I think Nancy did something to the disclaimer telling you that I don't own Ghosts characters. Just having some fun trying to figure out what exactly do the Cholera Ghosts do all day? Besides standing around.
The First National Bank Of The Water Heater
"Oh, Hetty. Sasappis," Isaac remarked as he joined his fellow ghosts walking in the hallway. "Where are you going on this fine afternoon?"
"The parlor of course," Hetty remarked.
"Oh! How lovely!" Isaac remarked. "I would like to join you. Yes, it would be nice to merely look out the window and ponder things."
"You're not fooling anyone Isaac," Sasappis told him. "You want the shaft this afternoon."
"Well, I'm not saying that wouldn't be enjoyable," Isaac paused. "If it happens to arrive while we're pondering."
"You know it does," Hetty remarked. "And it's close to that time."
"Close to what time?" Pete asked as he joined them.
Sasappis looked at Pete. "Time for someone to make a pepperoni scented candle. It's almost two. What do you think goes on in the parlor at that time?"
"Oh, the shaft," Pete realized. "I forgot about that. I was watching some really neat ants on the back porch and lost all track of time."
"Hetty, you know that it's my turn to get the shaft today," Isaac remarked. "You promised."
"I never agreed to this ridiculous schedule Samantha concocted," Hetty waved.
"Technically none of us did," Sasappis pointed out. "We just said that we'd come up with a schedule so Sam would stop lecturing us about using backrubs and fighting over the shaft. We just agreed to let Trevor have it on Wednesdays so he would stop whining about it and not blab to Sam."
"The man doesn't have any pants," Pete pointed out. "It's important to him."
"Well today isn't Wednesday so the shaft shall be mine," Isaac remarked.
"Unless I get it first," Sasappis told him as they walked down the hallway.
"We shall see…" Hetty remarked as they entered the room. "Oh no…"
Nancy was in the parlor looking out the window. "Hey guys! How ya doin'?"
"Oh, and it's upstairs again," Hetty winced.
"Hi Nancy," Pete said cheerfully. "What are you doing?"
"Looking. This is a nice window," Nancy remarked as she looked out of it. "Not even that dirty! You can see everything! Wow! I didn't know we had that many trees outside!"
Isaac remarked. "I suppose you don't see that many trees down in the basement. Where you usually reside."
Nancy went on. "Not really. I heard you guys were making a fuss over one stupid tree. Why? You literally have hundreds of them all over the place! You have one there! And one there! And another one there…"
"Now she's going to point out all the trees," Hetty grumbled.
"There's a tree over there," Nancy pointed. "And over there. And another one over there. There's a huge one right over there! Oh, and a squirrel! Cute little guy! And more trees over there. I mean seriously! You made such a fuss over one tree?"
"It was a special tree that had meaning to me," Sasappis explained.
"You made a mark on it every time a girl said hello to you," Isaac looked at him. "Not exactly one of the greatest accomplishments man has ever made."
"You're really enjoying being sarcastic and snarky to me, aren't you?" Sasappis looked at Isaac.
"It's so rare that I'm on this end of the snark with the two of us," Isaac smirked. "I mean Gadzooks Sasappis I had more success with women than that and I wasn't even trying!"
"I had a lot more success with women than that," Pete added.
"Now you're just being mean," Sasappis glared at him.
"Hang on," Nancy looked at Sasappis. "Let me get this straight. You made a mark on this tree every time a girl said hi to you? Just hi? And you weren't even doing it?"
"Yes," Sasappis gritted his teeth. "It doesn't matter. The tree is gone."
"I got an idea," Nancy quipped. "Hello! Now you can start a new tree! HA! HA! HA! Oh I kill me!" She walked out of the room laughing.
"If only that was literally true," Sasappis grumbled.
"Hey that's a really good-looking window over there!" Nancy was heard. "Wow! Those are some impressive streaks on it!"
"All right I didn't want to be the first one to approach this topic," Hetty let out a breath. "But has anyone else noticed that Nancy has been up here quite a lot besides myself? I mean she's being a bit familiar, isn't she?"
"Is that really a bad thing?" Pete asked. "I mean the ghosts in the basement are just like us."
"Uh no…" Hetty snorted. "I beg to differ. Peter did you invite Nancy up here? Or are you supposedly dating her again?"
"No, we're not…" Pete paused. "What do you mean by supposedly?"
