Chapter 1: In Which Seth Begins to Wonder Exactly What He’s Gotten Into
if you are a lost and wandering soul,
or seeking rest before your journey folds,
allow heaven’s tilt to guide you to sleep
at the alice of the midnight sun
Seth closed the brochure and hesitated outside of the cubicle. Alice of the Midnight Sun, hiring maids. A hotel. It definitely caught his eye more than some of the other places he’d seen so far. He wondered what his mother would say if he got hired as a maid. “You know, you can clean my bathroom any time too!”
The blandness of the Anchorage job fair: the beige cubicles, the tired interviewers, the forms and applications, the gradually thinning stack of identical resumes in his hand. All of it was wearing on him. He hoped that at the very least, this interview might be interesting.
The man in the cubicle was middle aged, rail thin, all handsome features and sharp angles. And then he smiled, so wide and genuine that it lit up the room – or maybe he was just blinded by the man’s teeth, white and straight as a picket fence. Seth couldn’t help but smile back. There was a snow-globe on the desk, next to a nameplate that read simply: Theroux. As soon as Seth sat down, the man flipped the snowglobe.
“Name?” he asked, without so much as a hello.
“Seth,” he replied dutifully.
“Mm.” Theroux made a note on his clipboard. All traces of his welcoming demeanor had vanished; he was all business now. In the snowglobe, the storm was winding down, only a few flakes still drifted hazily in the liquid atmosphere. “Favorite colour?” Theroux continued.
“Favorite. Colour.” He enunciated every syllable, with strong emphasis on the T. Seth sat up straighter.
He underlined something, then flipped the page. “When can you start?”
“Uh, now. I mean, whenever!”
“Now would be appropriate,” Theroux said, glancing briefly at the snowglobe. It was then that Seth noticed a truly immense timepiece on his wrist, looking heavy enough to hold down his entire arm. But he lifted it effortlessly, and held his hand out to Seth. The watch was thicker than his wrist; it looked like a little island of metal supported by a very thin bridge. The impulse to refuse the handshake, to see just how long that twiggy arm could hold up the watch, shook Seth. He resisted. Theroux’s hand was strong, and almost oppressively warm. “The Alice welcomes you,” he said, and the inviting demeanor with which he had greeted Seth was back.
It took him a moment to realize what had happened. All the practicing for the interviews, all the preparation of references, his carefully crafted resume. All the other interviewers had turned him down, but this one hadn’t even asked his last name!
“You got the job,” Theroux said briskly. “Effective immediately.” He squinted. “Is there a problem?”
“No, of course… it’s just… that was fast?” Seth’s voice raised into a question of its own accord.
“Yes, well.” He checked his enormous watch. “It’s just that I’ve only got forty-three years, two months, and twelve days left. I must make the most of the time.”
“Yep, the exit will be on your left. Hurry now, we haven’t got all day. I expect you in tip top shape tomorrow!” He handed Seth a thick white envelope, half-pushing him out the door as he did so. “Your information packet. I trust you’ll be able to find Alice.”
And then he was out of the cubicle, taking his papers and his snowglobe and his enormous watch. So much for more interviews. Seth stepped out after him, but he’d already vanished. Alone, the envelope offered neither clues nor comfort in this strange situation.
Despite his directions, Seth found the exit on the opposite side of the job fair.
“He lied, it wasn’t on the left at all,” said Seth righteously. It wasn’t until he’d exited the building and was out in the car lot that he realized he hadn’t given the interviewer his resume or reference sheet.
He shivered slightly. It had been exactly one week since he’d moved to Anchorage with his father, and already he was staring to put down roots here. The thought made him feel a bit sick, so he tucked it away in his mind and headed for his car.
Seth’s first day on the job began at 2AM sharp, according to his information packet. Perplexed, he showed up exactly on time, in the butler-esque uniform he’d been provided. For his breast pocket, a yellow handkerchief had been included – a coincidence, or evidence that Theroux had actually noted his favorite colour? The sky was still eerily lit by a low-sitting sun, and Seth’s more southern-reared sensitivities weren’t used to all this daylight. Winter, he speculated, would be even more difficult to accept.
