Last night in Vegas for this trip and, man, I’m ready to go home. I mean no disrespect – I do like Las Vegas – but two back to back work trips and I’m ready to head for home tomorrow. But as I haven’t yet left, this story will continue on tomorrow.

Eddie sat atop the stone arch formation known as “Elephant Rock” in Valley of Fire state park. The rising sun making the red Aztec sandstone glow. He sighed as the sun climbed above the horizon and the last cool dawn breeze blew across the desert as he disappeared.

“Knock knock,” Eddie announced just inside the door of Lacey and Georgia’s apartment.

“Oh, hey Eddie,” Lacey’s voice came from deep in her room. “I’m just putting on my makeup for today. You can come in.”

Eddie walked into Lacey’s room and into her bathroom to find her sitting in her makeup chair and… jeans and a black t-shirt with a caricature of a showgirl festooned with pink feathered headdress above the words “Jubilee! Bally’s Las Vegas”.

“Wow, where’d you get that shirt?!” Eddie gaped. “I remember when that show closed!”

“Thrift shop a few years ago. It’s my comfort shirt for when I need to feel safe.”

“Why do you need to feel safe? And you’re not working today?”

“I’m not,” Lacey said with a happy sigh. “Even showgirls need a day off, right?” She blinked to settle her mascara. “And I need to feel safe because you’re taking me on a ghost tour.”

“Wait, I’m what?”

Lacey set down her lipstick and turned to Eddie. “Who is possibly going to give a better ghost tour than a real ghost?” she grinned.

“I mean… I do know some folks…”

“Yes!” Lacey cheered.

They started by going through the Neon Boneyard at the Neon Museum – Lacey had been through the Neon Museum year ago when she first came to Vegas, but never spent time in the Neon Boneyard because those signs weren’t restored. But with Eddie in tow, he would say hi to this unseen ghost here and there and the “dead” neon lights would wink into existence for a few moments to Lacey’s delight.

“I forgot to ask what you were up to today?” Lacey asked. They had parked and were walking down Bonanza Road.

“I rode an elephant!” He smiled too brightly.

“You did not!” Lacey went to punch his arm but her hand went through him.

Eddie laughed. “Well, it was Elephant Rock out in Valley of Fire.”

“Eddie, that’s pretty far out of town isn’t it?”

He nodded sadly. “Just about fifty miles.”

“Is that…”

“That’s my limit, yeah. Any further and I’m instantly back on the strip. He looked back towards the southwest, where the Strip lay hidden by the low buildings and the freeway which still set up a dull constant roar.

“I… I haven’t asked, but…” Lacey paused and then continued, “Are you trying to see other places or… pass on? Whatever that means…”

“I don’t really know,” he said wistfully. “To me it’s been such an impossibility to pass that threshold for so long that it might as well be passing on – and, yeah, I don’t know what that even means either.” They both were quiet for a long time. “I have to say, though, picking up that Labubu costume was the best thing I’ve done since I died. Hanging out with you and Georgia has really made my afterlife.”

“Aww, kid…” Lacey smiled.

“Who are you calling a kid?” Eddie said, mock hurt. “I may look like I’m 16, but I’m actually decades older than you!”

“Sure, kid, call me when you have facial hair.” They both laughed. “What’s out here besides this… empty lot. Oh, wait, wasn’t this where the Moulin Rouge was?”

“You know your Las Vegas history!” Eddie said. “The first racially integrated hotel-casino in the country! Here,” Eddie said, putting his hand on Lacey’s shoulder.

She felt a tingle and her vision swam for a moment before it cleared and she saw… The Moulin Rouge as it must have stood back in 1955. “Oh my gods,” she gasped. “Eddie…”

“Figured you might want to actually see the ghosts I get to see all the time.”

“Oh, we just saw that neon sign at the Boneyard!”

“We did!”

Lacey took an involuntary step backwards as the vision in front of her began changing from the opening glory to a more and more run-down state. “What’s happening?”

