Already, the house feels lived-in, even though the lease just started a week ago.
I raise my hand, ready to knock, but before my fist can connect with the door, it swings open on its own, a burly boy standing directly on the other side of it. I stare at him for a second, wide-eyed, trying to keep my attention from traveling down his bare chest, the thin line of hair sprouting beneath his belly button and pointing like an arrow to the waistband of his shorts.
“Who are you?” he asks, a mop of brown hair tousled like he just rolled out of bed.
“I’m Margot,” I say. “I’m … supposed to live here.”
Suddenly, a sense of horror descends upon me and I cannot believe it didn’t dawn on me before.
I peer past the front door and into the house, a place so disheveled it looks like a cave occupied by animals. I think about the shoes outside, the men’s shoes, and take in the shirtless guy in the living room staring at me with a smirk on his lips. It’s the same way Lucy had looked that day in the dorm, almost like she was laughing at some joke I didn’t understand.
This is a prank. All of it, a prank.
She must have seen me staring at her that day on the lawn and thought it would be funny: inviting me here to live with her, with them, knowing I was desperate enough to say yes. I wonder if she’s watching me right now through the window of some neighboring house, pointing. Laughing.
I wonder if it’s too late to call Maggie and apologize. Beg for mercy, take it all back.
I feel the tears well up and start to mumble excuses, ready to pick up my bags and run away, until the door opens wider and I see Lucy standing on the other side of it.
“Sorry,” she says, pushing the boy out of the way. Her hair is pulled up into a bun and she’s wearing a Pink Floyd T-shirt and black biker shorts, her toned legs bronzed and beautiful. “This is Nicole’s boyfriend. Trevor, Margot. Margot, Trevor.”
She gestures between us and the boy smiles at me again, nodding that thick shock of hair before sticking his hand down his waistband and scratching his crotch. Lucy rolls her eyes at me like we’re sharing some kind of mutual disgust and I smile, feeling the relief fill me up fast.
“Everyone’s still asleep,” she says, gesturing for me to come inside. I grab what I can of my bags and watch as she motions to the empty beer bottles littering the floor. There’s a giant bong on the coffee table, cloudy water specked with debris, next to a glass ashtray shaped like a peace sign. I notice a bowl of assorted candy in the center; a handful of coasters I doubt anyone uses. “I’ll show you to your room.”
The house is one of those old homes Rutledge is known for: two stories with a giant front porch, big white columns, and defunct fireplaces in almost every room. The floors look like original hardwood, and they would be nice, if someone had cared enough to take care of them. Campus is small—a cluster of old buildings situated between bars and restaurants, coffee shops and independent boutiques—and although most students live in apartments downtown, out here, mere minutes from city center, there’s space to roam. Room to breathe. Already, I can feel the rural air infiltrating my lungs; the weight of the last year slowly easing off my chest. We’re about a mile from downtown, only a few blocks to a campus bus stop. Greek row looms large on the street perpendicular to ours and I can’t help but think about how this section of town has been overrun by students who can only afford to live in big houses like these because their rich parents pay for them to.
My own parents weren’t thrilled about me ditching out on a summer back home, but at the same time, when I explained the situation—a group of friends, real friends, the kind my mother’s friends were so sure I would find—they begrudgingly agreed to send me a security deposit and the first three months’ worth of rent.
“Nicole and Sloane sleep upstairs,” Lucy says now, weaving me through the living room. It’s furnished with two mismatched couches, a coffee table, and a floor lamp; on the opposite side of the room there’s a TV on the floor and an old record player propped open on a side table, a collection of vinyl covers decorating the main wall in a grid. “You and I are down here.”
When we get to the back of the house, Lucy gestures to two closed doors: one, apparently hers, and the other, mine. She swings open the one on the right and I peer inside, my eyes scanning it all.
“It came furnished, so it’s actually good you don’t have much to bring.”
There’s a little twin bed in there, a bedside table, and another fireplace, though it doesn’t appear as if it actually works. I thought about bringing my own furniture from home at first, but now, after seeing the way this place looks, I’m overwhelmingly glad I didn’t—I can just imagine her smirk watching me lug my wrought iron headboard and lace duvet into this place, the kind of stuff that fits right in in my parents’ beachside mansion but would feel horribly childish in a house like this.