Karma Hotel Ch. 11 Smudge

Margot is disgusted by a dead cigarette addict with Julie. She learns that she's dead.

                   

Chapter 11

Smudge

Margot contemplated the meaning of her exchange with Matthew and gazed around the first floor again. Through a side window, a moving figure outside caught her attention. Is that Julie? Holding a cigarette?
She remembered congratulating Julie on her first anniversary being cigarette-free. She started again, Margot thought. I wish that she had let me help her again. Hypnosis works, but people are afraid of it. Margot had learned to not take it so personally. Nevertheless this still very much annoyed her.
I wonder if I can get through to Julie from where I am. She's standing right there outdoors near the fence. Before she knew what was happening, Margot found herself standing next to Julie who was contemplating the lit end of a cigarette, apparently unaware of Margot.
Julie began pacing back and forth now. Margot noticed Julie's shaky hands that tried to steady the lit cigarette so she could inhale. Angry red globules hovered around like puffer fish with spikes ready to attack. Then Julie's mental buzz became audible:
"How could you do this to me! I love Mark. You know that. What's so bad about him? You never gave me or him a chance. Julie remembered her edict: 'You're not to marry that man! That's final. If you insist on marrying him I'll have no choice but to leave you out of my will'.
Getting the last word now, "Mother! You controlling bitch!"
Julie paced again repeating the argument in her head, word for word. Margot watched her closely now and noticed a ghostly grey smudge hovering around her. It followed her every step as if stuck on her aura. Where have I seen something like this before? Then she remembered in the old Peanuts comic, a kid named 'Pigpen' who was so dirty that swirls of dirt followed his every move.
"Who're you looking at?" A greasy moldy looking miasma sneered at her through the dirty mist hovering around Julie.
It was time for more self-talk. OK Margot. We've dealt with entities before. I'll call this one Smudge. Her therapeutic skills kicked in.
"Apparently I'm looking at you."
"Why?", Smudge challenged showing some brown teeth, bleary eyes glaring.
"Oh, I was watching my friend Julie out here pacing around. Then I discovered you here with her."
"So what?, Smudge sneered. "What's it to you?"
"Why are you with Julie?" You disgusting idiot, she wanted to say.
"Why not?", Smudge replied defiantly.
"Do you enjoy being with her?"
"Of course!" Smudge's eyes turned a dull yellow. "Oh, hang on a minute." He slicked back greasy hair and merged with Julie, momentarily helping her inhale smoke from a cigarette. After her exhale, his expression was one of blessed relief.
He returned to Margot and made a comment. "Don't you think she's held our looks over the years? Whoops! I mean hers, he he. All right, what's up?"
Margot was astonished. Can he really inhale with her? That's beyond disgusting! "Please forgive my curiosity but, How long have you known Julie? When did you first meet her? I'll bet you can remember."
Smudge answered dreamily, "In the attic when she was a kid. She'd sneak up there with her girlfriends and secretly try cig's. I was there to help. Her imaginary best friend." The entity was rather self-satisfied with a title: A girl's best friend.
"Help? Help with what?"
"What do you think! Oh duh...." Rolling his bleary eyes upward and shook his head. "Smoking cigarettes!"
"She was just a child. Why would you...ah. Do that to her? Besides can you actually help someone to smoke cigarettes?"
"I'd coach little Julie each time: 'Take it easy now. Suck it in gradual or else you'll cough. And Mother might hear you.' She took to it like a fish takes to water." Smudge was as proud as a parent whose daughter got straight A's.
Go for it, Margot. What we can do with this dead bar-fly. "By the way, what's your name?"
The entity had to ponder this for a minute. "Oh, I remember now: Bud. Yep, they called me Bud."
"So Bud, what brought you to her house when she was a child anyway?"
"No. It's my house,." Bud replied pointedly. "Her family just bought it, that's all."
Margot paused the dialogue for a moment. "Bud, it looks like you enjoy smoking cigarettes with Julie."
Defensive now, Bud reacted, "Yeah. So?"
"You've known Julie all her life. Remember when she quit smoking?"
"That was sheer misery for me! Damn glad she stopped that bullshit."
"Misery? How do you mean?"
"I was just dying for a cigarette." Then, dreamily, "Julie finally caved in. She and I both found blessed relief. " Bud almost fell into reverie with a smile.
"Bud, have you noticed Julie's health lately. She hacks and coughs every day. Cigarette smoking has caused this."
"No," said Bud. "Can't say that I have noticed anything.", he replied easily.
"Surely you care for her, Bud. Watch Julie hacking and coughing. Notice her shortness of breath."
"And so....I get it. You want us to quit?" Bud snickered. "Hang on minute." Bud caught up and paced with Julie. He matched her inhale as they sucked in smoke together.
Margot was almost nauseated watching Bud whisper in her ear: "Mother! You controlling bitch! I hate you!"
"Mother! You controlling Bitch! I hate you!", Julie screamed. "How dare you disown me! You can go to Hell!" She found another cigarette and lit up.
"I like to remind her of that fact when needed. It's the truth, you know. Mom's a real bitch." Bud studied Margot for a moment. "You don't approve. Right?"
Margot fumed. I'll bet he reminds her more often than just once in a while. "Bud, are you aware that if Julie continues to smoke cigarettes she will suffer bad health. Is that what you want?"
"I know what you're after." Bud grinned at her and replied cynically, "You want us to quit."
"Well, Bud. Let's look at Julie five years from now, still smoking. She's filled with toxins from cigarettes. Her energy looks sick. And she coughs all the time."
Bud raised his eyebrows through the smudge. "Is there a point to this?"
Margot took a direct approach with Bud. "She's getting sick. Don't you care?"
Bud tilted his ghostly head upward and paused, choosing to tell the truth. "How're am I gonna get mine?"
Next, they both distinctly heard, "What about me?" Margot watched another spirit drift near Julie. With dirty hair and a smelly t-shirt, a clearly unwashed woman who looked to have been a long-time resident of the streets. She addressed Bud directly, "It's my turn now, Bud. We made a deal, right? Don't you be selfish."
Looking for a weak place, Dirty/smelly inspected Julie's aura with her version of a butterfly proboscis.
Margot chose to ignore her for time being and instead confronted Bud. "So, you are using Julie for your own desires." She gave him a moment for Bud to consider let that sink in. "How about that. What do you have to say for yourself, Bud? Taking advantage of Julie like this."
Sometimes provoking a less than cooperative entity can bring it out. "Hey Bud. I have a new name for you: User." She was in his face now. "How do you feel about that, User?"
But Bud had more important matters to address. Hovering around Julie, Smelly/Dirty now began to poke Julie mosquito-like, frantically seeking entry. She seemed to be desperate for a smoke.
"She's mine!", Bud yelled. "Get out of here!" Bud put all his focus on blocking the long hose-like proboscis she used to find entry. Smelly/Dirty became a distraction for Bud, trying to block her as she poked around Julies chest, her head....all around.
Margot persisted. "What's the matter, User? Are you afraid to talk with me?"
"Leave me alone!". Bud sneered at Margot and returned to his struggle with Smelly/Dirty.
If only I could dialogue with Julie right now. She needs to know about Bud. What user he is! And that other one - Yuk!
"Julie! Can you hear me at all? Julie, you are being influenced in a bad way right now", Margot hollered at her. "You have a dead guy with you who is using you to smoke because he craves cigarettes. He couldn't care less about your health. He wants you to smoke. His name is Bud and he's totally self-centered. He's using you!"
Julie just stared off and took another drag. She now felt a longing take fire: more, more smoke. Without thinking, Julie lit a new cigarette on the glowing end of the old one. Oblivious of the power struggle happening in her aura, she was nevertheless slammed by waves of desire.
Now Margot understood. Little wonder it's so hard for Julie to quit smoking. And how many people are unwitting hosts for addicted entities? Hoping to get Julie's attention somehow, Margot poked at Julie's shoulder. With an automatic reflex, Julie's hand went to that spot to scratch an itch.
Margot was ecstatic. "Yes Julie! It's me! I'm right here!" She poked her again. Julie looked at her arm for the source of the itch.
"Hello Julie. I'm practically in your face. Julie, listen to me if you can. You have a very nasty entity with you. It's name is Bud and he is amplifying your anger. He's using you."
"Mother you controlling bitch!, Julie yelled into the twilight cloudy Portland sky. "Fuck you! You're not going to spoil my evening." Margot watched her toss a filter tip to the damp ground and entered the house through the kitchen door in the back.


