"Undue Influence is a legal term referring to an imbalance of power within a business relationship, usually between two people," Leslie read under her breath (in the vain hope that speaking aloud would make sense of the legalese). "The more powerful individual of the two is able to sway the decisions of the other, using this to persuade the less powerful individual into making decisions which may not benefit them. This power imbalance can be caused by differences in social class or education, and emotional manipulation may be used in some cases."
Already a cloud of confusion was forming behind her eyes, and Leslie put the phone down beside her soggy cereal.
She was trying to find a way out of this contract. So far today, Alastor made himself scarce, and she used the time to find a solution to all this. Leslie expected him to make some excuse to swing by and try to justify his actions, but apparently not. Perhaps he had business to attend to elsewhere.
In terms of ending the contract, Leslie didn't know whether or not to play it by the book, since deal-making Alastor most likely didn't. It would be satisfying, though, to find a loophole in his hitherto watertight agreement. It was worth investigating what grounds she had for breaking it off.
Her first idea was breach of contract, since Alastor bit Leslie harder than any reasonable person would want. The problem was, again, that Leslie never stipulated what 'soft biting' was to her. Alastor would argue he was using his best judgment based on her unclear wording.
Could she force him to rewrite the contract, to clear up any confusion? According to the internet, the answer was no, unless both of them agreed to make changes. Sorry, Les! Should've thought about that before you signed!
Was it an illegal contract, then? Not insomuch as Leslie was forced to let him play with her. Alastor had included the ability to withdraw consent at any time, 'excepting the final date' for himself. Effectively, Leslie could refuse every rendezvous until the eve of the extermination; that would solve the problem, were it not for the wiggle-room he'd written in, that one other clause... Either party could be persuaded. Leslie sat with that for a while and considered what it might mean.
No. If she was getting out of this, it'd have to be a clean break. Undue influence. Alastor took advantage of Leslie's crush, and worked her into a lather before giving his hand to shake.
As her phone complained of a low battery, Leslie realized this research was merely notional. She was not a lawyer, and he knew it. In fact, there was no criminal justice system here, unless you thought of Hell as one giant prison to begin with. Nobody was around to enforce the law.
Leslie hoped she was able to reason with Alastor.
"You know, I once had a girl who'd go sex-mad when she got a yeast infection?" said a demon seated nearby.
"No way," said his friend.
"Yeah. Said she liked to scratch two itches at once."
The demons broke into grossed-out laughter, and Leslie abandoned her food for good.
o - o - o - o - o
Ten minutes before work, she approached the front desk, holding her paycheck from last night. Husk noticed her coming and raised an eyebrow, then turned to the computer he kept on a countertop behind the bar. Leslie had the check in hand, ready.
"Here's your receipt," Husk said, proffering a slip of paper. "And don't do it like that next time, 'kay? Niffty throws out anything she can't clean."
Leslie stood there dumbly. "Sorry, what? I'm here to settle my bill."
"You already did."
"What? No, I didn't."
"You didn't leave four week's rent under a glass back here?" He produced another envelope, torn open and empty. "It's got your name on it. What, were you drunk? Again, I know you hid it good, but kinda stupid."
Leslie stared at her own name written on the paper. It was comically large, the letters twisted and deformed. Nobody had this penmanship in real life; it was a concerted effort to remain anonymous.
"This seemed legit to you?" Leslie said.
"Uh." Husk stared again at the envelope. His orange eyes narrowed. "I mean…"
"Forget it," she said, "disregard what was in there. Somebody's fucking with me."
"By payin' yer bed and board? Weird enemies you have."
Leslie opened her mouth to rant about Alastor and the nonsense he'd put her through so far… and yet she couldn't say it. Something stopped her from speaking his name. What had their agreement said? They'd agreed on blanket discretion. Neither Leslie nor Alastor shall identify the other in terms of their dealings (to wit: the terms laid forth in this contract) nor should the parties intentionally give rise to any suspicion thereof… or something like that. "Listen, I think…" Still, she couldn't say his name. "Fuck it! Look, that wasn't me."
Husk gave her a blank look. "OK, so… whaddya want me to do?"
"What's going on?" said Charlie, coming up to the bar. Leslie explained, making Charlie's usually cheerful face cloud over. She examined the empty envelope and its serial-killer writing. "Well, that's… strange. What happened to the contents?"
"I put it through already," Husk said, and backhanded the computer. Charlie told him off for mishandling hotel property.
