After reaching the second wall Ash had seen in the Gatsby diner, he and Abbey were immediately staring down a big, light blue door wedged between two adjacent booths. It had a single golden knob that looked ready to twist, and at the very top of the frame was a white plaque stating:
“PAYING CUSTOMERS ONLY”
Ash felt the air around him shift as Abbey quickly took up a fighting stance the moment she finished reading, her right arm drawn back behind her. Instead of trying to reason with her first, he immediately jumped out in front with his palms up to run defense for the innocent door. “Wait a second! This is the first thing I’ve seen in nearly half an hour that hasn’t been the same set of tables, let’s take this a little slower.”
Abbey held her form, her eyes looking more at the door past her new coworker than at his plea for a measured approach. “Punching tables got me here, so I don’t see why I shouldn’t start punching doors next.” Her black scaled fingers relaxed flexed one by one, each resulting in a faint, almost metallic sounding tick as her fist tightened.
“Let’s at least just try opening it first, if it’s locked up tight, you can knock it down.”
“Oh,” she said as she dropped her arm back down, “yeah I guess we should see if it’s locked first.”
Ash turned back around, feeling like he at least bought the door a couple more seconds as he reached for the knob. His hand tightened around it as he looked up at the plaque again, remembering that he was at least served coffee earlier, even if he didn’t pay for it. However, as he twisted the knob in his hand, it barely gave way, refusing to budge.
“Hey,” the pair heard a familiar voice, “I can’t let customers use the bathroom until you pay for your food, Gatsby never lets me hear the end of just giving people the key before paying.”
Both Ash and Abbey spun around, spotting Betty standing next to one of the door adjacent booths, holding the same sludge filled coffee pot she had earlier.
Abbey crossed her arms, already taking up a defensive stance. “Like I’m paying for that gar–”
“Right!” Ash cut in, “of course that makes sense.” He quickly went along with it, praying that Abbey would do the same. “I’ve been here before though, so it’s not like I’m going to skip out on the bill. I’ll be done by the time you get back with the check and can pay right after.”
Betty let out a small sigh, acting as if she had heard that before, even if it had been from someone different. “Alright alright,” she set the coffee pot down on the booth table nearby as she dug around in a pocket on the front of her apron. She quickly fished out a small silver key that was attached to a much larger keychain that had a big metallic looking slab at the end of it that was nearly three times the key’s size.
She held it out, leaving Ash to grab it appreciatively, while Abbey studied the interaction over his shoulder. “Just don’t use too much toilet paper,” her tone swapped to a hushed whisper, “Gatsby counts the squares at the end of the night.” Ash silently nodded, taking the key from Betty’s grip. His hand trembled a little when he felt the full weight of the attached keychain, but he quickly regained control of it.
The hanging lights flashed without a warning this time, plunging the diner, and both Divers into total darkness for a couple of seconds. Both Ash and Abbey had grown accustomed to it by now, and when the lights flared back to life Betty was nowhere to be seen. Ash’s grip on the key tightened as he felt the cold metal dig into his palm. Ash turned to face Abbey, key still in hand. “Did she disappear like that on you too when you last saw her?”
“Yup,” Abbey frowned, “she gave me a cup of salty mud and ran off into the dark.” She looked out into the distance, the wall stretching on for what seemed like forever with matching booths lining the entire way without a single customer. Ash turned back to the door, placing his free hand against its smooth blue surface as he looked at the keyhole just beneath its golden doorknob. It was an easy enough job to slide the key inside, but as he tried to twist it to the left it barely budged. With the little wiggle room he had, he jiggled the key a bit, hoping it would make the process a little easier.
“O-Occupied! I’ll be out in just a second!” A muffled, and panicked voice that sounded like it was fighting for breath called out from the other side of the door. The voice was familiar, but its hurried tone wasn’t. Ash recognized it pretty quickly, since he had just heard it a minute ago; it was Betty, Gatsby’s one lone waitress.
“Betty?” Ash asked from this side of the door. “You just gave me the bathroom key a second ago, what are you doing in there?”
“I said I’ll be out in a second!” The voice was much louder this time, panic still plain but now laced with frustration.