"It wasn't that hard to figure out that you asked Nancy to pretend to be your girlfriend," Hetty explained. "In a clumsy attempt to hide your infatuation with Alberta."
"That and the other ghosts in the Cholera Pit blabbed to Nigel and Thorfinn," Isaac added. "Who told us."
"Great…" Pete winced. "Does everyone know?"
"I'm pretty sure Bob the ghost who thinks he's a squirrel is oblivious to your situation," Isaac remarked. "And I don't know if anyone told Stephanie about what happened. But other than that…Yes. Everyone knows."
"Super…" Pete groaned.
Sam walked into the room. "Hey guys, just a head's up we have a guest coming tomorrow so I need you to be on your best behavior. All right?"
"Samantha," Hetty spoke up. "A situation has come to my attention! I need a word with you."
"Okay…" Sam paused. "What's going on?"
"Nancy is wandering upstairs," Isaac explained. "That is what's going on."
"I want to know who invited it to come up here?" Hetty inquired.
"Well," Sam paused. "I did."
"You invited that creature up here?" Hetty was shocked.
"I invited all the cholera pit ghosts to come up and visit," Sam admitted. "Nancy's the only one who took me up on the offer. For some reason they don't feel welcome up here!"
"Gee I wonder why?" Pete remarked as he looked at the others.
"Pete that was really catty of you," Isaac remarked. "Good job!"
"Your snark is coming along nicely," Sasappis admitted.
"Well part of that is my improv training kicking in," Pete admitted.
"I prefer to talk about kicking something out," Hetty bristled. "Samantha you must tell that creature to stay in the basement where she belongs! As the lady of the house, I demand you do so!"
"I won't," Sam looked at her. "First of all, I'm technically lady of the house now."
"Ooh," Isaac remarked. "Way to pull rank."
"And secondly Nancy and the ghosts in the basement live in this house too," Sam added. "They have a right to get out of the basement if they wish. And maybe by helping them they can get out of the basement permanently!"
"You mean help them get sucked off?" Sasappis asked.
"Yes," Sam nodded. "I'm not exactly sure how but it's a worth a try."
"I see your point," Hetty winced.
"Look maybe if we can figure out how to help Nancy," Sam went on. "We can help the other ghosts and then…"
"And us by proxy yes Samantha," Hetty groaned. "I follow your logic. I suppose at this point anything is worth a try."
"Well, we've done nothing about them for centuries and it hasn't worked," Isaac admitted. "I suppose it is time to try a different strategy."
"It is just Nancy that's up here," Sasappis pointed out. "I think she likes telling the ghosts in the basement what's going on."
"I suppose if we have to have any of those cellar people one is better than a group," Hetty groaned.
"Exactly," Sam said. "So be nice. Hetty…"
"I shall be a gracious lady and be hospitable," Hetty promised. "Or at the very least tolerate her."
"You can count on us Sam," Pete said.
"Good," Sam nodded. "To be honest, Nancy doesn't cause half as much trouble as some of the ghosts around here."
"I suppose so," Hetty sniffed. "Some of the other ghosts around here can be quite difficult."
"Yes," Sam said simply and left the room.
"You know you're one of the ghosts that cause trouble, right?" Sasappis looked at Hetty.
"At least I never lied to her about a tree!" Hetty gave Sasappis a look.
"She has a point there," Isaac agreed. "That was rather foolish of you."
"Really?" Sasappis looked at Isaac. "What about you? Mr. Sam You Need To Publish My Autobiography So I Can Become More Famous Than Hamilton?"
"Samantha is a writer," Isaac told him. "I'm merely giving her some material for her to use. It's not like I'm asking her to buy a car with one's paramour in it. Or coming up with schemes to bully the staff!"
"I beg your pardon!" Hetty bristled.
"The Freddie incident doesn't count," Sasappis added. "He was a disaster! Okay? We're all better off with him gone. Right Pete? Pete?"
Pete was sitting in the chair letting the shaft of light flow on him. "Oh, this is a really good shaft!"
"You sneaky bastard," Sasappis realized.
"Damn it!" Isaac snapped. "Pete! I will give you a hundred backrubs for the shaft!"
"One fifty!" Sasappis bid.
"Two hundred and fifty backrubs," Hetty smirked.
"Twenty thousand backrubs," Nancy called out as she walked in.
"What?" Hetty did a double take.
"You heard me," Nancy said. "Twenty thousand backrubs for that shaft of light."
"Seriously?" Pete blinked. "You're offering me twenty thousand backrubs for the shaft?"