“Time,” Eddie said sadly. “You probably remember the state of the Moulin Rouge when you moved here, after the first couple fires gutted the place.”

Lacey could see smoke billowing out the doors and heard panicked screaming. She saw the charred, condemned site, and then she saw what was there now: a sun-bleached empty lot of concrete and weeds. “Wow, that was intense.”

“Try seeing everything like that…” Eddie said quietly.

“Is that how you see everything? The past and present together?”

“I can – like that. I try not to, though. It’s just… too much. So much change… it’s enough to make a ghost insane. And some are!”

“You’re not,” Lacey smiled.

“Not yet… But I could feel myself starting to get cynical before I picked up the Labubu.”

“All roads lead to Labubu,” Lacey laughed. “Where to next?”

Eddie thought and then got a funny look in his eyes. “How much Las Vegas history do you know?”

“I mean… well…,” Lacey scrunched her brow in thought. “Mobsters?”

“Are you up for going way back?”

“I drive, you direct?”

“Let’s go all the way back!”

First stop, they went to the Las Vegas Springs Reserve where they walked around the original spring that started Las Vegas. Eddie touched Lacey’s shoulder and the neat gardens and restored water derriks and green buildings faded away. A deer-like creature looked through them as it surveyed its surroundings before dipping its head to the cool green pool. In a heartbeat it snapped to attention and then bounded off, chased by – Lacey gasped – an honest-to-god saber-toothed tiger.

Next, they drove to the Old Mormon Fort where they sat with their backs against the old adobe walls and Eddie rested his head on Lacey’s shoulder as they watched wagon trains pass on their way from the New Mexico territories to California.

From there they drove out to Fremont Street where they stepped into the El Cortez. Eddie touched Lacey’s arm and three men brushed past them, one tall and in a perfectly tailored suit. He was shadowed by two much larger men in more ill-fitting suits – clearly muscle.

“You were saying something about mobsters?”

“Oh!” Lacey caught her breath.

“That’s Bugsy Siegel in front. And that’s the start of modern Las Vegas. The town just doesn’t know it yet…”

They finished after the sun had set with their backs to the Las Vegas Convention Center, staring at a dark parking lot.

“It’s a parking lot…” Lacey stated the obvious.

“It’s where the Riviera stood,” Eddie said matter-of-factly.

“Oh! That’s right! I watched it implode! That was so cool!”

“For you… and for everyone watching, yeah, it was pretty cool… but for some of us – and for those of us still here, it was a symbol.”

“Of? It was an old run-down casino.”

Eddie smiled and the twinkle in his eyes belied his baby face. “We’re actually full circle. The Riviera opened the same year as the Moulin Rouge. But where the Moulin marked a movement in racial equality, the Riviera was the first high-rise hotel casino on what would eventually become,” he gestured to the glittering buildings to the south, “The Strip. It was the biggest, tallest… for a few years. Then bigger casinos were built. The Riviera kept reinventing itself – a new 12-story tower. Then a 17-story tower, then a 24-story tower. And then bankruptcy… but they came back. But time catches up to everything here and by the time you watched it implode the Strip had outpaced the Riviera.”

Lacey squinted at the empty parking lot. She thought, for a moment she could make out figures walking around. “Eddie, are you touching me? I think I can see… ghosts.”

“I’ve had you look through my eyes a lot today. Probably some lingering effects. Plus, this place really hums with ghostly energy. Between everyone that came and went at the Riviera and energized by the transient energy of thousands upon thousands of people coming and going to conventions here every week… I wouldn’t be surprised if you saw them regularly around here.” They were both quiet for a moment. Eddie watched the shimmer of headlights slide across the asphalt, the glow of the Strip just out of reach. “Vegas builds itself over its own bones. Every hotel you see out there? It’s sitting on the ghost of the one that came before it. That’s the trick of this place — nothing ever really leaves. It just changes costumes.”

Lacey smiled softly. “Guess that’s kind of what you did, huh?”

He looked down at his hands and for a moment saw Labubu paws and gave a little laugh. “Yeah. Maybe I just haven’t found my next act yet.”

