No Laughing Matter
By Hugo Prosperio
A Sequel of Sorts to Don’t Make Me Laugh
Comissioned by Bahamad
Part Two
---
Claire sat on her couch, her feet propped up on the coffee table, the tv buzzing in the background, some late night talk show she didn’t care about, as she scooped a spoonful of mint chip ice cream from it’s container. She stared blankly ahead, recounting the thoughts of what she had seen. Those girls had transmogrified before her eyes. Changed into silly cartoon characters and she had no idea how it was real, but...it was.
She almost dropped her ice cream as she was startled by the phone ringing.
“Hello?” She said.
“Hey there, Resident Evil.” came a male voice from the other end of the line.
“Very funny, Frank.” She said. “Yes, my name is similar to a character in your favorite dumb game. What do you want?”
“Well, how goes your case?” Frank asked, containing a chuckle.
“Fine. No real leads.” she lied.
“Are you sure? I know when you are lying, dear.” he said. She could almost hear the smug in his voice.
“You are reminding me why I broke up with you.” She said. “and besides, you have your own cases, Sam Spade, why do you care about mine?”
“Just asking, yeesh. Well, if you need an extra hand, you know where to reach me.”
“Yes. I’ll do that when hell freezes over.” She sighed.
“Good Night, Renfield.” He chuckled and she heard his end of the line go dead with a click.
“I really hate that man.” She sighed. She got up and put the ice cream back in the freezer and then laid back down on her couch, the drone of the tv lulling her to sleep, her thoughts bouncing around, thinking about the events at the strange store.
Her eyes opened, and she saw a world of colors swirling around her, her couch floating in the midst of the colors as if they were a mass of liquid. She said something but she couldn’t hear her own words, lost in a rush of wind.
A round full length mirror floated up to her sightline, and she saw her reflection. On her face was a round red ball, ruby red lips curling into a wicked smile, and fancy triangle shapes around her eyes in blue. Her hair flew upwards and became a blue beehive. She screamed, sound finally breaking through, shattering the mirror.
Her eyes opened again, this time for real, and she was sitting up on her couch, drenched in sweat. Her cat was in the corner staring at her, back arched in surprise at her outburst.
“Oh god, what the hell?” she said.
She shook her head, trying to shake the daze out of her mind, but the dream had done more than just startle her. She was turned on, which was even more startling than the dream itself.
She took a shower, resisting the urge to relieve her pleasure, then got dressed for the day. She knew she had to go out and do some research, something to figure out what was going on and what she had gotten herself into with this case.
She found herself at the local library and she began pouring over town documents and newspaper clippings. She tried to find sightings of an odd joke shop, disappearing buildings, anything that could explain the oddness of the whole thing.
“Oh come on.” she said as she flipped through the pages. “No one has ever seen this before. No one before Caitlin Scott or myself? This makes zero sense.”
She began to pack up the papers when she noticed a comic strip, one she hadn’t ever read. It had no title, but it had four panels. The first three had a clown juggling red balls. The final panel had the balls becoming heavy objects, including an anvil that konked him on the head.
“Heh.” she said as grabbed the papers and began to take them back. She thought about the silly clown with the anvil on his head, and began to chuckle mildly. The chuckle got louder as she went through the library, getting her dirty looks from those studying and reading. As she passed a librarian, she got shushed, which brought the chuckles to her attention.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me.” she said in a quiet voice. She handed the papers off to the librarian, taking her leave. As she walked out of the library, she was in such a rush, she bumped into someone.
“You really should watch where you are going.” The man said. She saw him, dressed to the nines in a purple pin-stripped suit. She had seen him around town, and knew that he was what one might call a pimp.
“My mistake.” she said quickly
“Well, no harm done. Have a lovely day.” he said as he walked off. His smile made her smile too, and the giggle returned, but she shook her head and continued on to her car.
“What the hell?” she mumbled as opened her car door. “Get it together, this is no laughing matter.” she added, repeating the message of her client.