"It's been a while," Nancy shrugged. "Yeah, it's worth twenty grand."
"Even if she had that amount," Hetty grimaced. "Which I doubt! Do you really want backrubs from her?"
"They can be transferrable you know?" Nancy looked at her. "Into non touching favors or even conversations. And you can trade those backrubs to other ghosts. Or just add them to your own wealth."
"What do you know about backrub currency?" Hetty challenged. "You and the other ghosts in the Cholera Pit just stand around all day doing…Standing things. You lot don't know anything!"
"How do you know what goes on down there in the basement?" Nancy challenged. "We do other things besides standing around talking about the water heater and watching ants you know?"
"Like what?" Hetty asked.
"We have choir practice at least once a week," Nancy told her. "Debate nights…"
"What could you people possibly debate about?" Hetty asked. "Which type of mold grows the fastest?"
"Nah, we settled that argument a century ago," Nancy waved. "It turns out it's mucor."
Pete asked. "Well, what do you debate about?"
Nancy told him. "Topics like, is it ever appropriate for the government to ban free speech? Is free speech really free or does it come with the price of responsibility? If ghosts were considered citizens, what part would we play in the government and what jobs would be available to us?"
Isaac blinked. "Those are good debate topics."
Hetty blinked. "Some of you cholera ghosts know how to read, don't you?"
"More of us than you think," Nancy smirked. "In addition to running a brothel, Agnes also ran a secret scandal newspaper. And helped some doctor write some medical book about the different sexual diseases one can get. I mean she saw all the symptoms in the brothel and…"
"Yes, yes…" Hetty held up her hand. "You don't have to explain further. What I want to know is how you could possibly have over twenty thousand backrubs?"
"First of all, I don't technically have twenty thousand backrubs," Nancy pointed out.
"I thought not," Hetty nodded.
Nancy explained. "It's more like twenty-five million backrubs."
"WHAT?" Hetty screamed. "That is impossible!"
"How did you get twenty-five million backrubs?" Isaac asked.
"I won a lot of it in the stock market we run down in the basement," Nancy explained.
"You have a stock market?" Isaac asked.
"Yeah, we use backrubs and stuff to buy stock in things like corn, beans, pigs…" Nancy explained. "We buy low and sell high. We learned about that stuff in the twenties. Remember when some of the Woodstones would secretly come down to the basement to talk about stuff they didn't want their wives and girlfriends to know about?"
"Yes," Hetty nodded. "I recall that."
"That's how we learned about the stock market," Nancy nodded. "And some of the dirt that was going on upstairs. Not to mention a nice recipe for bathtub gin. The secret ingredient is lemon."
"But how do you know how much prices cost?" Pete asked.
"We make it up," Nancy explained. "Duh!"
"That makes as much sense as the real stock market," Pete remarked.
"Plus, I invested a lot of my backrubs in our bank and they doubled with compound interest," Nancy explained.
"You have a bank down there?" Hetty shouted.
"Not a literal one," Nancy added. "Again, we made it up. The First National Bank Of The Water Heater. That was another debate we had. What to call it. I admit it. It has more zip than First National Bank of Cholera."
"Good choice," Isaac remarked.
Nancy went on. "So, at five percent interest and a twenty percent yield I have a tidy sum in not only backrubs. I also invested foot rubs as well as hugs and pats on the back. I have what you call a diversified portfolio."
"How do you know about compound interest in banks?" Hetty asked.
"We have a couple of guys down there that used to rob them," Nancy explained.
"That tracks," Sasappis nodded.
"You cannot simply stand there and tell me that you're the richest ghost in this house!" Hetty bristled. "That's impossible!"
"Oh no," Nancy waved. "I'm not. That's a tie between Agnes, Geraldine, Gerald and Creepy Dirk. Let's just say they have a real diversified portfolio of things I wouldn't do and leave it at that."
"Ugggh," Hetty visibly shuddered at the thought.
"So what do you say Pete?" Nancy asked. "Twenty thousand?"
"Sold!" Pete blinked as he got up.
"Unbelievable…" Hetty's jaw dropped as Nancy sat down.
"Aahhh…" Nancy let out a contented sigh. "I haven't had a good shaft in centuries. Ahhh!"
Sasappis blinked. "Nancy got the shaft."
"Now I've seen everything," Isaac remarked.
"Simply unbelievable…" Hetty was stunned as she left the room.