He’d seen the Alice before – in passing, on trips exploring his new city. Standing in front of it, in person, was an entirely different story. The building was gargantuan: a tall central building with shorter, wide wings stretching out in a semicircle on either side in an enormous embrace. The front lawn was more of a courtyard, with hundreds and hundreds of black windows gazing uniformly out at him. Above him was the logo of the hotel, the midnight sun, shining bronze and proud – the crown of the building. The way the metal caught the light truly did create the illusion of a smaller, more brilliant sun shining against the mountainous backdrop. Intimidating, and yet, Seth was not afraid to take his first steps across the lawn to the three granite stairs leading to the ornate entranceway.
Gold-gilded glass revolving doors welcomed him into the lobby, where his new supervisor (at least, if the cardboard sign she was holding – ‘Seth’s new supervisor’ – were to be believed) waited for him. She was a tall woman with blonde hair and a business pantsuit, impeccably groomed.
“You must be Seth!” she exclaimed with vigor.
He clutched his information packet, running through it again once more in his head before saying, “Are you Gwynneth?”
“That’s me! It’s lovely to meet you.” She extended her hand in greeting.
Her handshake was firm and confident, and Seth worried he was suffering a sure case of dead-fish-hand in comparison. “L-likewise,” he said chummily.
She wasted no time. “In order to get you started here, I’m going to pair you up with some of our bell-hops. I take it you’ve never visited the Alice before?”
Without missing a beat, she continued. “Following them will give you a better understanding of the hotel’s layout, give you a better feel for the place, than following our maidstaff would. So! Sorry to say, no toilet scrubbing today.”
Behind Gwynneth stood a pair of identically energetic women in matching black scrubs and hijabs.
“Theodora,” the first said, by way of introduction.
“Theodosia,” chimed in the second.
“Theos, plural,” Gwynneth said.
“Theos,” Seth tried, and the left Theo smirked. Theodosia, according to her nametag.
Gwynneth stepped past Seth and began to leave, but paused to ruffle his hair on the way past. “Pleasure to have you, Seth! Stick with the Theos today. I’ll be seeing you tomorrow! Oh,” she said, speaking over her shoulder as she continued walking away. “And no need to be nervous.”
Right, he thought. When he looked back at the Theos, they were already walking away. He hurried to catch up.
He stumbled after them, tripping repeatedly over the plush carpet as he went. The lobby was so opulent, with dual sweeping staircases fringing an ornate, carved wooden arched door leading to the first floor rooms. The carpet, laid out in pathways across the beige marble floor, was rich and red, and soft enough to sleep in. Seth swore his feet were getting stuck, sunk in with every step. Gold gilding covered the railings and wall mouldings, and the lobby and waiting rooms were dotted with richly upholstered couches and mahogany coffee tables. Despite it all, there wasn’t a single guest in sight. Right, he thought. 2 AM.
Behind the front desk, he caught sight of Theroux polishing a mirror. Seth caught his eye in the reflection, and Theroux flashed him an expressionless peace sign, which Seth returned with a grin.
Chandeliers lining the broad, carpeted way to the golden elevator bank seemed to be literally dripping crystals in the corners of his eyes; shining droplets that he could almost hear clinking as they hit the carpet. But when he looked, they were still, and there were no small piles of jewels beneath them. Even the few visible stars seemed to sparkle extra vividly through the massive arched windows, bright points in the deep orange light of midnight dusk. Once again, he wondered if he’d ever get used to these nights-that-weren’t-nights.
“Coming?” asked a Theo, breaking his reverie. Seth nearly saw which of the sisters had spoken, but they both turned away before he could read their nametags.
“This place is beautiful!” Seth said, too lost in the splendor to answer the question.
Both Theos stopped and regarded the extravagance around them.
“That it is,” Theodosia commented nonchalantly.
“You kind of get used to it.” Theodora shrugged. “But it is pretty nice.”
Seth doubted very much that he’d ever get used to it. All this opulence… it was unmatched, anywhere he’d been.
“You need a card to get to the restricted floors,” Theodora explained. She and her sister pulled out small, black keycards monogrammed with the hotel’s logo in white print.
“Since you’re a newb,” Theodosia explained, “Y’ain’t got one yet. But don’t worry, you can borrow mine if you end up needing one.”
“So anyway,” Theodora interrupted. “There’s a big staff commons in the underbasement. Everyone meets there. Maids, kitchen staff, animal and bird specialists, maintenance staff, librarians, desk staff… well, you get the picture.”