The air shifted, colder, sharper. The sound of a single person slow clapping broke the quiet. And then a voice, quiet but absolute spoke. “Such touching sentimental drivel. Lamenting over the churn and the ever-grinding course of ‘progress’” the voice sneered.

Lacey turned towards the voice, but unlike the translucent but defined Eddie, and even the faint but recognizable ghosts in the lot, this ghost looked more like shifting static. Lines shifted form and blurred into nothing then moved back into place as it sauntered towards them. “What… is that?” Lacey asked.

Eddie stiffened, and took in a deep breath. “Lacey, you need to leave. Now.”

“Eddie? No, I’m not leaving…”

“Lacey, go,” he said with a finality that chilled her.

She nodded dumbly and then hurriedly backed away before eventually turning and running towards her car.

The wind swept through the empty space where the Riviera once stood, carrying the faint echo of applause that wasn’t there anymore as Eddie faced the nameless entity.

Lacey always considered herself perceptive. She always knew which tourists would stop to take a picture with her – and tip well – and which would blow past. Tonight she was wearing her orange showgirl outfit, complete with enormous sparkly feathered headdress,  hoping to capitalize a little bit from Taylor Swift’s “Life of a Showgirl” orange look.

Georgia had agreed to come out tonight and the two were milking the strip – Lacey’s favorite spot in front of the Paris casino. Even Jared’s janky Spiderman couldn’t put a damper on her mostly-genuine smile tonight. Joey turned up in his plush Bluey character suit. A few other mascot performers came and went – Lacey figured they could tell she and Georgia were owning this block and they decided to move on down by the Linq.

And then the Labubu showed up.

No, Labubu have been showing up on the strip for more than a year now. Joey got a big rip right in the ass of his Labubu costume and hasn’t had a chance to fix it yet, so a Labubu showing up shouldn’t have been odd, but this specific Labubu with its huge grinning gremlin face, and pointed ears, seemed off. Lacey could feel it.

He acted fine – Lacey knew it was a guy, she just knew. He interacted with tourists perfectly. There was even a moment when a tourist wanted Lacy and Georgia to hug the Labubu. So, right there in front of Paris, two sequined, orange-feathered showgirls hugged a Labubu – and everyone around tipped.

Lacey and Georgia were thanking everyone when Lacey noticed the Labubu had slipped away.

“Hey, where’d Labubu go?” Lacey asked Georgia.

“I… he.. it… was right here…” she looked around.

Lacey spotted a brown ear disappear around a corner. “There!” she pointed. “Follow that Labubu!”

And they took off as fast as their stilettos would take them – which, let’s be fair, as veterans of the Strip, they could haul ass in heels. Feathers waving, they came around the corner only to see the Labubu duck around another corner into a parking garage. “Jesus, where is this Labubu going?” she huffed. Then louder, “Hey, Labubu! Wait up!”

The Labubu did not wait up.

But these girls could move better than the Labubu costume and they cornered him by a service elevator.

“Hey, hold up, man!” Lacey panted as she tried to catch her breath. “We just want to give you your portion of the tips on that last shot.”

“Yeah,” Georgia added. “You were working those folks. You earned it.”

The Labubu shook its head then looked around frantically for a way out of the corner.

“Will you chill out, dude?” Lacey said. “Look, what’s your name? You’re new, aren’t you?”

The Labubu just seemed more panicked at their questions. Finally, he realized there was no way out and even in a big Labubu costume, seemed to sigh. He reached up unsnapped the head of the Labubu costume and removed it.

And he had no head.

Well, kind of. There was a head – but it was a translucent one and it was kind of washed out by the fluorescent light of the service area, and—

Georgia screamed, turned, and sprinted away.

Lacey and the translucent head guy watched wordlessly as she ran off screaming.

“Is… she going to be okay?” translucent Labubu guy asked.

Lacey nodded seriously. “Yeah… she’ll be fine. I’ve seen her do worse when a dude spilled beer on her.”