Leslie's phone alarm rang. "I've got to go to work," she sighed, tossing her last paycheck on the bar, "but I'm really not comfortable with… whatever this is. Aren't there security cameras around? You could find out who did this and make them take it back. I don't like the idea of owing someone a favor."
Charlie still looked confused, but nodded. "Sure. We could do that."
Leaving the staff behind, Leslie walked outside, forcing herself to take deep breaths. She knew who was behind this, but didn't understand why. Her best guess? He was trying - again - to persuade her against moving out. What was the point of having an agreement with a lesser demon like Leslie, if she couldn't dance attendance on him?
She'd find him and argue with him later. This did not constitute an apology.
0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0
"He said what?" Ginerva exclaimed. She and Leslie huddled in the walk-in fridge at Hades: Leslie was taking an official break, Ginerva not so much.
"I guess one itch would be the infectious kind," Leslie mused, "and the other… well."
"That's disgusting."
"I hate Hell so much."
Ginerva matched her humorless grin and took an oat bar from a shelf right beside them. "Me too, sis. You want one?"
"No thanks."
Leslie began to daydream as Ginerva sank her beak into the stolen snack. The daydream devolved into a rerun of last night's kiss. Good god, that was only yesterday? She made herself snap out of it, biting her lower lip as hard as she could stand. Remember that feeling.
"So it sounds like the hotel is the same as everywhere else," said Ginerva - somewhere between a statement and a question.
"Well, I've been in the hotel for way longer than I haven't," Leslie admitted, "but it could be worse. There's a curfew, there's staff to help with stuff… and you know, the classes give you…"
"Something to do?"
"Hope. I know that sounds corny, but I feel like there's a chance of getting out of this trashfire." Leslie picked at a loose thread from one of her gloves. "It's my soul. I like working on it."
Ginerva was quiet for a moment as she finished her snack. "How much is it?" she asked.
"Er… to stay at the hotel? Two-thirty a week. Charlie told me once, her father hates charity, so she charges just enough to weed out timewasters." Actually, this was a lie. Charlie hadn't told Leslie this information; she actually sang it, along with a verse about Lucifer wishing she'd stay young forever. ("When I was a little girl, my daddy said to me, You're such a lovely princess, it's a shame you'll be a queen…!") It was quite a surprise. Leslie had heard about her tendency to do this, as though she were living in a goddamn musical, but barely believed it until that moment.
"Well, maybe I'll move in," Ginerva said, bringing her back to reality. "If you can afford it, so can I."
"Really? You're serious?"
"Can't hurt to try. You're right. Hell sucks, and I want out."
"That's great! Come back with me afterwards, I'll check you in."
"Wait, woah, not today! I've gotta pack and shit."
Leslie caught herself. Of course. Not everyone could pack their whole lives into a single, easily stolen-bag. "Sorry," she said, "I got excited. It'd just be nice to have another friend in the place."
The fridge door was yanked open by a cantankerous Mr. Rapier, his mustache bristling. "There you fucking are," he barked. "Ginny! Get your feathery ass in the kitchen."
"Yeah yeah," Ginerva said, picking up her dishtowel and storming past him.
"Lesbo, get your furry ass back out there. Breaktime's over."
Slapping on a smile, Leslie scooted out of the walk-in; she felt the hot blast of air from the kitchen. Since it was close to 9pm on a Saturday, everybody was working hard, and the griddle tops were used to their fullest extent. It behooved her to stay on Rapier's good side, she reminded herself. The mysterious rent money didn't count. It was just her and her paycheck, at least until the side hustle picked up steam.
0 - 0 - 0 - 0 - 0
Leslie got back late, exhausted, but hopeful that the situation had been handled. Though she couldn't find Charlie, Husk was serving behind the bar as usual. She waited her turn, behind a wall of inebriated demons.
"What can I get you?" he finally said.
"Nothing," said Leslie. "You guys find out who the culprit was?"
"Nah."
"What do you mean, nah?"
"I mean 'Boss Lady' checked the tapes, but she didn't see nothing suspicious. I dunno, wasn't there."
"But that's… not possible. Nobody showed up between last night and this afternoon?"
"Who cares? You're off the hook as far as she's concerned." He was in the middle of saying something else, but Leslie left him alone. Whatever. Let him see to the customers. There was nothing else for it. Time to take this up with the Invisible Man. She marched upstairs, past her floor, past Angel's floor, and found Alastor's office at one end of the fourth floor, opposite the ruined laboratory. Leslie took the knob in both hands, pulled towards her and found… a broom closet.
