Crazy Little Thing (5 page)

Welcome to Tulsa Town

As Ollie drove down I-44 entering Tulsa she pondered
how it was that one person (Claire) could make her feel so good one minute and
so horrible the next. If that was love, she didn’t want any part of it.

G-Ray was seated at the table, dozing
with his head thrown back and eyes wide open. The
only way you could tell he was sleeping was by the snuffling noises he made.
Claire was busily typing away on her smart phone. Ollie didn’t understand the
fascination with smart phones. She didn’t even own a cell phone. She had a
landline. What was that called, a dumb phone?

“What’re you doing with that gadget?” Ollie finally
asked.

“Facebook,” Claire answered. “Updating my status.”

“Yeah,” Ollie groaned. “Gotta let people know where
you are and what you’re doing every second of every day. Life isn’t worth
living unless you have an audience.”

Claire’s jaw tightened, but she didn’t say anything.

“You know Facebook isn’t real, right?” Ollie goaded.

Claire looked at her but still didn’t answer.

Ollie knew she was spoiling for a fight and acting
childish, but she couldn’t help herself. Facebook and Twitter were her pet
peeves. “And what’s with all the selfies these days? The first time I ever
heard somebody talk about a selfie, I thought they meant masturbation.”

Claire held her phone up and snapped off a picture
of Ollie. Ollie grimaced. Several long moments went by without either one
talking. Claire continued typing away on her phone. Ollie was never going to be
able to wrap her mind around the social networking phenom. Here she was, a real
live person sitting right beside Claire, but Claire was “socializing” with
people hundreds of miles away that she had never even met in real life and
probably never would.

Unable to stand it anymore, Ollie muttered, “What’re
you doing now? Taking one of those quizzes that tell you what animal you were
in a past life? Or what kind of cupcake you are? Or what fictional character
you are in the Harry Potter books?”

Claire sighed heavily. “No, Ollie, I am looking up
where we can stay in Tulsa.”

“So now you have to look things up? You used to play
it by ear. Last time we drove to Des Moines, we didn’t have to plan everything
out in detail. Planning takes all the fun out of it. Whatever happened to
adventure?”

“Well, maybe we should have planned some stuff. Look
how our last
adventure
turned out: D.I.V.O.R.C.E.”

“I know how to spell,” Ollie grumbled. She crunched
on a pork rind. She was hungry for real food. And she was tired. Maybe finding
a place to rest and grab some grub would make her feel better. “Find a place
with a pool,” Ollie said. Water always improved her mood.

Suddenly, G-Ray sat bolt upright, held up both hands
and commanded, “Quiet!”

Everyone held their breath and listened. After
several long moments, Claire whispered, “What exactly are we listening for?”

“I can hear them,” G-Ray said.

“Who?” Claire asked. “Your tocks?”

G-Ray shook his head. “Tapping. Listen.”

Ollie strained her ears. Sure enough, she heard
tapping noises. There were a series of long taps, interspersed with short taps.
“Does anybody know Morse code?”

“I do,” G-Ray said. “They’re saying… Stop car. Stop
car. I have to pee. Pee. Stop car.”

“Oh my God,” Ollie said. “It’s EZ! She’s awake.”
Ollie put on the blinker and took the next exit, which happened to lead
directly into the parking lot of the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino.

Between a Hard Rock (Hotel) and a Place

As soon as G-Ray untied EZ and lowered her to her
feet in the parking lot, she took off running for the hotel lobby. Well, she
didn’t exactly run. When you’re tied up on top of a van going fifty-five miles
an hour for eight hours on the Interstate, your muscles seize and freeze. So
what EZ did was more of a herky-jerky strut. She looked like a puppet that had
a drunk guy pulling its strings. She bounced off a couple of cars and a camper
before straightening out and finding the front doors of the hotel.

Oscar led the way on his leash, excitedly pulling
Ollie behind him. Claire and G-Ray followed them into the hotel lobby. As soon
as the door shut behind them they were swallowed up by loud noises, bright lights
and eye-watering smells. Thousands of slot machines whirred, purred, dinged,
donged and beeped. Dolly Parton’s voice boomed
9 to 5
over the
loudspeakers. Colored lights flashed and strobed. The fumes of stale smoke, old
whiskey and White Diamonds perfume assaulted their noses.

Claire dug in her purse, found her sunglasses and
put them on.

Ollie plugged her ears with her fingers.

G-Ray pinched his nose and said, “I’mb going to get
us a roomb.”

“What?” Ollie said. “I can’t hear you. I have my
fingers in my ears.”

“I want my very own room,” Claire said.

G-Ray turned loose of his nose, but continued to
mouth breath. “I know, man, I know,” he said. “It was in the contract that
Scarlet drew up and I signed.”

