Page 11 of Shroom for Improvement

It was some kind of annex, or extension, still attached to the main part of the house, but it looked as though the bed and breakfast had been built by a regular person who’d simply become sick to bloody death of living inside a bunch of giant wieners. Two of the walls were fashioned from red brick and had bog-standard windows and doors, and one was mostly made of glass. Beyond it, dining tables and chairs, and a sofa where an older man sat. Human maybe? I wasn’t sure. He was reading a book, or else looking down at his phone.

“Let’s take you through,” Oggy said, grasping my forearm in her tiny, cool hand.

The pair led me through the small, cosy, and reassuringly average reception area. Nobody staffed it but there was a bell, and a sign that read:Ring for Service.Another sign read:No Vacancies.

“We occasionally get nightly visitors to The Night Cap,” Oggy began. “But generally our guests are more...”

“Like tenants,” Willow finished. “Some have been here for decades. For example, Mr Dupont. He’s been staying here for what, forty years now?”

“Must be.”

“And there’s John. That’s John over there.” The old human man lifted his head from the laptop on his knees and waved. “He’s been here for fifteen, sixteen years. Writing a book.”

“A memoir, apparently,” Oggy said, running her tongue along her teeth. “Just...” she dropped her voice to a whisper. “Be careful what you say around him.”

“He writes everything down.”

“Wrote a story about your first boyfriend, didn’t he, Willow?”

“Mmm, that he did,” lamented Willow.

“Okay, noted,” I said. Not that it would be difficult for me. Keeping mum wasn’t exactly a stretch of my talents. “You mentioned someone else in your letter. What about Mrs Ziegler?”

“Shh!” Willow hissed, and Oggy literally climbed up my body to slap her tiny hand over my mouth. “Do not, under any circumstances, mention that woman’s name.”

“Why?”

“Quick! Through here.” Willow pulled me into a kitchen area, with Oggy still clinging to my side like a koala bear.

“Don’t say her name, okay? You wouldn’t want to accidentally summon her.”

“Summon her?” I said. “Gods, is she some sort of daemon—”

“Shh!” Oggy whipped her hand back over my mouth.

“Nnnnk—”I pushed her hand down. “Fine, I won’t mention her again.”

Oggy and Willow shared relieved looks.

“Okay, so this is the kitchen,” Willow said. I could have got whiplash from how quickly the pair changed subjects.

“You can get off me now,” I said to Oggy.

“Sorry.” She slid down. “This is where we cook breakfast. Let us know what time you’ll take it and what you’d like—anything you’d like—and we’ll have it ready. And you’re free to come and use this space any other time, if you want to prepare yourself some lunch or supper. There’s a fridge over there you can use. Just be sure to label everything with your name. And we can make some space in a cupboard. There’s a kitchen in the main house, but it moves about so much, I can never seem to find it.”

I held up my hand. “Um, two comments.” I needed to stick to the important things here, not waste my energy asking about a moving kitchen. “One, I’m not planning on sticking around for too long, so cupboard space won’t be necessary. And two, anything I’d like for breakfast? Anything? Do you have chai tea?”

“Mmhmm, anything.”

“Fancy chai tea?”

“Yep,” they both said together.

“Eggs benedict?”

“Yep.”

“Eggs florentine?”

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