As she drove down the street, the sound of just the car driving was driving her nuts. “Christ, I hate silence.” She said as she flicked on the radio. As a song from some pop star ended, the radio went to static for a moment, then circus music of the calliope variety began to pour through her speakers. She smiled, it bringing back childhood memories of going to the carnival with her mother, getting fried dough and riding the carousel. The smile grew wider and wider, until it started to hurt. She stopped, breaking out of her nostalgia, and turned off the music. She glanced in her rear view mirror and noticed the smile wasn’t totally gone.
“I gotta get to the bottom of all this.” She said, thinking that it was likely whatever happened to Caitlin Scott could easily happen to her.
---
“No, I refuse!” Chuckles said. He looked at the counter, a bobble headed doll sitting there, looking up at him. It’s lips parted as it spoke.
“It just likes the town, I think.”
“Two times in one week is crazy enough, but three! This store has a magical aura around it that could cause major problems if anyone were to see it vanish or appear, and the more often we show up, the greater the chance of it being noticed.” Chuckles said, seeming ready to rip out his blue hair.
“What do you mean, major problems?” Bobble said, his head wiggling wildly.
“Transformations. Unwanted clowns, running loose in an unsuspecting town. I can deal with silly, even wacky, but outright chaos is not my bag, man.” Chuckles said, teeth clinched.
“Well the store has a mind of it’s own, and it seems to want to stop here...again.” Bobble said as the store shook.
“Nothing good can come of this.” The clown sighed.
---
That evening, Claire slept in her bed. As her eyes closed, she slipped from reality into a dream of a trip to the circus. The smell of cotton candy was intoxicating., and she walked through the large tent, looking for a seat. She found one and sat down. “Hello there, Missy.” Said a friendly voice behind her. A female clown with a beehive of purple hair and a blue nose stood there, and giggled.
“Hi.” Claire said
“We need one more clown for tonight’s show. You want to help us out?”
“Uh, I don’t know how to be a clown.” she said. “I’m not very funny.”
“Well, we can fix that up. Let’s get started! Stand up and we’ll fix those dreadful clothes.” She said. Claire felt her body stand up, and with a wave of a plastic princess wand, the clown made all the clothes vanish from her body, leaving her nude.
“Oh, so that isn’t your natural hair color!” She said with a snicker as she looked from the girl’s crotch to her hair. “Well, let’s give it a new color all together!”
The wand waved, and both the hair on her head and her pubic hair turned a bright green. The hair on her head began to grow out and puff up, becoming an afro round and large.
“Now then, how about these!” the clown girl said grabbing Claire’s chest. This is when Claire awoke from the dream.
“What the hell is going on with me?!” She said as she went to the bathroom and splashed cold water on her face. She stared at her face to make sure her nose wasn’t about to burst out into a ball.
“I bet that idiot Crump knows more than he is letting on.” she sighed as she sat on the couch and flipped on the TV, which was showing an ad for a carnival themed dinner theater show opening in the next town over.
“Time for answers.”
---
Claire burst through the door to the police station. She walked past the main desk.
“Going to see the chief.” she said quickly to the officer working the desk, and she moved swiftly before he could say anything in response.
“Maybe he’ll know something.” She said under her breath as she knocked on his office door.
“Come in.” came a voice that didn’t sound quite like the chief.
She opened the door, and walked in, and saw no one in the room. She gasped when it closed behind her.
“Crump, I have questions.” she said sternly.
“Well, I hope I have answers.” He said, followed by a deep guffaw. She turned in the direction of the laugh, and saw a figure in the shadows. It stepped forward, and she let out a small sound, as air escaped her before she could form a scream. The man before her clearly had been Chief Roland Crump, but was now something far more strange. His head was now mostly bald besides three triangle tufts of hair, red as a fire engine. His tip of his nose was long, about six inches in front of him, red like his hair, and shiny like it were made of rubber. Blue lips curled into a smile and green circles wrapped around his eyes, which looked big and wide, like a childs.
“Hello Ms. Renfield. You are looking pretty today!” He giggled.