Claire was glad she had a lawyer for a girlfriend.
If not, she would probably be sleeping in some
skanky motel, sharing a bed with all of them. She looked over at Ollie.

Ollie was standing still with her mouth hanging
open, her fingers still plugging her ears and her eyes bugged-out. Claire
followed Ollie’s gaze. “Holy shit,” Claire muttered. And she didn’t use that
phrase lightly because personally she had never understood how shit could be
holy. But this time the phrase was warranted for its unrealistic appeal if
nothing else. Because what she was seeing was totally unreal and made her
wonder if they had somehow been transported to another dimension or another
plane of reality or perhaps sucked into the Twilight Zone.

The hotel lobby was crawling with animals.
Big
animals. Big,
furry
animals. People-sized animals, clad in fur
head-to-toe, with tails, and walking on their hind legs. There were dogs, cats,
kangaroos, coyotes, birds, and a wide assortment of cartoon characters.

“What the…?” Claire said under her breath to Ollie.

“You can see it too?” Ollie asked without turning
her head away from the sight. She unplugged her ears and winced.

Claire slowly nodded. “Uh huh.”

“Can you maybe do the Google thing on your smart
phone?”

“Oh, so now you like the smart phone.” Claire dug
her phone out of her purse and typed the words
fur, costumes, people, Tulsa
.
“Here we go,” she said. “Have you ever heard of Furries?

“Nope.”

“Well, according to Wikipedia it’s what these things
are. Furries are people dressed up in fur costumes and role-playing animal
characters.”

“Why?” Ollie whispered.

“For fun,” Claire whispered back. She did some more
scrolling and said, “This week in Tulsa is the International Convention of
Furries. The FurCon. There are Furries from all over the world - hundreds of
thousands of Furries - are coming here and joining together for the first time
in fur history.” Claire giggled. “Furstory.  History with fur, get it?
Furstory?”

Ollie said, “Yes, I got it.”

“And it says right here,” Claire tapped her phone’s
screen, “that they walk around squeaking at each other and hugging. This is a
complete culture unto itself. Those fur suits cost thousands of dollars. The
personality that they create through the art of fur is called a fursonae. Like
a personae with fur, a fursonae. Get it?”

“I got it.”

“And they have dances at night and runway fashion
shows and talent contests.”

“Fur-tastic,” Ollie muttered as she watched a large,
cartoonish, purple rabbit hop by. The rabbit was followed by a lifelike Corgi
dog. The big Corgi looked at Oscar, and snarled as he walked by.

When Oscar saw the big Corgi he yipped and ran,
yanking his leash out of Ollie’s hands. He made a beeline for the Corgi and
before Ollie could intervene, Oscar was humping the Corgi’s leg. The Corgi
shook its leg and yapped and yipped and yelped. But Oscar had his legs firmly
wrapped around the Corgi’s leg and was humping like his life depended on it.
Finally, the Corgi gave up, put his front paws on his hips and stood patiently
until Oscar finished his business.

When sated, Oscar turned, kicked his back paws like
he was tossing dirt over a doody. “I’m so sorry,” Ollie gushed to the Corgi.
“He’s never acted that way before. I’ll dry clean your leg. You can send me a
bill.”

The Corgi growled at Ollie and walked away.

Ollie spun in circles looking for Oscar. He was
nowhere to be seen. She weaved through the furry crowd, calling, “Oscar! Come,
boy!” After a few minutes of not finding him, she tapped a polka-dotted dragon
on the shoulder, asking, “Have you by chance seen a little Weenie?”

“Honey, have I ever,” the purple dragon lisped.  “My
ex had a teeny weenie.”

“I meant weenie
dog
,” Ollie said.

The dragon pointed a claw over to a corner of the
lobby, saying, “There’s some dogs over there,” the dragon said, disdainfully,
like being a dragon was so much better than being a dog. Ollie saw five large
dogs huddled together, scratching each other behind the ears. It looked like
the canine version of a circle jerk.

“Um, yeah, thanks,” Ollie said.

Ollie wandered around the room, calling Oscar’s name
until she finally found him sniffing a giant French Poodle’s butt. Ollie
quickly scooped Oscar into her arms and apologized, “Excuze-moi, mon chien est
fou.”

The poodle put her nose in the air and sashayed
away. Ollie cooed to Oscar, “Don’t pay any attention to her. Poodles always
think they’re so much better than everybody else.”

*

By the time Ollie found Claire, G-Ray was standing
next to her wearing his helmet cam. Its red light was on. Claire had that look
on her face. The look that said she was mad as a wet hen. Ollie knew that look
well and it was a scary sight.

“You’ve done it again,” Claire pronounced as Ollie
joined them.

“Done what? What did I do?”

“Bad news, man,” G-Ray said. “Every room is booked.”

