Best Served Cold

Day Three: Anger

Note: Characters are not mine, they belong to MysteryBen and Artsy. Exhaustion is mine. That I can claim. I can also claim a giant smile when I see your reactions to the story, and occasionally a cackle of manic glee, thank you kindly.

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            Something was pounding in the distance. Arthur squinted, peering out from under his covers. Was it his head? The headache had returned as he lay down, resting just behind his eyes and at the base of his neck.

             No, it wasn’t as rhythmic as the throbbing, it came in bursts of three or four, and someone was yelling. He burrowed back under the covers. To his chagrin, he felt them sliding off his body, leaving him shivering in the cold. “Mystery, what gives?”

             The cold sharpened his senses, allowing him to finally make out Vivi’s voice yelling from the front door.

            The ghost hunt. Did he sleep into the next day?

             Of course he did. Every time he’d woken up he’d just rolled over again, refusing to get up until sleep reclaimed him. But Vivi was banging on the door now, and he wasn’t ready! He stumbled out of bed, shouting, “Hold on Vivi gimme ten minutes!” He tripped over a pile of dirty clothes, landing on his face. Scrambling back to his feet, he checked himself. Smell? Not bad. Clothes? Rumpled from sleeping in them, but he could leave in this state. But his equipment!

             He darted to the front door, yanking it open. “Sorry Viv I AUGH!” He put up a hand to block the glare of the sun. “Sorry I overslept, come on in, I’ll be ready in ten.” He darted back to the hall closet without waiting for a response, swinging it wide to reveal the more mobile tech. He grabbed motion detectors, thermometers, walkie talkies, a compass, and kept grabbing, loading up his arms.

             “Hey Squire, I know this one was your idea, but I just wanna make sure you’re really up for another round? It’s been a little weird the last few da—”

             “Of course I’m sure,” he interrupted, shoving a digital recorder in his pocket. All the serious setup stuff was already in the van, but he firmly believed it never hurt to split up the tech. That way, in case his home or his van suffered a break in, he’d at least have SOMETHING to work with until he could replace things. “Really Vivi, it’s like you’ve never seen me oversleep or something.”

             She snorted, and he could just picture the silly grin on her face, prompting one on his own before he’d even turned around.

             “Yeah, Lewis used to complain he could hardly wake you short of a sledgehammer to the face. Or a handful of bacon under the nose.”

             Arthur paused for a moment, teetering between two emotions. He could feel the choice. He could slide down into despair again, hearing about Lewis, or he could reminisce awhile with Vivi.

             It would probably be the last time in a long time, and Lewis had been his best friend once.

             Forcing a smile, he nodded in acknowledgement. “Yeah. Well it was better than his first couple attempts, hitting me on the head with heavy books or dumping water on me. Couldn’t wake me with the first one. Got serious payback over the second.”

             “Oh? This I didn’t hear about, what’d you do?” She grinned as they headed out to the van with Mystery and an armload of equipment.

             “I hid a traveling alarm in his room that alternated between Everything is Awesome and Let It Go. It took him two days to find it, and he never pulled that again.”