The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue (Guide #1)(67)
The roadies parked the car and walked up a steep spiral staircase that ascended into the tower above. The inside of the UFO Observation Tower was one large, round room with a glass ceiling. The walls were covered in charts of various alien spacecraft and different types of alien species, and photographs of the most famous UFO sightings from around the world. Most of the unidentified flying objects were shaped like saucers, but some were triangular, and others were just orbs of multicolored light.
The merchandise was just as cheesy (if not more so) as the stuff on sale at the jailhouse museum. There were THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE bumper stickers, EXTRATERRESTRIAL CROSSING road signs, and alien head antenna ornaments. There were tacky T-shirts that said WE COME IN PEACE, I WAS ABDUCTED AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY T-SHIRT, and PROBE ME, I’M IRISH. There were also plush alien dolls, posters of Sigourney Weaver, novels written by Shirley MacLaine, and the complete series of The X-Files on DVD.
Topher, Joey, Sam, and Mo were very amused by the items on sale, but Cash just rolled his eyes and sighed at everything he saw.
There was only one employee working and she was sitting behind the checkout counter reading a book on her Kindle. Topher and the others were halfway through the store before she realized she had customers.
“Hi,” Topher said. “Are you open?”
“Well, hello, bonjour, hola, guten tag, buenos días, and kon’nichi-wa,” she said, and stood to greet them. “Welcome to the UFO Observation Tower, where you can find all your extraterrestrial essentials and exhibits at no extra price. We’re open every day except for holidays or unless I have jury duty. I’m Dr. Darla Plemons, owner and deep believer that the truth is out there. What brings you to the shop today?”
Darla spoke with the energy and enthusiasm of a camp counselor on crystal meth. She was tall and thin and wore a vest with hundreds of alien-related badges and pins. The gang was instantly exhausted just by being in her presence. Cash even took a couple steps backward when she introduced herself.
“We’re on a road trip from Illinois to Santa Monica,” Joey explained. “We’ve all read about the UFO crash that allegedly took place here in 1948 and saw on your Facebook page you had some exhibits about it.”
“The UFO crash that allegedly took place?” Darla asked like she was speaking in front of a giant crowd. “My friend, if you think it’s all just a bunch of allegations, then the government has already won. I bet you believe we actually went to the moon and Lee Harvey Oswald shot JFK, too.”
“So the crash actually happened?” Sam asked.
“Were George Washington’s teeth made of wood? Was Walt Disney cryogenically frozen moments before death? Was Beyoncé created in a Houston laboratory as an instrument for world peace?”
This only confused them more, and they stared at her blankly.
“Beats me, too,” Darla said with a shrug. “There’s absolutely no evidence to prove or disprove any of the theories I just mentioned.”
“There’s a theory Beyoncé was created in a lab?” Mo asked.
“When it comes to solving conspiracies, you should never look at the information they give you, only the information they don’t,” Darla said, and winked like a broken baby doll. “And when it comes to the UFO crash of 1948, the government sure spends an awful lot of time and effort telling us it didn’t happen.”
“I can’t tell if that’s brilliant or just bonkers,” Topher whispered to his friends.
“It’s 150 percent bonkers,” Cash answered.
Darla clapped her hands. “So you guys want to see some cool alien crap or what?”
She led them to the far side of the room to a square case that was covered in a black cloth. She put her hands over the top as if an exotic animal might jump out at any second.
“Before these objects are revealed I think it’s important to give you a little history lesson,” Darla explained. “Picture it—New Mexico in 1948. Truman was president and there wasn’t a damn thing to do but reproduce, raise cattle, and die. Two lonely farmers named Elmer and Essie Fitzpatrick awoke one summer night to the sounds of their livestock going berserk. They ran outside to see what the problem was and they saw smoke in the distance. They hurried toward it as fast as Elmer’s clubfoot would allow. In the exact spot where this tower stands, the farmers discovered a crashed flying saucer and four dead bodies of extraterrestrial beings!”
“Neat,” Joey said.
“Whatever,” Cash said.
“What did the farmers do?” Sam asked.
“What any respectable couple would do upon such a discovery—they called the sheriff,” Darla said. “However, Elmer and Essie didn’t realize at first what they had discovered. Being simple country folk during the time of World War II—and blatant racists—the couple assumed the four little green men among the debris were Japanese fighter pilots. So the sheriff immediately called the military when he got off the phone with the Fitzpatricks. They drove up from a base in southern New Mexico and were at the scene of the crash within three hours—but it only took a matter of seconds before they realized what they were looking at. The military had the whole scene cleared in under an hour and they shipped the wreckage and the bodies off to some secret government facility. The Fitzpatricks were told the crash was just a weather balloon and the bodies were seasick little people who had stolen it. But luckily for us, that wasn’t before Elmer Fitzpatrick took a piece of the wreckage for himself!”