“So what?” Ollie said. “We’ll just go to another
hotel.”

“All the rooms, man. All the rooms are booked in the
whole town.”

“So, we’ll go to another town,” Ollie said.

“All the rooms within hundreds of miles,” G-Ray
said. “Claire already goggled it. It’s like the entire state has been
fur-polized.”

That explained the look on Claire’s face. And that
explained why Ollie immediately went on the defensive. “It’s not my fault,
Claire. It’s not like I sent out invitations to the whole Furrie population and
invited them to the great state of Oklahoma for the weekend. So don’t look at
me that way.”

“Put the dog down,” Claire ordered through gritted
teeth.

“What?”

“I said… Put the dog down.”

Ollie did as instructed. Oscar ran and bounced into
G-Rays arms. Claire took her purse off her shoulder, held it by the strap,
wound up and pitched it right at Ollie. It hit her square in the belly.

Ollie doubled over. All the air left her body in a
giant whoosh. She crumpled to the floor, knowing how a fish must feel when it’s
reeled out of the water and lies flopping on the bank.

But Claire wasn’t through with her. She retrieved
her purse and stood looking down at Ollie over the length of her perfectly
shaped nose. “What is it about you? Everything that can get effed up about you
always does. It’s like you’re a universal target for effed up scenarios - like
Zeus is sitting on high and says, ‘You know what? I’m bored today, let’s send
some effed up crap Ollie Hiland’s way and see how it affects her and anyone who
has anything to do with her.’ Tell me, what are the chances of a big bunch of
fur freaks landing in Tulsa and taking all the hotel rooms for the weekend -
odds even Vegas wouldn’t play, but here we go - in Ollie-world anything and
everything can happen. Our whole effing relationship had moments like this!
What is it? Somebody please tell me so I can understand it!” Then she burst
into tears.

By the time Claire finished her tirade Ollie had her
breath back. She slowly climbed to her feet. She watched Claire swipe at her
tears then said, “I’m sorry. You’re right. I’m a freak magnet. A big, ol’ freak
magnet.”

Claire wailed louder and marched away.

“What? What did I say?” Ollie asked.

“Well, if you’re a freak magnet, man, that makes her
a freak,” G-Ray said.

*

Finding EZ was easy. All Ollie had to do was follow
the angry voices. She elbowed her way through the knot of Furries and there EZ
was – laid out on a baggage cart, snoring to beat the band.

“The nerve of some humans,” a Dalmatian said.

“They think just because they have opposable thumbs
that they rule the world,” A Siamese cat said.

Ollie ignored the irate Furries and grabbed one end
of the luggage cart while G-Ray got the other end. Together they rolled EZ up
to the front desk where Claire was standing.

“Oh great, one more person to find a bed for.”

“Claire, I don’t think we can tie her back up on top
of the van. Look at her cheeks. She has a bad case of windburn already,” Ollie
said.

Claire turned to Ollie. Her eyes were puffy from
crying and more than a little bloodshot. Ollie thought she looked kind of like
how she did when first waking up in the morning. Ouch. Thinking about waking up
next to Claire in the morning made Ollie’s heart hurt. Actually, what made her
heart hurt was the thought of never again waking up next to Claire in the
morning. Double ouch.

“We’re staying,” Claire said. “There was a last
minute cancellation and I grabbed it. It’s a suite with two bedrooms.”

“A suite?” Ollie said. “Our budget won’t allow for
that.”

“Don’t worry about it. Scarlet paid with her credit
card,” Claire said.

“Scarlet paid? Why is she being so nice suddenly?”

“Because she doesn’t know about it yet.”

“Here you go, Ma’am,” the pudgy desk clerk said,
handing Claire two electronic card keys. He eyed the comatose EZ who was
snoring in the luggage cart, and said with the air of a seasoned hotel worker
who has seen it all, “Do you need help with your luggage?”

“Yes, please,” Claire said. She handed Ollie one of
the key cards. “We’re in the Elvis Presley suite. Bring my luggage up with
you.” She marched off to the bank of elevators.

The clerk gestured to Oscar and said, “I’m sorry,
ma’am, but our hotel has a strict no pets policy.”

“He’s not a pet. He’s a Furry. He’s here for the
convention,” Ollie said.

The clerk sneered. “That is a very small Furry.”

“He’s a midget,” Ollie said, crossing her arms. “You
have something against midgets? Does your hotel discriminate against little
people? And before you answer that question, might I suggest you think long and
hard about what my lawyer will say about it. Because my lawyer will eat your
ass for lunch.”

The clerk seemed to know he was fighting a losing
battle. He exhaled heavily and said, “Enjoy your stay at the Hard Rock, Ma’am.”

“Thank you,” Ollie said with a tight smile.