“You’ve been in there long enough!” A new voice boomed, shaking the entire diner with a thunderous echo that made every hanging light sway. Ash reflexively let go of the key, leaving it to hang inside the keyhole as he took a step back, accidentally bumping back first into Abbey. She put a scaled hand on Ash’s shoulder, this time without enough force to make his joints pop, but just enough to keep him steady on his feet.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“I’m not paying you to potty squat!” One of the hanging lights nearby Ash and Abbey burst into sharp fragments, suddenly littering the floor as the diner got just a little darker. “Get out there and start pulling people in!” The diner quaked with each word, sending chairs dancing away from their tables before some fell onto their sides with a clamoring thud.
“What the hell is that?” Ash finally found the strength to ask, his dead heart beating faster than when he was alive.
“I dunno but it’s giving me a headache…” Abbey was holding a scaled hand over one of her ears with a wince as the remaining lights above them continued to swing back and forth.
“I’m sorry…” Ash heard from the other side of the door. The voice was much smaller this time with its frustration completely replaced by monotone compliance.
“I’m sorry…”
“I’m sorry…”
“I’m sorry…”
“I’m sorry…”
“I’m sorry…”
“I’m sorry…”
“I’m sorry…”
“I’m sorry…”
“I’m…”
The voice stopped. The lights stopped swaying, staying completely still. The diner was completely cloaked in dead silence, before a single, loud click of the door’s lock broke through the quiet.
Without being touched by either Ash or Abbey, the light blue door slowly started to open inwards with its hinges groaning with aged effort. The white plaque, sitting atop the door as an ever present warning, fell from its post to land on the ground with a hollow, plastic thump.
Through the doorway was exactly what Ash would have expected, sans one apologizing waitress that he had definitely heard inside. It was a spacious but single occupant bathroom, with a blue checkered tile floor, one small looking porcelain throne, and a rusty metal sink hanging underneath a foggy mirror. Without really thinking, Ash took a step inside, passing through the threshold with Abbey quickly following after him.
“Pretty big bathroom for just one shitter.” Abbey couldn’t help but mention as she looked at the toilet, spreading her arms to see if her wingspan could go from wall to wall. She’d need another Abbey if she wanted to be able to have hands on both walls at the same time.
“It’s a pretty big diner for four customers.” Ash responded, wondering where Gray and Ren could be inside of this mess. He walked over to the sink and twisted the knob marked “C” for, presumably, cold water. Twisting it the right didn’t make the faucet cry, and neither did the left. As he reached for the second knob to see if that one worked Abbey caught his attention over by the toilet.
“Hey, think that guy really counts the tp squares?” Abbey quickly swiped a half full roll of toilet paper from the holder next to the toilet.
“I’m not putting anything past the guy that has both a sign and a lock on the bathroom to stop people from pissing out his coffee before they pay for it.” Ash looked back towards the sink again, his hands resting carefully around the edges to avoid any particularly rusty spots.
“This is starting to look like a dead end too, and just when it felt like we were getting somewhere.” Ash thought as he reached for the second knob, giving it a twist to the right, and then to the left to pretty much the same dry result. He looked up towards the mirror next, unable to really see anything past its blurry surface. “You mentioned a center earlier,” Ash rubbed at the mirror with the corner of one of his sleeves, “does this bathroom feel any closer to the center to you?”
“It feels a lot more center…ey than the table maze.” Abbey stretched out the toilet paper roll, letting a long line of paper fall onto the floor.
“Is that just a hunch or can you actually feel something in here?” No matter how much Ash tried to rub away the fogged up surface of the mirror, it stayed exactly the same.
“Bit of both!” Abbey let the now empty roll drop onto the ground as she tapped her scaled fingers against one of the walls she was touching earlier. “That waitress, Betty? This room feels like her.”
“I don’t really think I follow, but this whole place is her, isn’t it?” Ash turned away from the sink, looking over at Abbey who was still tapping on different spots of the wall. “The diner, the little stretch of street outside of it, even the coffee that tastes like seawater, they’re all from her aren’t they?”
“Yeeaaah but,” Abbey trailed off as she suddenly smiled when tapping a particular spot. “Theeeere it is.” Her scaled finger dug into the wall as she scratched it hard enough to leave a mark, and then another as she made a gray little X. Ash didn’t have to ask what Abbey was about to do as he saw her take up the same stance she had in front of the door just minutes earlier.
She dug her heels into the blue checkered tile as she squatted down low, her right arm slowly drawing behind her as her left raised up as if she was holding an invisible shield. “Stand back, it’s my turn to do what I do best.”
