Bathroom with a Book - The Wheelman

LISA PERELLI KEYED INTO THE FRONT DOOR, AND IMMEDIATELY felt this weird vibe. Somebody else was here. Had her father rented this place out without telling her?

Of course, why would he tell her?

She was here to pick up Andrew’s things. This house on Oregon Avenue was one of many that her father owned. It was the one she had used during the past six weeks. Her and Andrew.

Lisa hated Andrew’s dorm room—it was like a shoebox, only with worse interior design. Andrew, meanwhile, hated camping out on the couch at Lisa’s father’s place in South Philly. Andrew never said why until one day, a month and a half ago, when he finally broke down and admitted the truth: he couldn’t use the bathroom at her father’s house. Not the way he usually did in the mornings. Andrew veiled it in all kinds of cute terms—I’m a regular guy, I need to read in the morning—but Lisa knew what he was talking about. Funny thing was, Lisa was the same way. That’s why she hated crashing at the dorms. She just couldn’t feel comfortable getting up, walking down a hallway past a bunch of strange doors with strange boys behind them, walking up two flights of stairs, then using the common women’s bathroom. She wasn’t used to that sort of thing. That’s why she never chose to live on campus in the first place.

The only solution: Dad’s Oregon Avenue rental property, complete with one and a half baths. A full bathroom upstairs, and another smaller one on the first floor.

It was like playing house, only without the risk. Andrew had some minor things there—an Aerobed, a stack of paperback books, extra contact lenses, and a cardboard box with underwear, deodorant, a toothbrush, and a huge tube of Crest. Lisa brought candles and stored jug bottles of Pinot Grigio in the fridge, and stacked some of her unmentionables neatly in the master bedroom closet.

Her dad didn’t know they stayed there; Lisa had filched the keys one night.

The same keys that were in her hand now, still halfway jammed into the front-door lock.

Lisa listened.

Somebody was definitely here. Upstairs.

She closed the door behind her and locked it.