Free Fly Paper by Max Allan Collins Page A

least a couple of showers already, as all the towels were used up and the floor was wet. All of which was only in keeping with this nuthouse hotel, this asylum populated by kids so weird, they made Jon seem normal.
    Like, for instance, this green, pointy-eared girl with whom he shared the elevator. Nolan hoped she’d get off soon so he wouldn’t have to say anything to her. Strangers were always a pain to talk to, let alone green ones. She would ask him if he wondered why she was made up this way, and he would say no, but it would be too late: they would be talking, and this was a particularly slow elevator that could make a fifteen-floor ride seem a lifetime. Besides, he figured he already knew why she was dressed this way: there was going to be a full moon tonight, and she was just getting an early start.
    “I bet you’re wondering why I’m dressed like this,” she said, in a squeaky voice.
    Nolan said nothing, but he did manage a smile. Sort of.
    “Normally I wouldn’t be wearing this.”
    “Oh?”
    “At least, not till tomorrow night. There’s a convention going on, you know, comic books and ‘Star Trek’ and things, and the costume ball isn’t till tomorrow night.”
    “Oh.”
    “This is just for the press conference. Some of us were asked to dress up now for the press conference. Some newspaper and TV people are here, doing interviews and stuff about the con. If you watch the six o’clock news, you just may see me.”
    The elevator was now at ballroom level, just a floor above the lobby. The doors slid open and, crowded in front of the ballroom entrance, were maybe a hundred and fifty people, mostly kids five years either side of Jon in age, some in strange get-ups, and cameramen and reporters and newsmen shuffling around, jockeying various equipment and holding mikes up to some people standing under klieg lights a shade brighter than the aurora borealis.
    Nolan stepped to the rear of the elevator; he did not want to be on the six o’clock news.
    The green girl shouted, “Scotty!” and ran out of the elevator and into the crowd, toward a red-cheeked, roughly handsome dark-haired guy who looked familiar to Nolan; some television actor, he guessed. He caught the actor’s eye and smiled sympathetically and the actor shook his head, as if to say, “I wish I was going down to the bar like you, my friend.” The poor actor was swamped by girls and reporters, and Nolan wondered how anybody could ever stand going into a business as hair-raising as that.
    The doors slid shut and Nolan got out at the lobby. He quickly went into the bar and had a Scotch, as much for that put-upon actor as himself.
    Sitting on the stool next to him was a very pretty girl with short brown hair, wearing a chic pants outfit. Nolan gave her a look that asked if he could buy her one, and she gave him back a look that said he could.
    “Gin and tonic,” she said, in a voice designed to order gin and tonics.
    Nolan glanced at his watch. He was running early. He hadn’t really expected his buddy Bernie to be able to supply him with everything he needed, and so quickly. It was a good hour-and-a-half till he was supposed to meet Jon in the coffee shop, and he decided to kill some time.
    He examined the girl’s delicate but distinct features (her eyes were a hazel-green color you don’t run into that often) and asked, “Model?”
    She shook her head. “Flight attendant.”
    “Stewardess, you mean.”
    She gave him a firm little smile. “Flight attendant,” she said.
    “Don’t worry.”
    “Don’t worry what?”
    “I don’t believe what I read in paperbacks.”
    She laughed, and the bartender brought her the gin and tonic. She looked at him, examining him in much the same way he had her. “Gangster?”
    “Right the first time.”
    “Don’t worry.”
    “Don’t worry what?”
    “I don’t believe what I read in paperbacks, either.”
    They both laughed, and in her room on the tenth floor, forty-five minutes later, she