Debbie's Hellmouth

By Matthew Sawyer

Debbie Menon has a unique pseudo-Victorian house she must sell – because her soul is held in proxy for that same disowned portal into Hell. Yet the evil nature of the place makes it unsaleable. Fortunately, Debbie’s not totally helpless – she’s been to Art school.

Locally, the place is known as the Witch’s house and stands in gossipy Wister Town. The house is named for the mysterious Betulha Dohrman, whom no one has ever seen. The old woman had vanished with an unannounced debt. That debt becomes the onus of the Mikelmeier Real Estate office. The selling agent, Debbie Menon, too, once lived near the house in this small, Swiss-themed city.

Debbie had moved away to Los Angeles so that she might utilize her Art education and find work, but that didn’t work-out. Consequently, she's moved back. Home again, she falls in love with a city alderman, Jerry Leutenegger then quickly establishes a career selling real estate. The Witch's house becomes the bane of her otherwise successful and happy life back in southern Wisconsin.

Debbie learns her soul is held in proxy until an owner is found. This is where the story of Debbie’s Hellmouth begins. The house – or specifically the tumorish and displaced widow’s watch atop the faux-Victorian home – wants to break loose and spread evil. Elements of that evil already pester the residents of Wister Town. What happens now with this cursed house only worsens the situation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Matthew Sawyer
• Release date: Feb 18, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301465583

Matthew Sawyer

I hate talking about myself. Like everyone, I suppose, I am a bit narcissistic, but not egotistical. My own failure for success is that I just do not think much about myself. That is not to say I spend too much time thinking about others. In truth, I should think more of everyone; and there is a dull guilt attached to that confession. There is something of who I am, I am old enough for regrets.At my age, I am prone to think about immortality And being an atheist, there seems no alternative but science. Even so, I know that science is beyond my lifetime. I have no faith nor hope, nor do I believe in ghosts, elves, unicorns...In that hopeless disbelief, I write so there remains a record of accomplishments in my life. Unrecognized and even scorned, I continue to tell stories so I will be remembered after I am dead. My struggle with grammar and punctuation are evidence of my effort to make my writing decipherable. Because, what success means to me are hieroglyphics upon a Pharaoh's tomb.

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Debbie’s

HELLMOUTH

Fourth Revision

Matthew Sawyer

Published by Matthew Sawyer at Smashwords

Copyright 2017 by Matthew Sawyer

ISBN: 9781301465583

Debbie’s Hellmouth is a fictional story. All characters, names and locations are the creations of Matthew Sawyer. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, is unintentional and coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing form from the copyright owner.

Please contact the author for permission to make copies of any part of this work.

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Our Lord Weathercock

Unction

Cover Art by Matthew Sawyer

Book Design by Matthew Sawyer

Debbie’s HELLMOUTH

Chapters

An Origin of Gossip

Chapter 1 Real Estate

Chapter 2 No Choice

Chapter 3 The Pit

Chapter 4 Placatory Lure

Chapter 5 Harbinger

Chapter 6 Medium

Chapter 7 Inspiration

Chapter 8 Revived

Chapter 9 Pagan Experiments

Chapter 10 Ensnared

Chapter 11 Redemptive

Chapter 12 The Speaking Dead

Chapter 13 Onward

Chapter 14 The Shadow Within La Crosse

Chapter 15 Enlightenment

Chapter 16 The Styx

Chapter 17 Southward

Chapter 18 Underpainting

Chapter 19 Critique

Chapter 20 The Open Door

Chapter 21 Earthly Visitation

Chapter 22 Conspiracy

Chapter 23 The Encroaching Evil

Chapter 24 Hellbound

An origin of gossip about the house Debbie Menon tries to sell, before monsters had come to Wister Town...

Lee and Devon take shortcuts from the public pool on their way to the home of Lee's grandmother. The route travels through the backyard of the Witch's House, and the day was perfect to go inside the house and explore. The boys might not get another opportunity. The witch, Mrs. Dohrman, had just move away, so the structure supposedly stood empty. More important, the summer afternoon was bright and warm.

Two days ago, Lee had watched the witch's belongings packed into a moving truck, but the kid had no details to report to his friend Devon. Besides stained and torn antique furniture, everything removed from the two story, red-brick home had been wrapped in opaque plastic or sealed inside cardboard boxes. Lee classifies anything old and scarred and still works to be antique.