“You forgot the bellhops,” Theodosia said.
“Oh yeah, us. There’s more bellhops usually, but not today. We got it covered for this shift.”
“Anyway, it’s not important,” Theodora said impatiently. “You’ll meet everyone eventually. She called an elevator and beckoned her companions inside, then inserted her keycard into a slot at the bottom of the keypad and tapped a button. It was then that Seth noticed the sheer number of buttons – far more floors than the outside of the hotel would suggest.
“Jeez, how many stories does this place have?”
“About 100, give or take a few on weekends,” said Theodosia.
“And extras. Can’t reach everything from this elevator bank.”
“Some rooms, you have to take the ski lift to get to.”
“How can there be one hundred stories,” Seth asked. By the time the ‘ski lift’ bit had time to process in his mind, he was too baffled to comment on it.
Theodosia shrugged. “There just are,” she said. “And you’ll be cleaning rooms on all of them, so no need to take our word on it.”
Seth said nothing. It was all too strange, like things were happening in a dream. He continued scanning the panel of buttons – lobby, basement, B1, etc…. one button, ominously, simply read, ‘Canada.’ On the very bottom of the panel was a slightly elongated button labeled ‘Underbasement,’ approximately twenty floors down from where they stood. It was this button that Theodora pushed.
“Hold onto your cookies!” she said cheerfully.
Too late. The floor dropped out from beneath the three employees, and simultaneously, the lights went out.
The Theos’ echoing giggles and squeals nearly drowned out his scream. The fall was long – so long that Seth had time to reflect on the length. His scream petered out and he gasped for breath. The fall was just too long. his eyes began to adjust to the dark, seeing cracks in the elevator shaft column: doors from other floors, letting in a little bit of light.
“Theos?” he asked. He was trying to sound calm, but his voice broke on the name.
“Yep!” replied one. “’Sup, Seth?”
“What the fuck?” he asked, as conversationally as he could manage.
“Does this thing even have a bottom?” he asked baselessly.
“Of course. Almost there!”
Seth was suddenly unsure if reaching the bottom was a good idea, given their speed.
It was too dark to see what they fell into, but it felt like a layer of cotton balls so thick that he barely felt the slowing effect until they were seven feet into the… pile.
“Oh,” Seth said when they finally came to a stop. All ten of his fingers trembled, and he lay still, not trusting himself to even move. There was quite a large part of him that was convinced he’d definitely died.
“Totally safe,” the Theos said together. “And fun. And practical.”
“It’s so dark,” Seth said delightedly. “I can’t really… see.”
Someone clapped, and fluorescent lights flashed to life along the walls of the shaft, temporarily blinding Seth. When his eyes readjusted, he poked his head out of the top of the white fluffy cushioning that had saved his life. One of the Theo’s heads was visible; of the other, all he could see was an arm adrift in the cottony sea.
“Oh, Theo, your hijab,” said the more visible sister to the arm. “I can see your hair. Better fix it.”
“How do we get out?” Seth asked.
“We climb… swim… ish. Just make your way to that door.” Theodosia said, joining her arm in Seth’s field of view, hijab intact.
The three of them trundled through the mess in silence for several minutes.
“This is really inefficient,” Seth said.
“Beats not having a cushion,” Theodora said.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Plus, it’s pretty fun,” her sister chimed in. “The Alice loves fun.”
“Not Alice. The Alice,” Theodosia corrected. “The hotel. Oh, here we are.” She pulled herself to freedom from the cushiony cloud. Through the door, Seth and the Theos entered a low-ceilinged, drippy pathway. The walls, floors, and ceiling had been painted sky-blue in an attempt to liven the place up, and someone had gone to all the trouble of painting in fluffy white clouds. It was a corridor of sky, but the exposed pipes and leaky walls made it anything but cheery. Seth thought of making the walk through here every morning, of taking the fall down the chute, and his stomach sank. The move had been hard enough to adjust to without all of the inexplicable things he’d seen this morning. Further dampening matters, his foot caught in an algae-coated, stagnant puddle and he felt the filthy cold water ooze into his sock. He scowled.
Finally, the corridor gave way to a barred steel door.
“After you,” beckoned Theodosia after she opened it. Seth stepped in.
On the other side of the door was his living room. Startled, he jumped back.
