#rivervale_lodge

"very proper. do try to not embarrass me by dying ignorantly. it's...tacky." and i won't have scrawny minerva making light over it in our next high tea, the harridan"until next." And the phone disconnects.

He flips the phone to selfie mode and peers at the makeshift mirror, scowling - at least they missed the eyes. Slipping the phone into a pocket, he dumps his flies into a tupperware and starts to search the house, slowly and methodically, for anything new and unusual. Ann Marie stirs in her sleep "No, not my good gladware... she murmurs- must be a nightmare...

Yup. Chimerical blood stains remain, though the lettering is now all a blorky blurb. Crude. Anne Marie is going to fuss bout the stains

A shake of his head... maybe she won't think to look up? And.... a grunt, as he pulls the laundry basket over - there. floor stain good as gone. And then up to the kitchen. And new ceramic jars - fiestaware, rookwood knockoffs, probably painted with tawdry little flowers or babies or something... boxes, containers, anything he hasn't seen before?

He double checks the box where he keeps his dice - nope, still just an old cigar tin. Whew.

In a fit of irony , there is a vase like object being used for some flowers including forget me nots. He's..pretty sure that's meant to be an URN

"Oh for bleep's sake...." He is tempted to dump the flowers on the floor, but instead he fetches a juice pitcher from the kitchen, replacing them while he takes up the floral-patterned "vase", and carefully turns it over, checking for any inscription.

Only keen sluagh eyes might notice 'RIP: Agatha DuPreen- formidable beyond death'

"What an epitaph to get stuck with..." He mutters, and carefully takes the vase back to the basement. All he needs now it to break it and have Ann Marie AND the ghost mad at him.... and he sits, glowering at it, for much of the night, trying to decide what to do about this.

A choice, a challenge, a two forked path at the least, and each prong sharp.

(End Scene)