Imagination squeezed whatever nightmare the boys concoct in the old house with the hermit-like woman into sixteen inch boxes. Lee supposes a few of the terrible monsters can be disassembled and assembled again in their new home. But, if Mrs. Dohrman was truly evil, she would have left demons in the house on purpose. The boys wanted to see those monsters the witch trapped in her house, or their remains.

The Witch's House is next to the paved parking lot of St. Daniel's Catholic Church. The three-hundred and sixty degree widow's watch on top of the old house overlooks consecrated ground. A couple years ago, Lee and Devon argued whether a witch could really live next to holy ground. They agreed there was no better place if the old woman sought to desecrate the church. Mrs. Dohrman then became an evil witch.

That summer, Lee and Devon had played a game where the goal was to sprint across Mrs. Dohrman's lawn without being seen by the witch. If a shade opened, or Mrs. Dohrman stood in the window, the daredevil runner had to dash to the divine safety of St. Daniel's parking lot.

The most frightening day Lee says he remembers was when Mrs. Dohrman came outside and cursed at the boys in Swiss. He probably lies about the encounter. As Devon was aware, the sighting would make his friend the only person who had actually ever seen the witch in the flesh.

Devon claims his most terrifying moment at the Witch's House was when he saw red, glowing and disembodied eyes, squinting at him through an upstairs window. Lee went back and looked for the eyes, but he saw nothing. Still, Devon might have really seen them, the house was truly evil and haunted.

I bet whatever she's hidden inside is in the widow's watch, Devon says to Lee as the boys enter the backyard of the Witch's House. They slow their pace, ready to dart into the church parking lot, as they study the uncovered yet dark windows.

I bet it's a Christmas tree, suggests Devon. His comment was not unexpected.

Lee speculates Yeah, a lighted-up tree up there, with those windows like a lighthouse. That would look cool. Wait, all those windows are painted black on the inside, remember?

Yeah, I know, Devon answers. That's why she'd keep it up there.

Nobody would see it then, answers Lee.

No, that's not the point, Devon insists. There are living Christmas trees. I told you I saw one in my house.

Yeah, but that was a long time ago, years, Lee states.

That happened last year, idiot, Devon reminds his friend. Lee deserves a slug, but both boys are wary of doing anything that might put them off guard. After all, they do stand in the shadow of the Witch's House.

Hey, I'm thinking of a way we can get inside, Lee justifies his preoccupation.

I was gonna say, we can find an open window, but the witch never took off the storm windows, Devon offered, unhelpful.

Let's try the doors, Lee decides. This is Wister Town, nobody locks doors.

Yeah, but Mrs. Dohrman moved away, Devon clarifies.

That's even more reason not to bother locking any doors, Lee rationalizes. Unless, the witch left something behind she didn't want to get outside.

Then why are we going in? Devon asks not entirely in jest. His feet were growing cold. Standing in the long grass of the backyard casts a pall over his brave and adventuresome spirit.

I was just joking, Devon, Lee claims.

Yeah, but all we're wearing are sandals and wet swimming suits, Devon complains.

They're getting dry, Lee said. And we got towels. Are you chicken?

No.

Chicken!

I'm not, Devon shouts at Lee. He tells him, Let's check the back door first.

The scantily clad boys carefully approach the back door of the house. They wear large, printed beach towels around their heads and shoulders wrapped as if shawls. A cartoon pig brands Devon whereas Lee promotes a flying robot.

Because of the teasing, Devon opens the peeling, unlocked wooden door. The rear entrance goes directly into the kitchen. Both boys see the bare counters and ancient appliances in the shadow of the room. The interior of the creepy house clings to darkness, despite the mysteriously blunted light from the unobstructed window.

Lee and Devon stand on the last of three concrete steps leading up and into the house. Both boys spend a moment internally debating whose turn it was to prove something, and if either had something to prove. This first kid who steps into the house would do so voluntarily.

That volunteer will automatically gain enormous respect from the other boy. Daresay, a hero could claim the title just by stepping over the threshold of this haunted house. Devon steps into the shadow.

Hey! I was going to go into the Witch's House first! Lee exclaimed in fright and outrage.

But you didn't, Devon brags.