“Oh, don’t worry. It’s like that for everyone,” Theodora explained. Her eyes drifted past him, over his shoulder. “Salām, Daadi,” she said, waving at Seth’s fireplace.
“She’s talking to our grandmother, who can’t see you,” explained Theodosia in a stage whisper. “And you can’t see her. You’re in your home, and we’re in ours. Is anyone home for you?”
“N-no?” Seth stuttered. He followed the women nervously through the room, trying not to flinch when they walked through his sofa. It was an exact replica of the new living room – he half expected his father to walk and ask him why he wasn’t at work.
Both Theos said goodbye to the figure only they could see before they left.
“What happened back there?” Seth asked.
“Oh, our grandma likes to stay up late watching the murder mysteries,” a Theo explained.
“No, I meant… that was my house!” Seth said with a frown.
“Oh. That. Yeah, sorry about that. It’s a bit weird at first. We’re occupying different places in that room,” Theodora explained.
This did nothing to ease his confusion, and his frown deepend.
“You get used to it?” she tried.
“It’s pretty convenient if you forget your lunch in the living room,” Theodosia said.
“Wait, it… it works like that? It’s real? I was just home?”
“’Course. The Alice is like that sometimes. Weird stuff happens, and honestly, you’re going to have to start getting used to it a bit faster. It’s all uphill from here.”
He was so lost. Whatever this place was, it was definitely not normal. So he followed his guides. What else was he to do?
The Theos spent the next hour showing him the underbasement, realm of the staff. A whirlwind tour that Seth barely registered. He’d begun to feel disconnected - out of tune with the oddness of his surroundings.
The cafeteria: state of the art, all steel and white marble. Surprisingly glamorous, considering it was staff-only. Food was delivered via dumbwaiter – any food, apparently. If the Theos were to be believed, Seth could eat whatever he wanted for free from the restaurant above, so long as he asked nicely into a tin can perched on the ledge next to the dumbwaiter.
The laundry room: maid headquarters. The Theos barely ‘wasted’ time showing him this room; said he’d learn all about it tomorrow. All his peers-to-be were making the rounds and doing rooms, so there was nothing to see there.
Though there was much more of the hotel to be seen, the Theos cut the tour short, claiming that the rest of the hotel wasn’t something to be toured, but to be experienced. So they ended off with the bellhop ‘office’ – a closet next to a stairwell, crammed full of all manner of things. A bed, a gaming system, several books, and an artist’s easel.
“We just chill here until someone rings for us.”
“We don’t chill a lot,” the Theos explained.
“And usually there are more people in.”
“Slow season?” Seth cut in. “It’s summer!”
“Slow season,” Theodosia confirmed.
But the most remarkable thing about the office was the charcoal images papering the walls, arranged in a carefully numbered, labeled grid. Somehow, in the tiny amount of wall space available, there seemed to be a drawing for every single room in the hotel. Each was a caricature, a uniquely captured individual glaring from the walls.
“Did you draw these?” Seth asked. He stepped closer to the walls, then jumped back. He could have sworn he saw one of the drawings wink.
“They’re… they’re the guests!” he said as he caught on.
In front of his very eyes, a rheumy-looing old man with jowls for days turned and, in a series of jerky movements resembling a flip-book, left through the side of his drawing.
“There goes 216,” remarked Theodora.
“Maybe he died,” suggested Theodosia. “He was pretty old.”
Theodora giggled. “Gross.”
More and more of the portraits turned and left their drawings.
“Check out time,” Theodora said. Seth glanced at his watch. At 3:00 AM? Yet another question to add to the pile forming in his mind.
“Or they’re all dying,” Theodosia posited.
“Has anyone actually died here?” Seth asked, shaken from his confusion for a moment.
The Theos blinked at him as if unsure how to take the question.
“Hoards,” Theodosia said blankly.
“Suicides, murders, and natural causes. Lots of people seem to think this is a good place to come to die,” Theodora said.
“I bet they’re right,” said her sister.
“But don’t worry, we hardly ever find the bodies.”
“Don’t go into a room with a raven on the door handle, that’s a good rule,” Theodosia said. “They’re the hotel’s corpse-sniffing ravens. If you see one, just call security. Seriously, don’t go in. It’s not worth it.”
