran towards them.

  “Just take them and go. No charge,” he said, his face white.

  Lexie swallowed. “I’m sorry, did something happen?”

  “Your dog began singing while in the tub,” he said. “Singing! I don’t know what kind of prank you’re pulling, but it scared my staff. Ben lit out of here like his pants were on fire when your rat began asking about interdimensional travelers that might have passed through. I hope you got all the secret footage you wanted for your YouTube channel or whatever but I strongly suggest you not step foot in my store again. In fact, I will be notifying Head office to make sure you can’t pull this on anyone else!”

  “Heyyyyy, Lexiieeee,” Nelson called out cheerily as he peered from behind the counter.

  “Ah…haha,” Lexie laughed weakly. “You caught us. Okay, Nelson, they know now, stop making it look like the dog can talk.”

  “Man, y’all are no fun,” Nelson grumbled. “Come on, Nash. We’re blowing this popsicle stand.” The two bounty hunters sauntered through the open counter gateway, Ben having forgotten to secure it in his mad dash.

  Connie glanced around as customers and the rest of the staff watched them, accusations of guilt painted upon their faces. “We really didn’t think things would go this far,” she mumbled, scooping up Nash. “You guys are in big trouble,” she hissed at the pair.

  They hurried out to the car where they fastened the pair in.

  As Lexie backed out of the parking space, they heard Nelson say, “Bada bing, bada groom.”

  “That’s it!” Connie shouted. “You two are grounded!”

  Chapter 11

  Just Forget About It

  “What the hell were you thinking?” Lexie exploded. “Seriously? You two thought it a great idea to just start talking to the staff and run around like a pair of hooligans?” She glared at the two bounty hunters.

  Nash sat on his back legs, studiously examining his front paws. “I forgot I was a rat,” he mumbled.

  “Come again? You forgot you were a rat? You were at a damned pet store being groomed after getting stuck in a jar of effing peanut butter and you’re telling me you damned well forgot you were a fucking rat?”

  Nash looked back up at her, his nose and whiskers twitching in righteous indignation. “Okay, fine. My mouth was glued shut with peanut butter, which, by the way, I would be happy to never ever see another spoonful of! My paws were also stuck with it, my ears were gunked with it, the whole nine yards. So when I could hear and see and felt my mouth was free, I was so relieved that for a split second I forgot what body I was in and where I was. I sat up and said ‘thank you’. You'd have thought I’d threatened to blow up the damned planet or something.”

  “Yeah, then when he realized his mistake he tried to fix it, right?” Nelson wheedled. “He asked if they’d not met an interdimensional traveller before. I tried to let the dude know that we didn’t usually borrow bodies, especially of animals, but that just weirded him out even more. It was a real shit show. We were only running around because a lady who was picking up her Pekingese thought we should be put in a cage and the police called. No way did we want to end up being dissected in some lab or something! Then the manager tried to calm everyone down but he was super mad and yelling, too.”

  “Yeah,” Nash said. “He was pretty upset. He thought the whole thing was an internet prank.”

  “And he needs to keep right on thinking that,” Connie said. “Those poor men. They were nice as pie, trying to do their damnedest to help us out of a bind when we didn’t have an appointment and they usually only do cats and dogs. Lexie, we should send a muffin basket with an apology note, at the very least.”

  “And say what, Connie, hmm? ‘Gee, we’re really sorry that we pranked your store with an animatronic mouse and a dog with a micro-speaker in his collar’? Anything we say or do is just going to make things worse.”

  Connie’s shoulders slumped as she looked away, dejected. Lexie felt guilty for making her sister feel bad, but the sight of the two bounty hunters simply blowing the severity of their actions off as no big deal, made her see red. Before she could say anything more, her phone buzzed. She picked it up and glanced at the incoming message.

  “Oh! It’s Turner! He says he’s out of the hospital!” Lexie excitedly selected his number and rang him. “Hey, Turner! You feeling all right? Oh. I see.” She paused. “Uh huh, well, we’re in Tallahassee, actually. Just sitting in our hotel room, trying to decide if we are going sightseeing or leaving early to go on to Jacksonville. Um, yeah, we stopped by his house. He didn’t answer the door. We wanted to give him a piece of our minds- oh, you know what he did? You were there? Oh my gosh, Turner!” Lexie turned to face Connie, placing the phone against her chest to try to muffle the sound. “He says he was there when the portal was opened,” she hissed.

  “Whaaaat?” Connie exclaimed.

  `’I can still hear you,” Turner said when Lexie put the phone back to her ear.

  “Sorry, Con’s here and I was just trying to keep her in the loop.” She pressed the screen to put him on speaker.

  “I don’t want to talk about any of it, okay? It happened and it’s over. You know, I was fully aware the entire time that dude was riding around in my body. I was just unable to take back control or kick him out. I’d like to just move on and forget, though.”

  “Sure, sure,” Lexie said. “Um, I have you on speaker.”

  “Hi, Connie. I’m okay, you’ve got no need to worry. I was released today and I go back to work tomorrow.”

  “You were there? So you saw him open that portal?”

  “I experienced the whole deal. Listen, you two steer clear. Let the police handle this, though I don’t know what they'll do if they
figure out even a sliver of what actually happened. Right now they think he only slipped me some drugs.”

  Lexie put her finger up in a ‘shh’ gesture intended for Connie and the two bounty hunters. “Okay, Turner. Don’t you worry about us, we’re just going to enjoy a day out at the beach tomorrow and then drive the rest of the way up to go see Daddy.”

  “Don't tell Dad, whatever you do! Not even the only slipped me drugs version!”

  “Okay, okay! We met you for breakfast and had fun with you at the beach,” Connie replied.

  “That’s right, nothing else,” Lexie chimed in agreement.

  Turner grunted. “Glad we’re in agreement. Hopefully the police catch his sorry ass and put him in jail before he can do that to anyone else.”

  “Oh, he won’t be doing that again, I’m sure,” Connie said. Lexie gave her a ‘what are you doing?’ look. “I mean, he only did it to you because he lost his job, right?”

  “You two went over there, I know you did,” Turner said flatly. “The police already mentioned seeing your car on the complex gate’s security footage.

  “He wasn’t in, we just knocked!” Connie blurted out.

  “Look, I don’t care. It’s like I’ve already told the cops. If you went there, it was to yell at him for slipping me drugs. He’s not been seen since the night after I went over there, when he was caught on camera buying beer at the gas station up the street. They think he did a runner and sooner or later, they’ll catch up to his ass. Now, I’m tired and I have to get up early to open the store. We’re holding a meeting before it opens to address things with staff. Love you, okay? Come see me again soon, we’ll have a good time with just the three of us and no hijacking whatevers along for a body ride.”

  “Night, Turner,” his sisters replied as one. Turner disconnected the call.

  “He knows we were there,” Nash said. “But he didn’t mention us, even once.”

  “He probably didn’t realize you had come through and ended up in these bodies,” Connie said in Turner’s defense.