Lee reluctantly follows Devon into the house. He had lost the contest for hero-hood, so he was not ashamed to convey his timidity. Although, he still scrutinizes the strength and bravery of his friend. Lee would not run from the Witch's House. In fact, this became an opportunity to steal Devon's mantle.

If his friend turns and runs, and Lee follows, making him the last boy to leave the haunted house, Lee's bravery would dwarf any of Devon's claims. Bravery was Lee's redemption! His voice cracks when he asks his friend a question.

So where will we go now, the widow's watch?

I suppose, Devon said.

All the same, The boys linger in the kitchen a little longer. Goosebumps rise on every exposed piece of flesh and both boys shiver. Hey, it's cold in here, Lee complains.

Yeah, I know, Devon answers. I bet its warm upstairs, let's go.

Devon races through the big, dark and empty house while Lee stays on his friend's heels. The stairwell could not be missed. A grand, central cherry wood staircase slants toward the second floor and commands the view from any corner of the three empty front rooms. Devon stomps on the antique steps, desperate for the anticipated warmth upstairs.

The two wrapped boys wrestle each other during their rapid ascent – and the air upstairs does feel a little warmer. Another narrower staircase goes up to the widow's watch. Devon pauses without warning and Lee slams into him. The collision pushes both boys toward the stairs to the widow's watch. Lee pushes Devon, who shoves back. Once the physical posturing is over, they test each others wits. Lee taunts his friend.

Why d'ya stop, something scare you?

Yeah, your butt, Devon counters.

How can that be? Lee asks logistically. I'm behind you.

I can smell you.

Ha, ha, Devon laughs sarcastically.

As they joke, the beach towels drop off their heads and onto their shoulders. The upstairs may be warmer, but definitely darker. There are no windows in the hall. Lee and Devon make-out a half dozen closed wooden doors in addition to the beginning of a partially spiraled staircase.

Holy shit, it's dark up here, Lee says aloud. Devon repeats what his friend says, for the sake of using profane language.

Both boys navigate down the hall feeling the walls, searching for door handles. A door comes open and with light, Lee said, Hey the windows in the bedrooms aren't covered, open all the doors.

The reflected illumination is dim but better than nothing at all. Once Devon and Lee open the doors, the additional sources help very little. Lee tells his friend, It's still pretty dark.

Yeah, I know, Devon says imitating his big sister's arrogant pout. With the windows painted, I bet its pitch black in the widow's watch.

Yeah, I think so, Lee agrees. Downstairs, he had blamed his quivering voice on the cold. But up here, he helplessly exposes his undisguised fear.

His friend's anxiety unnerves Devon. He wants to say nothing more, in case he scares Lee away. Without Lee even a moment leaves Devon alone in the Witch's House. The thick shadow pushes him closer to seizing his friend's hand, and he resists the childish temptation.

So you want to go up there? Devon asks him so he can be certain his friend truly intends to go into the widow's watch. Though satisfied and wanting to leave, Lee pushes Devon closer toward the cliff.

Something does scare you! he exclaims victorious. What do you see? I bet it's made of ice, 'cuz it's cold downstairs.

I don't see anything, Devon corrects his friend. And that's a stupid idea.

Like a living Christmas Tree? Lee teases him, remembering stories his friend had told in school around Christmas last year. Is the 'Ghost of Christmas' up there?

Why are you bringing that up now? It's summertime, Devon whines.

Okay, if you don't see anything, let's look in the widow's watch, Lee proposes. You go first.

Okay, Devon parrots his friend and adds an explanation to assure himself. The tree almost set my house on fire.

All right, Lee shouts. His command reverberates through the house.

Without further delay, the boys tiptoe as quietly as their flopping sandals allow on the bare wooden floor. Dark wood covers the floors of the entire house except the kitchen. A single sheet of gray linoleum covers that corner of the lower story. The shadow makes the shade of the floor difficult to distinguish. It might have originally been white and could still be.

Both thin boys fit side-by-side as they climb the creaking narrow stairs to the widow's watch. The sound echos back and forth between the empty rooms downstairs in the house. The stairs ascend to a blackish, red wooden door. The stairs peak in the south-eastern quadrant of the circular widow's watch. The curving wall holds a single window. A thick black paint on the glass and frame seals out drafts as well as light.

Hey, Lee stalls Devon. Why does this house have a widow's watch? Lake Michigan is over a hundred miles away.

I don't know, Devon replies.