The silence that followed hung heavy. For his part, Seth had no idea how to respond to this information. Corpse-sniffing ravens? He was seriously beginning to believe he’d slept through his alarm and this was all a dream.
In the end, it wasn’t any of them that broke the silence. It was one of the portraits.
Both Theos jumped and turned to the source of the noise. One of the portraits was leaning out and, in that bizarre stop-motion art style, speaking to them.
Seth’s jaw dropped open. The woman in the drawing had overly exaggerated large pearl earrings, but on closer inspection, he could have sworn, “Hey, that looks like…”
The Theos bowed. “Bellhop service,” they said in unison.
“724 will be requiring a flamingo for this evening, please.”
The portrait retreated back into the page and fell still once more.
“Well, you heard,” Theodosia said to a still-stunned Seth. He was forced to pull his eyes from the portrait.
Theodora glanced at her sister out of the corner of her eye. “Trial by fire?”
Theodosia smiled. “Exactly.”
Theodosia handed him her key. “To the aviary, captain!” Frankly, he was relieved that Theodora had stayed behind to handle other guests. It was much easier to call her by name when only one of the sisters was present.
He scanned the directory, punched in a code, and swiped his key. “To the apiary,” he agreed.
“No!” she protested, but it was too late. It was then that he noticed aviary and apiary might possibly be separate words.
“The apiary is on the roof,” she moaned. “The aviary is in basement one. We passed it already!”
“Already? We fell for so long! There’s no way we made it that far so quickly.”
Theo jerked her head at a scrolling series of numbers above the door – somehow, they were on floor 13 already. “The hotel doesn’t care about your logic.”
“It’s not logic, it’s… physics, or something.”
“The Alice doesn’t care about that either.”
Don’t even bother asking, he thought. Just then, the elevator dinged: they’d reached the roof. The doors slid open, and a man haloed by a bug hat and a swarm of bees waved at them from beneath the streaky orange sky. Sometime while they’d been in the underbasement, the darkest part of night had passed and the sun was making its return trip.
“Hey Nathaniel,” Theo said. “This basic bitch sent us here instead of the aviary.”
“New?” the man asked Seth.
“Brand spankin,’” Theo replied for him.
“Happens to the best of us,” the beekeeper replied. “What do you need from the aviary?”
“Just one? They usually ask for ‘em in pairs.”
“Well, enjoy that. Maybe give them Fergie, he’s pretty good at being a lone wolf.”
“One of the birds,” Nathaniel explained. “Such a nice guy.”
Somehow, the ride to basement one from the roof lasted much longer than the trip from the underbasement to the roof, despite covering a shorter distance. It was on the tip of Seth’s tongue to ask how, but he’d already completely given up understanding this place.
“This way to the avia-hey! Samantha!”
A wide-eyed, short-haired brunette standing in the hall turned to look at Theo.
“The one-and-not-so-only,” Theo said with a grin. “Hey, Seth. That way to the aviary. Keep my key. Catch ya later?”
She phrased it as a question, but she was already making her way over to where Samantha waited, looking curiously at Seth.
“Oh, and ask for Fergie when you get there! Put him on a leash! See ya!”
Whatever he’d expected from a basement aviary, it wasn’t this. Neither cavelike nor dim, a warm, damp breeze greeted him as he stepped through the palm-covered doors.
The noise was outstanding, so much so that Seth stepped back out of the room and shut the door to prepare himself properly for the onslaught. But once he was in the room, the birds settled down.
“Would it kill you to knock?” squawked a parrot perched in a tree by the door.
There was no organization to the aviary that Seth could see. It was an entire indoor zoo, divided by climate zone. Puffins, robins, birds of paradise. Trees, ponds… he had no idea how long he’d been wandering when he saw a flamingo.
He could have sworn that the bird shook its head before ambling away on its stilt legs. Moments later, another one wandered over and settled next to him.
“Could have just asked, could have just asked,” the parrot caroled, winging by overhead.
“Alright. We’re going for this.”
It took him another twenty minutes to find the leash (pink, rhinestoned), and by the time he reached the elevator, Theo had come and gone and all that remained was a note stuck to the elevator shaft with a pink magnet shaped like the word “LOL.”
Seth. It’s sink or swim. It’s up to you to find 724. Me and Sam are needed elsewhere. Also, you got this.
“Well, shit,” Seth muttered.