She has no idea that she is host to a dead cigarette addict. Like a glowing ember, this encounter burned within Margot's gut. Julie is feeding two addicts. How can she ever make a conscious choice about health? And I can't get through to her. This is so not OK with me!
What an incredibly vivid dream! Or is it? Maybe. But this is supposed to be Hoyt House where Bob and Lauren and Beny live. And that's just what it is! But, it's not that either....
More confused than ever, her mind began to spin. This must be a dream! And who are those other people? Matthew says that they are all dead. Well, they don't have much to say. I would have thought the dead to be more interesting. And those friends of mine. They won't even look at me to talk to me, as if I wasn't even there!
Desperate for some kind of human connection she blended back through the wall and into the living room. She looked around hopelessly at her friends all going about their business as if waiting for her arrival.
All right, Margot. Enough of this! "Hey, guys. I'm leaving now." They must be deaf, dammit! "I'm going home. Hope to see you all again....one day." No one even nodded in response.
Intending to drive home, she wondered, Where are my car keys? And my purse? I must have spaced it. Uh.... where is my car? Oh Margot, how stupid?
She ghosted herself out to the curb at NW Hoyt Street. Where the hell is it? A wave of shock ripped through her. She backed up to find the porch railing for ghostly stability.
A station wagon slowly lumbered along the rough cobblestoned street and turned into the driveway, slowing to a crawl. The headlamps washed Margot with light and she fell into a trance-like memory.
Police car! Sirens! An ambulance! They're after me. I think they found me too.... Margot streamed herself back to the grisly scene. She gaped at it with her mouth wide open. Oh, my car. My dead body!
She was in a panic. I gotta get back to the house and tell everyone what happened!


