twenty-twoJoey Wooten reckoned that the waiting room of the Berkeley Institute for Paranormal Research was nice enough. It was located in a clean, modest, one and a half story bungalow in West Berkeley. The waiting room had once been the bungalow’s clean and modest living room, but, now, an imitation Persian carpet covered most of the worn down, wall-to-wall carpet. Navy blue, structured beanbag chairs provided seating. There were two little black tables topped with back issues of New Age and Spirit Consciousness. Six potted plants—Joey didn’t know what kind—hung suspended from the ceiling in macramé plant hangers.
Joey sat half-slumped in one of the beanbags, hiding his pool-cue scarred face behind an incongruous issue of Sports Illustrated. Across from him, sat an aging hippie: sandals,