"Huh?" This wasn't right, she thought, dithering on the spot. She knew she was in the right place. Remembering the portaling capabilities of this door, she closed it again and rapped on the wood surface: shave-and-a-haircut.
A long pause. Maybe he wasn't in. She knocked again, and heard the two-bits knock from within. Now when she tried the door, it did lead to his office. Quite a neat security system, she had to admit.
Alastor saw her from the couch and clapped his book shut. "Ah, hello!"
"We need to talk," she said, but Alastor teleported to her and hunched down, confidently smooching her full on the mouth. Leslie temporarily lost the will to protest - he seemed pleased to see her - but then she pulled away. "No, we still need to talk."
Alastor straightened. "If it's about your rent, I don't want to hear any complaints. You work too many hours at that degrading job of yours. I did you a kindness."
"Hey, my job may be degrading, but it's mine."
"Yes, how marvelous to be independent and to earn an honest living," he chuckled sarcastically. "Don't defend your waitressing, please. I've met your boss; he's an oaf."
"At least he doesn't bite me until I bleed!"
Alastor sighed impatiently and turned around, walking back to the couch. She followed him. The book he'd been reading had some kind of voodoo symbol on its cover.
"Look," he said, "that, yesterday, was my first kiss in a long while. Perhaps I got over-excited. But I'm a perfectly reasonable man, and if that was too much for you, I can adapt."
Leslie was a little unsettled by his cooperation. She sat. "What about editing the agreement? Just to... redefine a few things."
"But you had a chance to define your terms when we were drawing up the agreement," he argued. "I don't think you were strong-armed into anything. It was your idea in the first place!"
"Maybe not strong-armed," Leslie said, recalling the article about undue influence, "but you can be pretty charming when you want to be."
"Why, thank you!"
"Not a compliment."
"My point is," he said, crossing his legs, "if we adapt the thing after every misstep, its integrity is bound to collapse. We wrote it together. We must put our faith in it, not tear it down!"
"I just…" Leslie grappled for the words.
"Leslie, you'll simply have to forgive me," he said. "It's the divine thing to do. It's the only thing to do if we want to continue as we are, and I very badly want to." He touched her ear. "This deal of ours," he said, "is important to me. You need to be a part of it. We're onto a good thing, something that is worth your patience."
"How's it possible for you to move too fast and too slow at the same time?" Leslie grumbled, but her irritation was turning inward. She'd done enough arguing for a lifetime and didn't want any more of it. "Is this an apology?"
"It's as close as you're going to get, my dear."
She sighed and nodded. "Alright," she said. "Fine. Just be careful with me from now on."
Alastor laughed, still stroking her right ear. "Not to excuse my actions but… it isn't as though I broke your nose. I thought you might enjoy a certain kind of play."
"I'm not allergic to the idea," Leslie admitted. "Just dial it back a few notches, OK? Don't push your luck."
"But I like pushing my luck."
Scoundrel. "I could still leave the hotel," she said half-heartedly.
"You're right," he said, "and contrary to popular belief, I cannot be everywhere at once. However, I do have an old friend with an alarming ability. My friend can track down any demon, using only a bit of their dander."
"That's disturbing," Leslie said. "What's dander?"
"Oh, you know, shed skin, or hairs, or saliva. Luckily, the biological information from demons will decompose quickly. Still, a frighteningly effective power. Hell is full of those kinds of evil souls, Leslie. Stay at the hotel, and you will be protected."
"Alright, I get the picture," Leslie said, and shuffled closer. "You don't have to threaten me if you want me to stay. Less stick, more carrot."
"Hm," he said, tugging her long ears. "That's appropriate."
"Oh, fuck off."
Though Alastor has a book to finish, he allowed her to remain in the room for a spell. This time, she chose their music. He was reluctant at first, expecting nothing more than abrasive "stubdep", but Leslie was, after all, a choreographer. She had thousands of songs on her phone; not all of them were fast-paced. And so, scrolling through the playlist of slow jams, she found something pleasing to the ear; something not so tied to Karlton as to make her sad; something that sounded the way incense smelled. Alastor seemed to like it, and picked her up for a waltz around the carpet.
"No biting?" he clarified before kissing her.
Her eyes half-closed. "Mo miding."