She backed away horrified as he moved forward. His body had warped strangely, looking almost pear shaped, wide hips and a bottom that wobbled as he walked. He wore the torn remnants of his uniform, and his large bare feet slapped at the floor.
“Oh, don’t go. I just want to say hi!” he said, sounding sad.
“What happened to you?” she said
“I don’t know, I just feel so silly!” He said. “I can’t stop smiling!”
“Think!” she said. “I have a feeling whatever did this to you is responsible for my missing girl.”
“Oh, thinking is hard.” he added as he put his finger to his lips.
“Oh, I know. Veronica James was all funny and silly and we did the nasty in my office. Ever since then, things have been so strange, and I started to smile more.”
“That was the first officer to disappear.” Claire said.
“Yep. Last time we saw here was when she kissed Caitlin!” he giggled.
“She kissed Caitlin? Don’t you see, she is the cause of all this madness.” she said, grabbing him by the shoulder. He smiled, then winced as he let out a powerful sneeze right into Claire’s face. Pink dust swirled around her head.
“Ah! My eyes!” she said as she coughed, some of the dust going down her throat. “What was that stuff?”
“I dunno, but I bet it makes you smile too!” He said, his grin becoming more menacing than child like.
“Leave me alone!” she shouted as she backed towards the door. She fumbled for the handle and opened it, falling out into the station’s main hall. She looked around, her vision blurry, and she saw several faces looking at her. When her vision cleared, she saw six clowns, all wearing cartoonish police outfits staring down at her. She shrieked and stood up, and began to make her move towards the exit.
“Ms. Renfield! Don’t go!” came the Chief’s voice.
“Stop her!” came one squeaky sounding cop, and the rest began to converge on her.
“Get away from me!” she shouted as she turned and ran for the door.
She ran through the door, and ran down the street, looking behind her, seeing a sea of policemen and women running after her, waving balloons twisted to look like police batons. “STOP! HALT! WHEREYAGOIN?!” came various voices from the mob.
“Oh god, this can’t be real!” she shouted as she got into her car, and drove off, just as the mob approached. She sped down the road, glancing in her rear view mirror and she let out a cry of surprise when she saw three tiny cars, looking more like a toddler’s toy than actual vehicles, all speeding after here. One of the clowns was helling “AHHOOOOO AHOOOO AHOOOOO” into a bullhorn, imitating the sound of a police siren.
“You have got to be shitting me.” She said as she turned hard, swerving before heading down a side street. The clown cars were gone. She sighed in relief until she let out another scream as she slammed on the breaks. The alley had always led onto the major street in the town, but now it was a dead end with a little shop, a candy striped awning hanging above the door.
“It can’t be!” she sad as she pulled over to the side of the street and flung her door open.
“HOW CAN YOU BE HERE?!” She shouted at the top of her lungs. From around the corner she heard the imitation of a siren getting closer, and she closed her eyes.
“Here goes nothing.” she said as she ran towards the store, and grabbed the handle and pulled the door open. She was greeted by a loud honk from a horn, and a clown turned around to see her
“Hello there.” Chuckle said. “Who might you be?”
“Claire Renfield, Private Eye. And you, whoever you are, have some explaining to do.”
“Oh dear.” said the plastic bobble head on the counter, causing Claire to do a double take.
“Don’t mind him? What seems to be the problem?”
“I am being chased by an army of odd clowns that were once policemen and women! They are right behind me!” she said. Chuckles pushed her aside, and looked out the door, seeing only a few alley rats scurry across to head down to the sewer.
“Quite sure about that?” he asked her.
“Yes, Can’t you hear them making the siren noise! Their little tiny putt putt cars?”
Chuckles eyes opened wide.
“Dear, have you been seeing spots?”
“What...n...well, now that you mention it, I do kind of see spots!” she said as she looked around the shop.
“It’s as I suspected. The store is causing problems just like I said it would, Bobble! Well, why don’t you have a seat, and we’ll take care of your issues, Ms. Renfield.” He said as he closed the door behind him.
This time, no one saw the store vanish.
TO BE CONCLUDED