"Hey Momma. That drawer in the kitchen is open again. And stuff in it is moving around too. And I know why." Beny was excited about his discovery.
Lauren, sitting at her desk, was momentarily distracted by his announcement. What she wanted to do was to return her focus to a journal of figures for a client instead of hearing about more ghosts in her home. "Hmm. Is that so."
"It's that man with glasses. I just saw him pull it open."
"Man? What man?" She began to feel shivers. A strange man in my kitchen. Now what? "And there's a woman too. She talks all the time about bread."
That sent her alarm bells off. "Umm Beny, how about talking with your father about this."
"I just thought that you would want to know what I saw, Mama. You're the grown-up after all."
Lauren just froze and gave Beny a blank look. "You have a very active imagination. Your father is the one to talk with about it."
"OK." Beny spun around and ran out the back door to the lawn where Bob was pruning a laurel hedge with an electric trimmer.

Bob took one look at Beny and asked, "Are you here to help rake up the twigs and leaves?"
"Ah, sure." Beny could smell the pungent aroma of laurel sap. "Can I ask you a question?"
"Of course. What's on your mind?" He removed his work gloves and looked down at his son.
"Mama doesn't like to talk about weird stuff. I think it makes her nervous."
"I know. But, you must have something important on your mind. Some weird stuff?"
Beny looked down. "Yeah I guess so. Umm, what am I supposed to do when I see spirits in my room?"
That naturally triggered Bob's fascination. "Spirits? What spirits?"
"There is a lady wearing a great big hat. She's always looking for something. I think it's her lost baby."
"Really?" Bob was smiling now. "A lost baby. How sad. Does she talk to you?"
"Nah. She pretty much ignores me, being upset and all. I wish that I could help her find her baby."
"You don't seem to be afraid of her."
"Why be afraid? She seems like a nice person, but so upset about her lost baby." Beny stared absently for a moment. "And there are the other two spirits."
"More of them! In your bedroom?" Maybe I really should be concerned. I need to know more. "What happens when you see them?"
"Well, they offer me bread."
"Bread? What do you mean, bread?"
"You know, to eat. The woman spirit usually says that I should be eating better, that I'm too skinny. So she offers me bread. Sometimes it's round bread shaped like a donut."
A ghost offers my son bread. This probably should not be happening. What do I say? "I hope that you have not accepted her bread."
"I tried it once just to be polite. It didn't taste like anything. Boring. What should I do if she offers me bread again?"
"How about telling her thank you, but that you're busy with homework. Or tell them that you want to go to sleep so don't bother me."
Beny wrinkled his forehead. "So, it's just like talking with regular people?"
"I suppose so. Do you ever feel afraid of them? Or do they seem to be creepy?" Beny shook his head. "Not really. Mostly they're boring. Even that bread was boring."
Bob felt the need to be somewhat protective. "So, just promise that you will tell me if any spirits ever bother you at all."
Beny shook his head. "OK, Daddy. What about that man in the kitchen. He opens a drawer there and moves stuff around."
"So, that's why it's open so often." Bob nodded, "I'm often pushing it closed."
"Yeah and I told him to stop doing that because it makes my mother scared."
Bob was proud of his son, without any coaching being so direct with a ghost. "What did he say?"
"He just looked at me sort of for a minute. Then he talked about bread again. He repeats it a lot but never really speaks to me."
Bob nodded respectively while listening.
"I don't think he wants to be friends."
"I think that's fine for now. Let's just keep closing that knife drawer so your mother won't see it. OK?"
"OK."

End of Chapter 12

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