~This story was
previously published in Colorado Review
(2009)
After Hannah
scraped the decorative border from the nursery walls, she placed an ad in the
university housing office. Summer break had just started, but within days
someone called. Rune was her name. “Like the fortune-telling alphabet,” the
girl said, her voice throaty and low. Hannah imagined thick black bangs veiling
the girl’s eyes, a mouth tense with secret sorrow.
In
person, there was nothing mysterious about her. She came to see the newly
painted room when the neighborhood was silent and shimmering with midday heat.
Clive was at a lunch meeting. Hannah kept glancing over her shoulder as she led
Rune upstairs. Tucked under the girl’s arm was an orange motorcycle helmet. Her
short hair was spiky, inky roots giving way to shades of red. Henna tattoos
snaked from beneath her jacket and encircled her slender fingers in ornate
flourishes. She was remarkably chatty, hurling questions at Hannah in a breathy
contralto. How long was the walk to campus, to the nearest bank and grocery
store? Could she have overnight guests? And could she pay half the rent on the
first and half on the fifteenth, just until school started and her financial
aid kicked in? Hannah’s head started to pound.
When
they reached the room, the girl strode past her, craning her neck at the crown
molding. “Female students only,” Hannah had been careful to note in the ad. No
dirty boxers piled everywhere. And a female tenant felt less intimidating. At
the last minute she’d dragged in a wingchair from Clive’s office and angled it
by the window. A perfect study spot. Any college girl would love it.
“I
guess this’ll work,” Rune said, tossing her helmet on the chair. She sat on the
bed and bounced, as if testing the springs, then gazed at the wedding ring
quilt, her lips curled in a half-smirk. Hannah pictured the quilt stuffed in
the closet, replaced by a threadbare coverlet that smelled faintly tangy and
unwashed.
Rune
flopped back. “Stars and moons would be nice up there. Bishop and I had them.
They glowed in the dark. We made up constellations. Cat eyes in the north, a
witch’s wand in the south.” She rested her cheek on the quilt and stared at Hannah.
“Who’s
Bishop?”
“My
fiancĂ©. Ex-fiancĂ©.” There was the slightest hitch in her voice. She brushed her
arms up and down, as if making angel’s wings in the snow. “He got the apartment.
I got the scooter. He doesn’t know it yet.”
Downstairs,
the front door opened. Clive’s footsteps thumped up the stairs.
“Come
meet Rune,” Hannah called and stepped into the hallway.
He
stopped on the landing. “Who?”
“Our
new tenant.” Like that, she’d committed herself. She hadn’t meant to and
wouldn’t have if not for Clive’s knee-jerk frown. She itched to give him a
little shove.
“Professor
Jacobs, hi.” Rune stood in the doorway, her fists balled in her jacket pockets.
“I didn’t know you lived here.”
“Have
we met?” he said in his lecture voice. He smiled politely.
“I
was in your fall urban myths class.”
Hannah
watched his expression glaze. Students passed through so quickly, he often
complained, that he’d stopped trying to remember their names.
“I’m
sorry,” he said. “You don’t look familiar.”
Rune
waved her hand dismissively. Her tattooed fingers flickered through the air
like butterflies. “I sat way in back.”
He
peered into the room. “Is that my chair?”
“I
left the other one,” Hannah said. Clive stared at her until she looked away.
“I
guess we’ll be seeing more of each other,” he said to Rune and marched down the
hall. His study door clicked shut, an unfriendly, obstinate sound.