Twenty-one
Rachael stopped by
her apartment pro tem on the way to the queen’s mansion. She did so
partly because she wanted to make sure Edward hadn’t left any
messages for her, and partly because she was becoming quite fond of
her den. Apartment. All right: den.
Well within walking
distance of the queen’s hideout, her apartment was part of the
basement of a small Victorian, a two-story house with five
bedrooms, nearly as many bathrooms, and a turret (a turret!). There was no yard to speak of, but
Rachael was used to that from her years in the Boston area.
Besides, there was a turret. (A turret!) It looked like they were smuggling
princesses up there.
She parked her rental
car in . . . no. She parked the rental
car in the alley behind her apartment. No. The apartment. Dammit, this was a temporary living
situation, so: The rental car.
The apartment.
Anyway. She parked in
the alley behind the apartment, circled around to the front, and
bounded up the steps. The porch floor was painted sky blue, and
various sherbet-colored chairs from the sixties—clunky lawn chairs,
which were bulky and made of too much metal—were scattered along
the sizeable porch.
Well used to the
Cape’s orderly color schemes of cream and white and green and cream
and white and cream, and sometimes green, and maybe red if the
neighborhood was spiraling out of control, the odd pastel colors
more than pleased her. She found them delightful.
Perhaps the Cape could stand with some color changes;
perhaps if they tried something more daring and less conventional .
. . ack! Traitorous thought!
She opened the front
door, realizing (again) that it hadn’t been locked and remembering
(again) that it never was, until her landlord went to
bed.
All right. She would
confess. That was something she could get used to, and no
lie.
The entryway was all
dark blond wood and hardwood floors waxed to a high gloss. The
stairs were much the same—the house smelled more of floor wax and
cleaning supplies than anything else. Given how old it was, Rachael
was beyond grateful. More than once she’d walked into a Cape Cod
cottage that reeked of dead fish and dust.
If she took the
stairs up, she’d find herself in the area of the house the landlord
shared with his elderly wife and their grown son. Their grown son
lived in the turret, fortunate bastard.
They were all human,
which she had expected. Humans outnumbered Pack by a minimum of
fifty to one. She’d been fortunate Mrs. Cain was in the Midwest,
and in a position of power to help a Pack member newly come to
Minnesota’s capital.
She took the stairs
down and down (there were quite a few). The more she burrowed, the
calmer she felt, until she was standing in her small living
room.
Mrs. Cain hadn’t
known (as Rachael herself had not) how long she would be staying,
so she’d rented a furnished apartment. The small basement area was
decorated with several rugs in jewel colors, while the walls were
lined with cement blocks of a color she had never before seen:
rose. They were, she had to admit, the most glamorous cement bricks
she had ever seen. She hadn’t been aware bricks came in rose. There was an old-fashioned rolltop
desk that gave off a strong, though not unpleasant, odor of decades
of furniture polish.
The worst that could
be said was the faint undertone of live mice. It was a battle she
knew not to fight; mice outnumbered Pack by a ratio of seven
million to one. In an old house like this, mice were the nature of
the beast. The thought made her chortle. Who would know the nature
of the beast better than she?
Every other Pack member on the planet, for starters. You
have to admit, Rachael-girly-girl, you’re a beta. You’re the second
spear-carrier from the left, the kid in the play who has no
lines.
True enough. And
irrelevant now.
The kitchen, tucked
around a corner to the left, was small, with all the disorder and
filth found in the average operating room. In other words:
immaculate. Possibly sterile. Back home, Rachael never cooked . . .
she had a three-ring binder, organized by cuisine, stuffed with
menus from every take-out and delivery joint on the Cape. So the
small fridge, half-sized stove, and lack of counter and storage
space suited her nicely.
The living room was
also festooned with several rugs (mostly reds) as well as a daybed,
built-in book shelves (dens for her books!), and a plasma screen
television. That made no sense until her landlord, a perfectly nice
older gentleman whose name was Call Me Jim, explained that their
nephew worked at Best Buy and was always bringing them electric
doodads at a severe discount.
“Those plasmatic TVs,
they hurt my eyes,” he confided while giving her a tour. “But you
know kids. If it’s new, it’s gotta be the best, and if it’s the
best, you gotta have it. Our old one works just fine.”
“That’s very generous
of you, Mr.—”
“Call Me
Jim.”
The small bedroom was
large enough for a queen-sized bed, an end table with a lamp, a
closet, and a small chest of drawers. More than adequate. And the
bathroom just off her bedroom had a shower, tub, medicine cabinet,
enough rolls of toilet paper to build her own fort, and lots and
lots of old towels that were faded but clean and smelled like
cotton and Tide.
Best of all were the
windows. There were several, and though they were small for house
windows, they were large for basement windows. If she stood on her
tiptoes in virtually any part of her den, she could see out—a
perfect view of the backyard, the side yard, and the side street.
And it was much harder for someone to see in.
She had liked the
apartment as soon as she’d seen it, and she knew why. It was her
den. It wasn’t so small she felt claustrophobic, nor so large she
felt intimidated by the empty space trying to swallow her. (She had
no idea, none, how Michael tolerated living in that enormous
mansion by the sea.)
In it, she felt
closed in and safe. She supposed it wasn’t very interesting as far
as individual characteristics went. Pack members liked small spaces
they could call their own. She was Pack, ergo she found the
basement apartment both comfortable and charming.
Dull, dull,
dull.
She went to the
rolltop desk and woke her laptop, which kicked right into her
e-mail account. Nine new ones. A thanks for
doing this from Michael. A come to my
next show! group e-mail by comedic Einstein Jim Gaffigan. A
here are the new movies out this week
from Netflix. And six from Edward, whose e-mail account was (and
why was she surprised?) PicardRules666.
“I’ve assumed by now
you were a figment of my imagination. A smokin’ hot spectacular
figment. On the off chance I haven’t
gone clinically insane, when can I see you? How’s tomorrow? Or
tonight? Or an hour from now? Or right this second? Am I coming off
as creepy or obsessive? Because I’m neither, I think. Did you know
your hair smells like strawberries? Why do I now want a huge bowl
of strawberries? It’s summer, why can’t I find strawberries? Call
me, call me, oh for the love of God, please call me:
651-249-3377.”
The others were more
or less the same. She could feel the silly smile spread across her
face and didn’t especially care. So she hit reply and typed,
“Tonight’s good. Come by my new place . . . remember how we agreed
our new living situations were sad? Mine’s not so bad. Pop by 369
Summit Avenue, anytime after six P.M. Sincerely, Strawberry Fields.
P.S. I have no idea if you’re clinically insane, and don’t much
care.”
Then she memorized
the queen’s address and looked up the quickest way to get there.
She memorized the directions, made sure her den was secured, and
left.
What if you don’t make it back in
time?
A fine question.
Rachael stood on the sherbet porch and pondered.
Am I worried about being killed in her house, or missing
my date with Edward? The fact that I have to take a moment and
figure that out is sad, sad, sad.
So she mentally
shrugged and went on her way.