Estella's Valiant Voyage

“Hey, you got a job for me?”

The bartender took another sip before looking back at the man standing beside him. He had a greasy mop of hair that was combed to the side and a beard that looked like it hadn’t been trimmed in a year. His clothes were plain and slightly faded. The bartender sighed and wiped his hands on a towel he kept in his back pocket.

“Yeah, I got one. You buy me a drink though, and we can talk about what you do. I don’t like talking to folks who don’t buy me drinks.” The bartender turned around and grabbed a glass from the shelf behind him. “What’ll it be?”

The man thought for a moment, “I guess just an amber ale will do.” The barman nodded and began pouring beer into the glass. As he did so, he said, “You know I have to keep my money too right? Buying you a drink is just good business sense. You say you have work for me? What kind of work are we talking about here? I ain’t much for manual labor these days if that’s what you mean by work.”

The man leaned over the bar and whispered loudly enough to be heard by anyone who wanted to listen, “No no, none of that manual labor stuff for me. You see I have some strange things happening at my house and I need some help cleaning up after them. Things disappearing randomly almost every day now, things moved around, sounds in the night that don’t make sense... It needs to stop before things get even worse than they already are. I can pay whatever you want, just please do something about it sooner rather than later because this is getting ridiculous. My wife is terrified! We need to fix this problem because if we don’t... Well if we don’t then I can only imagine what will happen next! Please help me sir!” The man wore a pained expression on his face as he begged the barkeep for assistance.

The barkeep finished pouring the beer and slid the glass across the bar top towards the man who quickly snatched it up with both hands as if it was as necessary as air itself to stay alive. After taking a long draw from his drink, he set his glass down on the countertop and wiped his mouth on his sleeve before speaking again to the barkeep who had begun wiping down glasses again while listening intently to everything that had been said so far.

“So basically you want me to stop some ghosts or something from haunting your house? That all? Is that really all that complicated? Just tell me how much you want me to do it for and I can get started tonight if you like! No time like the present ya know! So how about it!? How much does this job pay!? What do you think!? How much!? Just tell me!!” The man had now worked himself up into quite an excited state as he waited on baited breath for an answer from the barkeep who simply stared back at him blankly without saying anything more than one word in response: “Fifty dollars."