“Huh,” he responded.

“So, ghost, huh?” Lacey asked nonchalantly.

“You’re not terrified?” He asked surprised.

“Dude, I’ve seen some shit out here.” Lacey rolled her eyes. “You’re kinda cool, honestly. But what the hell are you doing out here? After I die, the last place I’ll be is on the Strip!”

“I’ve been… around town for a while… maybe… ten years…”

“Ten years?! Jesus! Can you not leave?”

“No, not really,” he said sheepishly. “I mean I tried after I realized I was dead… I can’t seem to get out of the desert. I go so far and then poof, I’m right back in Vegas. I got tired of just, you know, haunting. I managed to find this Labubu outfit and I figured it’d give me a chance to interact with people.” He demeanor brightened. “And it worked,” he grinned.

“And you’re good at it,” Lacey said nodding. “But why’d you duck out like that?”

“I… I figured you guys would want to, you know, talk.”

“You mean like this?” Lacey laughed.

“Just like this,” he said.

“Well, here we are. I’m Lacey, by the way.”

“Eddie,” he responded.

“Well, Eddie, you seem like a good guy – or ghost, as the case may be,” she patted his fuzzy arm. “You wanna get back out there and ham it up with a showgirl?”

“Really?”

“Put your head back on and let’s get out there before Jared slinks back in that ratty spiderman costume.”

And the orange feathered showgirl and the Labubu headed back to the Strip.

The elevators in the Horseshoe have an exceptionally frustrating “feature.” If you select more than three floors (in this elevator that services floors 5-15) it blanks all selections and suddenly no floors are selected. During the first day or two here I only noticed it sporadically, but as the conference breaks send many of us scurrying back up to our rooms at a moment’s notice, suddenly eight people are trying to select five floors and… chaos.

After the third time it deselected the floors selected, a woman explained, “It’s a feature to keep people from hitting all the buttons as they leave the elevator.” There was a collective “oh”… but it didn’t really help the frustration.

The woman took charge: “Alright, first three floors: anyone on 5, 6, or 7?” through this method she got the first three floors and as we hit each subsequent floor she asked whose floor was next and it really went well.

After the 11^th floor it was just myself and the woman and her daughter.

“That makes sense – the only three floor thing,” I said, breaking the new silence in the elevator. “And here I just thought it was haunted,” I quipped. Her daughter laughed, but the woman said, “Well, it could be that too, given the history of the place.”

She had my full and complete attention. “Oh? Tell me more…” I said as the elevator doors opened on floor 14 and the three of us stepped off.

“Well, you know the Horseshoe Casino used to be Bally’s, right?”

I nodded.

“And before that it was MGM Grand…”

“Right…” I didn’t see where this was going.

“Well, in 1980 there was a big fire here. Killed 85 people.”

I stopped. “Wait, here here?”

“Yeah, this very tower – the other one wasn’t built until after the fire closed the hotel.”

“So, you mean there’s ghost stories about this hotel, this tower? And we’re staying on the ‘fourteenth’ floor.”

She snickered. Her daughter looked quizzically at her. “Most buildings don’t have a 13^th floor – it’s superstition. But since this would technically be the 13^th floor…”

“Oh!” her daughter nodded.

“Anyway, yeah, the fire radically changed how they built buildings and hotels after that – there were no sprinklers, for example. The stairwells weren’t sealed, so the fire used the stairwells as virtual chimneys. Most of the people who died were trying to go down the stairs and suffered smoke inhalation.”

“Oh my god,” I said, “That’s terrible!”

“Yeah, the ghost hunter types say you can still hear phantom screams and cries in the stairwells of this tower.”

I stopped and stood silent.

“You’re totally going to go check out the stairwells, aren’t you?” the woman asked.

“Well, I mean, I write ghost stories! Of course I am!” I exclaimed as I reached my door and fumbled for my key.

She laughed. “Well, have fun and don’t blame me if you get a good scare!” she waved and she and her daughter walked straight through the closed door opposite mine.