Pheromone Fangs
The sign outside the Bates Motel 13 lobby promised a continental breakfast.
Underneath, someone had added MARSHMALLOWS in uneven chicken scratch.
The handwriting looked strangely familiar, but before I could place it, the thought of marshmallows overpowered my brain.
When I entered the breakfast room, every mannequin from the motel was already standing in line. They extended from the buffet counter all the way past the vending machines, each one holding an empty paper plate.
I walked directly to the front.
I turned toward the mannequins.
“Does anyone have a problem with me cutting in line?”
Nobody said anything.
“I’ll take the silence as a no,” I said. “Silence is also an answer.”
The continental breakfast was displayed beneath several flickering heat lamps, although none of the food required heating.
The grapes were plastic. The cakes were preserved beneath glass. Several French baguettes had been mounted in decorative positions as though they had been professionally taxidermied.
“This is not breakfast,” I said. “This is a mannequin diet.”
At the far end of the counter stood a man with his back to me. Most of him remained hidden in shadow, but I could see the edge of a familiar cape.
A label stitched into the lining read:
DESIGNED IN MILAN. MADE IN A SWEATSHOP.
He was polishing a cluster of plastic grapes with a small, bloodstained cloth.
“I’ve seen that cape before,” I whispered.
Before I could place it, the beating of wings erupted above us.
A swarm of bats descended through the lobby, carrying Chicken between them.
Chicken floated majestically over the breakfast room in his badly bat printed silky robe, tiny velvet slippers, and miniature dark sunglasses. The bats held him beneath his wings as though he were arriving on a sacred cloud.
Chicken lowered his sunglasses and looked down at us.
“I guess you weren’t joking about laying low,” said the mysterious man. “You know this motel only accepts counterfeit money, which explains why the guests are all plastic.”
“You thought I was too good to set foot in a place like this, but I’ve stayed here several times while ghost-hunting with Hollywood witches.”
He crossed the room, seized me by the point of my hat, and pulled me toward him.
“Let go of my pointy hat!” I shouted. “You know it’s attached to my hair.”
“I am sick and tired of you, you unhinged buffoon witch.”
“Then unfollow me and block me so you never have to see me again.”
“No. I don’t have the time or emotional energy for that.”
“Chicken,” he ordered, “hold her feet while I take the heart.”
The overfed chicken waddled across the room, huffing with every step. The chicken shoved both of my feet together, adjusted them until they were perfectly aligned, and then planted his entire body across my feet like a feathery paperweight.
"Don't you dare lay an egg on me!" I shouted.
The mysterious man leaned in and whispered in my ear.
“Don’t you understand? I only want three things from you.”
“Your heart.”
“Your unwavering worship for all eternity, including liking all my posts and watching every one of my stories.”
“And take my bats out for their evening flight while I go on dates with those fine-ass Hollywood witches.”
He exposed his fangs and leaned toward my neck.
“Just to show you that I know how to treat you right,” he said, “I’m going to sedate you first.”
“Get your pheromone fangs off me!”
He stopped then stared at me.
“Why do you always have to say the weirdest things?”
“How the hell do you even come up with this shit?”
“They’re how you seduce women, aren’t they?”
“They’re pheromone fangs.”
I looked down at Chicken, hoping he would look up and meet my eyes with his crossed ones.
“After all the cheap caviar I bought for you!” I cried. “I even went to great lengths to clip coupons for it, and this is how you repay me?”
Chicken lowered his gaze to the floor.
“And if you must know, the luxury caviar he overfeeds you to purchase your fleeting, counterfeit affection came from the very same pregnant fish as the caviar I gave you.”
“The only difference is that his came in a tiny rhinestone-covered jar with an automatic-opening lid.”
The mysterious man rolled his eyes.
“It was imported directly from the polar bears that fill the luxury water bottles,” he said.
Before the mysterious man could lean any closer, the Innkreeper snatched the taxidermy French baguette from the table and struck him across the back of the head.
The mysterious man stumbled forward, brushing against my shoulder.
“If anyone is going to Houdini that unhinged witch,” the innkreeper declared, raising the baguette like a lightsaber, “it will be me.”
He lowered it slightly.
“Besides, she still owes me the three-star review she promised.”
Meanwhile, Chicken remained sprawled across my feet, half asleep and wheezing contentedly like an overstuffed, feathery pillow.
The Innkreeper stared down at him with disgust.
“I’m not touching that thing. It could have salmonella.”
He grabbed two loose mannequin arms from the floor, positioned them beneath Chicken’s round body like a pair of enormous salad tongs, and carefully lifted him off my feet.