It looks at St. Daniel's, Lee shockingly concludes.

Not really, because the windows are painted.

Oh yeah.

You really want to do this? Devon asks his friend the final time. His hand rest on a brass door handle.

Lee chickens out. No, not really.

You want to check out any other room in the house? Devon checks with his friend.

No, I just want to get out of here.

Me too, Devon says, suddenly needing to pee.

As the boys shift their weight and step onto a lower stair, the door into the widow's watch pops open. The unexpected sound comes as a crack of thunder in the silent house. The utter lack of illumination blackens the interior of the widow's watch. Lee turns and sees Devon staring at him. As far as Lee is concerned, they had already made their agreement to leave. He turns around and hops down the stairs. The flying robot on the beach towel waves as if in actual flight. Thankfully, the darkness around him lifts a little as he goes. Devon also races down the stairs, into the tainted light.

Devon catches-up with Lee at the top of the flight traveling down into the daylight passed through downstairs windows. Cold needles prick the toes of both boys and they again shroud their heads with their beach towels. The boys alternately watch the black opening and the dark warmth upstairs, and the exit downstairs. Their escape is bathed in bitter cold light.

Run for the back door, Devon says exchanging the foot he lifts from the denser cold air near the floor. His teeth chatter when he tells his friend, We know that one is open.

Yeah, Lee says already chattering. He repeatedly dances the same steps his friend takes.

Run and don't stop, Devon directs Lee, stalling as he convinces himself the sprint through the unnatural temperature will feel like jumping into a cold pool on a chilly morning.

Let's go then, Lee shouts and he hops down the stairs, allowing momentum carry him two or three steps at a time. He makes a single sound. Woof!

Devon follows Lee down into the invisible subzero air. Unlike swimming, the cold sucks the warm air out of him. When Devon takes a breath, the stale, frigid wind freezes his lungs and seizes his throat.

He feels an asthma attack coming, in which case, he had again forgot to bring his inhaler. So many people now carry inhalers that if he really needed one, there always seemed one around. His friend, Lee, did not need any, so Devon might be in trouble.

The cold air stiffens Lee's muscles. His limbs are locked in place, as if still in flight, when he lands awkward on the stairs. Lee cartwheels, turning on his head when he hammers against a hard wooden step. Tumbling down the stairs, he shouts in pain. His limbs immediately regain flexibility when he lands at the bottom, yet Lee lies fetal on the floor and shivers.

Devon gasps as he joins Lee in the paralyzing cold at the bottom of the stairs. Light still shines through the windows and only warms the unnatural shadow downstairs, but the room still feels as cold as dry ice. Devon tugs Lee onto his feet. Lee loses his towel as he stands and his freshly tanned back suddenly discolors to deathly white.

As the boys stumble into the kitchen, where Lee loses a sandal, Devon takes small breathes. He could not bear enough of the frigid air in his lungs to speak to his friend. Devon continued towing Lee behind him. Dragging his friend toward their escape, his towel falls over his extended arm. Devon watches his own flat belly fade from caramel to vanilla. Two weeks worth of summertime tan was lost in ten minutes.

The boys find themselves outside the Witch's House with numb limbs and dead fingers and toes. Lee's head hurts but determination keeps him on his feet. Escaped, the boys race across the overgrown lawn and into the St. Daniel's Church parking lot. The cold did not pursue the boys into the sunlight, but they wanted heavenly protection just in case.

Their hands and feet ache while the warm afternoon sun resurrects each digit. Devon's lips also feel as if rubbed across a razor. After some minutes, he finally gathers enough breath and feeling in his face so that he can talk to Lee.

We have to go to the police, Lee mumbles before Devon says anything. At minimum, we gotta tell our parents. My grandma! She leaves a block away!

We can do the same thing I should have done to the Christmas tree last year, Devon states grimly. We'll burn it.

No, Devon, Lee declines. I'm not getting near the Witch's House again, I promise.

There are the eyes again, Devon shouts and points at an upper story window, swearing he spotted the malicious, glowing ghost people claimed to be living inside the house. The boy swears, They were just there.

I'm really not going back now, Lee says collapsing cross-legged onto the pavement. He holds his head. Dang, my brain hurts bad. Go tell my grandma she has to pick me up with her car.

All right, Devon shouts as he runs down the street, his asthma vanquished in the summer afternoon.

