Page 41 of Shroom for Improvement

Sonny caught me up at the bottom of the staircase. “Uh... I think it was this way. Wait, are we looking for the library or the model trains?”

“Yes,” I replied.

We searched for over an hour. Sonny would run off ahead like an eager puppy out on walkies. He would open random doors, peer inside, sometimes pulling a face at whatever he’d witnessed, and sometimes slamming the door in such haste I was fearful he might lose a finger.

“Was it . . . Or maybe . . . This way . . . ?”

The sky was dark outside the windows. Occasionally, we saw a glimpse of the easternmost moon—the pink one. We’d reached the end of a narrow corridor which had only one door. A sign spelled out:

HIGH VOLTAGE. DO NOT ENTER

IMMEDIATE DANGER OF EXCRUCIATING DEATH AND/OR BRUSSELS SPROUTS

“But what does that even mean?” Sonny said, studying the sign. “Actually... never mind.” He shook his head.

“That’s probably the wisest decision, given the curveballs this house throws at you. Sometimes literally.”

Sonny smiled, and yet again I found myself staring at those lips of his.

“I happen to really like sprouts, though,” he said.

“Me too,” I agreed. “They get such a bad rep. Just because they’re small and bitter doesn’t mean they’re unlovable.”

Sonny’s grin stretched wider across his face. His tongue darted out to wet his lips, and my whole body went into fight-or-flight mode. Except I did neither of those things—I froze. My heart stopped beating, my lungs wouldn’t function. The only things that seemed to work were my sweat glands.

All of them.

Gods, I hope he didn’t think I was talking about myself. I genuinely meant the vegetables. Sure, I was bitter, but at six foot, I wasn’t exactly small.

Unlovable, though. Why had I said that?

Maybe there was a therapist’s office somewhere in the chaos of this house.

Luckily, Sonny’s stomach rumbled so loudly it could have been picked up on a seismograph.

“All that sprout talk,” he said, placing a hand on his belly.

“We should locate the guest kitchens before we starve to death. Gods knows how long it’ll be before we find our way out of this labyrinth.”

Sonny nodded. “We can try again tomorrow. Do you reckon we might find books with information about the shroom magic?”

My gut churned again. Part hunger, part guilt. “It’s worth a try. It’s the only place I can think to start.”

“Me too,” he said. “What’s through here?” He stopped outside a plain panelled door. It looked like something you’d see in a hospital or office block.

“That wasn’t there five seconds ago.”

Tentatively, Sonny eased the door ajar. Chatter and laughter and cutlery tinkling against crockery greeted us, and warm, spicy, buttery onion scents that made my stomach groan louder than Sonny’s. The bed and breakfast’s dining room.

Oggy and Willow, with their now peach-coloured waves tucked into hairnets, busied themselves around the kitchen, feet tapping and heads bobbing along to the radio tunes.

At the far end of the dining room, John perched at a table littered with notepads and sticky notes and a couple of police files.

“He’s writing a book,” I whispered into Sonny’s ear as we shuffled into the space.

Sonny glanced at the papers. “Thriller? Mystery?” he whispered back.

“Memoir apparently, but don’t ask him about it unless you want some cockamamie hogwash story that will rob you of at least several hours.”

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