“Jeopardy doesn’t work that way, Poppy, and you know it,” the cat scolded. “Alex Trebek would be so insulted.”
She gaped at the cat. “How do you know my name?”
The cat scoffed, sitting up straight and affecting a jaunty pose. “Well, it went something like this: ‘Yo, yo, yo, girlz and booooyz! This is Poppy M to the C to the Guill-i-cudd-E in da house, spinnin’ you some oldies but goodies tonight! Who all remembers this mad-ass hit by the Spin Doooctooooors?’ So see? It wasn’t like you kept your name some big secret.”
Right. Her Run DMC impression. She’d been DJ-ing at her old friend Mel’s party before all this had gone down. And what had gone down during that party was nutters. Everything was nutters.
So she said as much to the cat as she rubbed her hands together to keep them warm. “This is insane.”
“Or maybe you are,” the feline offered, dry with sarcasm, sitting back on its haunches and eyeballing her with those wide green orbs.
Poppy cocked her head, remembering the cat’s words. “Insanity… That was one of the choices you laid out, right?”
“Yep. Because sometimes if you’re crazy, it goes hand and hand with delusions. Maybe I’m just a delusion you’ve cooked up in your nutbag head.”
Right. Maybe this was all a delusion. She wasn’t prone to them that she knew of, but how would you know you were having delusions if you were delusional?
She looked down at her phone and the number the cat had told her to call when it realized something was terribly out of whack and talked her into coming outside to handle their little indiscretion with less Blink-182 and Rick James blaring in their ears.
Poppy picked up her phone, letting her feline companion hear the endless drone of ringing on the other end. “I don’t think anyone’s going to pick up. Maybe I dialed the wrong—”
“This is Nina Blackman-Statleon of OOPS, for all your dramatic, life-altering emergency paranormal needs. Recently PA-and ratchety-ass, bag-o’-old-crusty-Paranormal-Council-bones approved as a legitimate source for the stickier paranormal events in your life. So, do tell. How can I help your pathetic, whiny soul today?”
Before Poppy was able to ask what all this talk about crisis and crusty-bones approved business was about, someone cut off the woman on the other end of the line.
“Nina!” a woman with a melodic voice chastised in the background. “Stop that! That could be a real client on the other end in dire need!”
“What, Fakey-Locks? Like they’re not pathetic when they’re all needy and clingy? Please. You asked me to answer the phones tonight, and that’s what I’m doin’. Just shut your over-glossed lips and let me handle this.”
Poppy waivered, rethinking the cat’s nutball suggestion to ring up this hotline called OOPS, one alleging it offered help when you were in paranormal crisis.
But the cat had told her to call this number as if the number itself were a lifeline to God. The talking cat said this was who to call—nay, it had insisted these were the people to bring into this so-called mess.
“Well speak, for catnip’s sake!” the persistent feline urged, nudging her elbow with its peculiarly round head. “We don’t have all stinkin’ night. We need to get this shit straightened out before Familiar Central sends someone in. It won’t look good if we dawdle. You don’t want to look bad in front of your new superiors, do you, Spin Doctor?”
“Poppy!” she blurted out her name, because for some reason it seemed important she be known as something more than the DJ. “My name is Poppy. DJ-ing is just something I do on the side for a little extra cash,” she stated with as much clarity as one could muster when having a conversation with a house pet.
“It’ll be Shit On A Stick if you don’t get crackin’.” The cat’s tail swished in an agitated semi-circle over the surface of the bricks again. “Now talk!” it hissed.
“Hellooo? You’ve got twenty GD seconds before I use my internal GPS and hunt your ass down for crank calling me,” the woman named Nina groused. “I’m gonna start counting now. One…”
Poppy closed her eyes and took a shaky, deep breath of the cold night air, trying to sort through the bits and pieces about familiars and superiors and focus on the fact that this person on the other end of the line was supposed to help her.
With a trembling hand, Poppy finally held the phone up to her ear. “Um, hello?” she whispered into the phone, attempting a calm tone.
No one was going to retell this horror story someday and call Poppy McGuillicuddy a chicken-shit. Not on your life. When witnesses retold this harrowing tale, it would always be prefaced by how brave she’d been.
“I said, how the eff can I help you?” the voice belonging to Nina, the OOPS operator, growled.