Cloaked by Alex Flinn Page A

food, and I need it bad. I’ll ask where the desk clerk is too.
    I stand and walk to the bar entrance. It’s dark enough to look like night. I linger in the doorway, not wanting to go in. But what are they going to do? Beat me up? I’m a nice, polite person who never gets beat up.
    The guys at the bar are the same ones from yesterday, and they’re wearing the same clothes. The golden bird, which looks like a canary, hangs over the bar, asleep in his wooden cage. I wait (politely) for the men to finish their conversation before I approach the bartender.
    “Excuse me? I wondered if you had any food? I want to check in for the night too.”
    “I got leftovers from yesterday I could warm up for you.” The bartender squints at me. “Hey, didn’t I see you out by my Dumpster before?”
    “Leftovers will be fine,” I say, ignoring the other question, and also ignoring any nagging concern about what leftovers would be like in a place like this.
    “Yeah, you was out there, talking to yourself.”
    “Can you please get me that food?” I hand him a twenty. “Keep the change.”
    “Ooh, big spender.” The bartender laughs but takes the money and turns to look at the refrigerator. “We just got a couple burgers.”
    “Burgers are fine. Anything.”
    I hear a noise outside, a motorcycle. It sounds familiar. Too familiar.
    No, that’s just paranoid. I know nothing about motorcycles. Probably they all sound alike. Still, I look out the window.
    A pair of broad, black-clad shoulders come into view. I turn real quick and duck behind the bar.
    “Hey, what the . . .” The bartender stumbles over me.
    “Please. I need you to hide me,” I whisper. “That guy wants to kill me.”
    “What guy? What are you talking about? Get outta here.”
    I hear a door slam, then hard footsteps. I’m a dead man.
    I could use the cloak, but then the bartender would be on to me. I reach into my backpack and withdraw one of Victoriana’s hundreds. These are going faster than I’d like. I flip it up and show it to the bartender. He reaches for it. I pull it away, mouthing, “Later.”
    The footsteps come closer, and then a voice says, “Have you seen dis boy?”
    He sounds like the robot in the Terminator movies. I’m squirming, about to pee my pants.
    “He is a stranger here,” the accented voice continues. “Skinny. Tall.”
    “Nah, haven’t seen him.” That’s the bartender.
    “Wait a second,” another voice says. “Lemme see that.”
    “You’re drunk, Lefty.”
    I’m flattened against the floor. But still, I can hear my knees rattling. I don’t breathe.
    “But he looks like that guy—”
    “You mean the guy that was here yesterday? That was my cousin, Frank, and he’s gone now.”
    “Your cousin? You treated him like crap and charged him twenty bucks for day-old burgers.”
    “Didn’t say he was my favorite cousin. Can we drop it now?” He steps over me and tells the terrorist guy, “I ain’t seen him.”
    “If you do, you vill let me know?” The guy sounds more like Dracula than Schwarzenegger now. “Dere is a reward.”
    “Reward? What kind of reward?”
    A pause. Finally, a voice says, “Five hundred dollars.”
    I glance up and see the bartender looking at me. I nod. Yes. Yes, I have that.
    “I’d tell you if I’d seen him, but I haven’t.”
    A pause. I hear heavy footsteps, pacing. Everything else is silent, even the two drunks. Finally, the guy says, “Very gut. But if he comes here, you vill contact me, day or night?”
    And then he leaves. I stay there, not sure what to do, not even breathing. The two guys at the bar could betray me at any second. What’s stopping them?
    I hear a loud thump, then something rolling, a barstool.
    “Lefty’s passed out,” says the other drunk. “Now would you mind telling me why you lied about the kid behind the bar when the guy offered you five hundred dollars?”
    “Code of the bartender, my friend. I protect my customers. Like how I didn’t tell