Sea Change: Killing Time

I walked through a giant heart, someplace in the left ventricle. Paul was ahead of me, wearing his Harry Potter robe and carrying a wand. We walked through the heart and downward, until finally we came out in the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, where Michelle was waiting for us.

"The giant heart is exactly the way I remember it as a kid," I said. "I used to come here on field trips a lot. We lived just an hour north of here."

"Well, it was a good idea to come for the Harry Potter exhibition," said Michelle,"And then stay for the rest of the museum."

"Can I go in the heart again?" asked Paul.

"No reason why not," I said. Paul ran into the giant heart, and I sat down on the bench with Michelle.

"See that plastic lung over there?" I said. "I showed that to my dad when I was a kid, in an effort to get him to quit smoking."
"Did it work?" she asked.

"Yeah. Just forty years later, he quit."

She nodded. "I booked a hotel in Allentown overnight. We can sleep there and head back to Lock Haven in the morning."

"That'll be nice," I said. "I have a class on water monsters to teach at work, so I'll be needing to get back. I'm still checking into the Susquehanna Seal, so I'm hoping to find some sort of results to publicize."

"Still doing the water monsters?"

"Still working on it. It's good practice for me, trying to get back to what I once was. When I was a kid, I built a sea monster trap in my dad's pond. It was the only body of water I really had access to. It's probably still sunk to the bottom someplace."

"Anything like that near the hotel?" Michelle asked.

"There was a UFO sighting there," I said. "Maybe I'll check into that. But if I have to spend the night just hanging around the hotel room, I'm capable of that."

"No you're not."

"Usually something turns up to kill a little time."

Paul exited the heart, smiling. "Can we go back to the brain now?"

I looked out the car window as we rode over the Schuylkill River bridge. The river, coming from the north, was below us as we rode out of Philadelphia.

"I spotted a water monster down in this area as a kid," I said.

"Cool," said Paul, who was busy eating some of the candy from the gift shop. Michelle had spent considerable in the gift shop, and Paul had, at my estimate, at least $3.50 worth of candy in his mouth at that moment.

 "My grandfather had a farm in Montgomery County, and I used to spend a lot of time there at the Schuylkill River," I said. "When I was, oh, eleven maybe, I saw something in the water one summer. Tried to get pictures with my Polaroid. I always pictured it as a plesiosaur or something like the Loch Ness Monster, but it could have just been an especially big catfish, or a loon, or something."

"What's a loon?" asked Paul.

"A really big water bird. Though it's worth noting that there are some huge fish in the water, and some of the people in Philadelphia believe there's monster creatures. Probably because of the constant dumping of murder victims into the Schuylkill. I'd love to make another round, and see if I can investigate it."

"Maybe we'll do that sometime," said Michelle.

"Can I come?" asked Paul.

"Of course you can," I said. "I need you."

I watched Paul splash around in the hotel pool, cheerfully diving under and coming up for air. "Speaking of water monsters," I said.

"What are we going to do about dinner?" Michelle asked me.

I shrugged. "Gotta be someplace around we can eat. I'll ask at the desk, I suppose."

"You want to go ask now? While Paul is swimming?"

"Might as well," I said. "I wanted to explore anyway."

The woman working the front desk was dark-haired, with glasses, wearing entirely black clothing. I had the feeling that she might be a good person to ask about the local haunted scene; she had the look. I waited until someone else had checked in, and then stopped at the counter.

"Hi, checking in?" she asked.

"No, we're already in room three-twelve," I said. "Just had a couple of questions. How are you doing?"

"Having a rough day," she admitted.

"I'm sorry to hear that," I said. "I work with the public, too. I get it. Is there anyplace around that we can get something to eat?"
"P.J. Whelihan's," she said. "It's right up the street, two lights and then turn left. It's really good."

"Thank you. This next one is gonna sound kind of weird....Are there any good ghost stories around here?"

She smiled and lit up. "Right here!" she said.

"Here in this hotel?"

"Oh, yes," she said. "We have stuff happen all the time."

"This makes you my best friend in Lehigh County," I said. I handed her my card. "I'm a writer and paranormal investigator. I'd like to hear more about this."

"Oh, really? That's awesome! Sure! Well, the whole hotel is haunted. We have stuff happen a lot. Just the other night, I heard footsteps here in the lobby---They walked right up to the desk, but there was nobody here. We've had people die in here. One guy got shot right where you're standing, and we get ODs in here all the time."
Most of the time, hotel staff aren't as open about that sort of thing. I was intrigued, though I decided not to share the part about the ODs with Paul. 