Lee pushes himself to his feet and staggers after his friend. Although he stands on consecrated ground, Lee did not like the sight of the dark, empty windows. Their stare makes his spine tingle and chills his limbs. The beach towel, lost sandal and his early summer tan was all the Witch's House would take from him.

1 Real Estate

Last week, snow had fallen and stuck to the ground – living there until each flake melted away its short life. Today, all that moisture in the soil and air makes the eighty-degree temperature feel humid and even hotter. Familiar and re-acclimated to the climatic chaos of late Spring in Southern Wisconsin, Debbie Menon knows she should wait in her air conditioned white sedan until her real estate clients arrive for their tour.

This morning, a young Minnesotan couple were looking at the faux Victorian on Fourteenth street with Debbie. Tom and Mina Krenshaw had told the agent the home listing attracted them to Wister Town from another state. The prospective two-story, red-brick house was over one hundred and fifty years old. And its two hundred and fifty thousand dollar listing and purported pristine condition flirted the promise of a wise investment.

The building probably qualified for some historical status. A tax-break of this sort would benefit adventurous buyers, but Debbie must research the idea before she began using her assumption for a selling point. In this respect, her boss kept all his agents in check.

Besides, what made the edifice a faux Victorian was the peaked widow’s watch on the mansard roof over the western wing. The strange and unbalanced addition might disqualify the house because it no longer met modern bureaucratic requirements. Debbie expected as much.

Although, the aberration may be an antique architectural quirk – the house was so old. Debbie avoided looking at it. Waiting in her car, she remembers speaking to the convenient building inspector who had been contracted to visit the site. She recalls his rugged and twangy Wisconsin speech.

He told her, Honestly, I'm not certain if the peak and its surrounding windows are part of the original construction or all that had been added soon after. I bet you can't tell me.

Deb agreed with the expert and she had nodded her head. More recently, a past owner had painted black every interior pane of glass facing inside the widow’s watch. Pete Marondich, the inspector and a moreover contracted handyman, said Those windows were painted within the last forty years or so. I discovered that when previous prospects for this place paid for lead testing.

What did you find? Debbie asked as a matter of professional courtesy.

Pete reported, The uninsulated porch summit is free of lead, but that cold room – your window's watch – that space still isn’t safe. You won't die of lead up there, but something else can probably get you. Accidents happen.

Debbie respects the man’s experience and his wisdom and she believes him. The little dark room is cold, colder than the rest of the house. She and Pete had gone into the widow’s watch this past March. Winter had still howled its prolonged Midwestern death throws, but the small loft had felt even colder than outside. Debbie had no qualms against him nailing the door shut. New owners can come and open the room, and the jamb will only begin their remodeling. At this time, the reddish black door of the widow’s watch remains shut, primarily because Pete had vaguely deemed room unsafe.

The vision of the displaced widow’s watch from the street is impressive – to anyone who is brave and looks. The circular brick, blind tower rises the height of nearby, baby-leafed treetops and overlooks the asphalt parking lot of Saint Daniel’s Catholic church. A Protestant church stands on the opposite corner of the same block. Debbie feels embarrassed and a little ashamed she can't remember the name of the church in which she's been baptized and confirmed – and she might go look after her appointment with the Krenshaws is done.

Religion had never meant anything to her. That and whole other past experiences in her life had faded and all were mute after moving to Los Angeles, then very briefly to New York. Life had gotten crazy, but Debbie was now where she'd been born and at home in Wister Town, Wisconsin.

Despite how frustrating and backwards this place can be, life in this small town has definitely slowed down her hectic and dead-end life. That especially concerns her meritless existence in a mega-metropolis. Here, Debbie is convinced she can peacefully waste her time at the beginning and the end of her life on Earth and not die because an early stroke or heart attack – or mugging, or plague of bedbugs or terrorists and flesh-eating lunatics.

When she spots the Krenshaws arrive in their chrome-blue sports car, she turns off the air conditioner in her vehicle and removes the key from its dash. She groans when she imagines stepping into the wet heat outside. Her reservation is weakened as the air inside her sedan thickens and makes her feel sticky. In desperate contrast, the weird cold trapped inside the widow’s watch suddenly seems empirically preferable.