"You mind if I do a little investigating?"

"Nope, that'd be great!"

"Okay, cool. Mind if I ask your name?"

"I'm Madison. I'm the manager here."
I shook her hand. "Hi, Madison. I'm Lou. So if you see me walking around down here later with my son, carrying around some equipment, don't be alarmed. We're just checking for dead people."

"That's so cool," she said.

After dinner, Paul and I wandered down to the lobby of the hotel. There was a very long back hallway I'd discovered that led down that way, making it easy to reach from our room.

"How come you get to wear the cool stuff?" Paul asked.

I looked down at myself. I was wearing my alien shirt, skull gloves, and the black fishing vest I used for traveling. "I packed my uniform," I said. "You want me to get you a travel model?"

"Yeah." He was wearing a set of peach-colored pajamas.

We walked into the lobby. Madison was there with another employee, a black woman. She took one look at us, and said,"Oh my god, are you the paranormal guys?"

"Yeah, that's us. We're going to do a little investigating. I'd planned to focus on cryptozoology this summer, but your ghosts are good practice, too."

"That is so cool," she said. "This place is so haunted. Stuff happens all the time. Do you guys have a YouTube channel?"

"No, but my team's got a Facebook page." I handed her the LHPS card.

"You have a little ghost on there! I love it!"

"We're going to be doing a few tests in here, but we won't be too obtrusive."

"Help yourself," she said.

I got out my new all-in-one EMF meter. It was around five inches long, with a small screen and a thick antenna on top. "This is my new piece," I said. "It measures both EMFs and temperature, plus it's got a flashlight built in. I'm testing it out tonight."

"That's pretty cool," she said. "You don't use a spirit box?"

"Not usually, but mainly that's because it interferes with my other equipment."

"Oh, I see."
Paul looked at the new piece. "Daddy, can I try it?"

I handed it to him. "Go get some readings."

"We have stuff happen all over this lobby," Madison told me. "One night the pinball machine came on all by itself."

"I'm going to get a few photos," I said.

The lobby was big and open. I walked through with my laser thermometer in one hand and my camera in the other, snapping photos. I got a slight temperature rise on the south side that turned out to be coming through the windows. Paul came out of the hallway with the all-in-one.

"Can I have the regular thermometer?" he asked.

"Sure. Let's trade. You want the wand, too?"

"Yeah."

I handed him the laser thermometer and the small, wand-style EMF detector. He walked over to the wall while I checked the middle of the lobby.

"Daddy." he said. The wand was beeping against three small mirrors that hung on the wall.

"Try the outlet nearby."

He moved the wand over to the outlet, and the beeping slowed. Back at the mirrors, it picked up again.

I glanced at Madison. "There's no reason for that," I said.

She raised her eyebrows.

"I'm also getting some high readings over here, in the center of the room," I said. "No reason for that, either. Normally you check to make sure you're not near any power lines, but there can't be any here. When I lower it to the floor, the readings drop off."

"So there might be something," Madison said.

"It's certainly possible."

Paul circled the room and came back around to me. "I think I saw something in the hall."

"You want to join me for an EVP session?"

"Yeah."

We sat on the lobby couches, and I turned on the digital recorder for a few minutes of sound recording. I'd taught Paul to d this when he was five, and he was getting pretty good at it. We went back and forth for a little while, firing off questions for the ghosts.

I clicked off the recorder. "Okay, little man. Having fun?"

"Yeah."

"Well, Madison over there mentioned to me that the pinball machine is haunted, too. I brought ten dollars in quarters for you to play with, so you want to try it out?"

He smiled. "Do you think the snack machine might be haunted, too? I want some Oreos."

"Come on. Let's get you Oreos, and then play pinball."

Ten PM. I was sitting in bed with a book, wearing my Lake Erie monster pajamas. Michelle was already asleep, and Paul was laying out pillows and blankets on the floor.

"You planning to sleep on the hotel floor?" I asked.

Paul nodded. "Yeah."

I let it go. I'd done dumber things at his age. "Thanks for helping out with the investigation tonight, little man."

"I had a fun day today, Daddy," he said.

I smiled.

"I'm glad," I said. "You lay down and get some sleep. We'll be heading home tomorrow."