Debbie honks her car horn when the Krenshaws step from their vehicle. She then holds her breath as if she jumps into nearby Wister Lake and hops into the stewing morning wearing tennis shoes. Smiling, she welcomes her clients. Hello, good morning Tom and Mina. How are ya’ doing? Are you feeling good.

Debbie hates when she talks like that, but everyone else in Wister Town speaks with similar colloquial – all through Wisconsin and into Minnesota, actually. The dialect she has grown-up-with returns like an addiction – like an alcohol addiction, common in the Midwest.

The booze might even promote the strained and whiny accent and mannerisms of speech, that or Wister Town and its neighboring communities adopt the language of teenagers having fun with the dialect of their ancestral Swiss and German immigrants. Half the town playfully calls themselves Switzers, with a capital I.

Debbie thinks about the pronunciation ‘Swy-tzer, like sky-ster.’ She's certain that's somebody's brand name. Nobody but her knows Swiss mercenaries are called Switzers in Hamlet.

William Shakespeare, Act IV, Scene 5, she's probably mentioned to a client.

One time, someone from Texas tried to correct her grammar.

Tom unbends his long shape, out of the squat aqua-colored vehicle. His wife steps out the other side of the sports car. Like the car, she also is squat, but curves perfectly in the spots that matter to both women and men. Debbie notes the couple dress in analogous warm colors; yellow and pastel being prominent.

We’re good, Tom said.

Fine, Mina adds.

Debbie smiles wider and remembers she hadn’t checked herself in a mirror before greeting the young couple. Her makeup, what very little she uses today, is ruined if she doesn’t escape the heat and humidity. She pushes her premature-graying blond hair from her damp face then rubs the wrinkles in her white blouse and beige knee-length skirt. Debbie then hustles her clients. Let’s go inside.

Mina agrees. Yes, please.

Debbie pauses and adjusts the post displaying the faded yellow Mikelmeier Real Estate sign. The old house-for-sale placard had grown tiresome for the local population last Spring. These visitors from out-of-state renew her hope. Hardly anyone shows interest in this handsome home, despite its immaculate, albeit ancient, condition. After stomping the depression the tilted post has pressed into the lawn, Debbie turns toward her clients, exhales and smiles.

Okay, she declares happily and takes the couple up the concrete steps and onto the wide and empty wooden front porch. The heavy door, set between two triptych-modeled, long windows on either side of the front of the house, swings inward once Debbie twists the brass knob. The ordinary glass of the window set into the door makes a ting when the house is opened and cool, damp air flows around everyone’s knees. They all rush inside.

The parlor they enter is the center of three barren rooms with openings looking upon the street and Debbie’s sedan and her clients’ sports car. Mina and Tom drift apart while they are drawn toward the mesmerizing, curved, black cherry-wood staircase. While they wander, the chocolate, wooden floor is tapped and knocked beneath their footsteps. The couple comes together in front of Debbie and lock their hands.

Well, Debbie exhales before she launches her presentation. The house is 3934 square feet and on a center lot, eighty-five by one hundred and twenty feet. There is no off-street parking, or even a garage, but I suppose you can build one – probably not attached. This is probably a historic building, I have to check.

Tom contributes his opinion. Yeah, I suppose.

Debbie continues her tour. This is all on the website, of course, but there are two baths, a full upstairs and a half down here. Insulation has been blown into the walls and the furnace is on the ground floor. There isn’t a basement, per se, but the churches offer shelters during emergencies – tornadoes.

Yeah, we know, Mina says and rolls her eyes knowingly.

Sounds good, Tom said.

Debbie sells. "And this place has a huge backyard – large enough to dig a survival shelter, if you're one of those folks. It's kinda needed, if you think about it, the house doesn't have a true basement.

But it is big," dreams Mina aloud.

It is, this is a big house, Debbie repeats. The neighbors across the street are retired, so things stay quiet around here. They also watch for strangers or kids, so there’s some extra security.

Yeah, we looked-up the website again at home, Mina states. Is this district zoned for business? The advertisement says the extra rooms upstairs can be used for private offices or rented.

Sure, Debbie assuredly confirms. Is that what you want to do? Why did you come to Wisconsin?

The real estate agent asks for the sake of friendly, ordinary banter. Everybody has a reason for coming to Wister Town. Often, the stories are complicated and angsty, like her own. One thing is sure; only the lost come here by accident.

I like Wisconsin, Tom replies. "I got my Mechanical