of hell. Andrea did not seem to notice the ceiling fragment, still lying dead center on the kitchen floor, or else she just chose not to mention it, stepping around or over it as she bustled about in her absurd robe and sash.
“Handsome hubby’s asleep?”
“What? Oh — yes,” Susan said.
“I used to be the same way. Howard would tuck himself in at nine o’clock, or go up to read his mysteries, and I’d wander about the house for another hour or two. Liked the ‘alone time,’ I suppose. No shortage of that now.”
“Hmm,” said Susan, and then she squinted at Andrea’s phone, a cheap Samsung clamshell, five or six years old, lying on the kitchen table next to her own shiny pink-cased iPhone. “So, what exactly is the issue?”
“Well, it won’t
Susan poked at the power button. “It’s got no battery, that’s all. No power. When did you last charge it?”
“It’s been charging all day.”
“And are you sure the outlet is working?”
“The …” Andrea tilted her head back, whacked herself dramatically on the forehead with the heel of her hand. “My goodness, now that you mention it, my hair dryer hasn’t been working
Susan slid the dead phone across the table and managed a tight smile.
“I was actually going to bring the dryer down also, but I thought, ‘Well, for heaven’s sake, Susan is a busy person, she’s not your own personal Maytag repairman.’ Even just the phone seemed enough of an intrusion … oops, there’s the kettle!”
Andrea had a free hand with the sugar, but Susan sipped the tea gratefully, enjoying the sensation of sweet burn on her throat. The older woman remained standing, leaning back against the counter with her stick arms crossed, peering at Susan over the rims of her reading glasses while they drank their tea.
“All right, young lady,” she said at last, playfully stern. “You want to tell me exactly what’s going on here?”
Susan looked up.
“Because I’m going to be honest with you, hon. You don’t look so hot.”
Andrea leveled Susan with a caring, motherly gaze. “You can tell me, sweetheart. What are landladies for? Is it—” She angled her chin upward, toward the bedroom, and brought her voice down to a low and raspy voice. “Is it Alex?”
“No. No, not exactly.”
Susan felt the rising tide of anxiety and desperation welling up from her stomach, filling her chest. She didn’t think she could bear telling the whole story to Andrea, to have one more person tell her how crazy she was being. But it was too late; she put her head down on the table and moaned long and loud.
“Oh, God, Andrea. Oh, God, oh, God.”
The older woman rushed over, her slippers shushing across the hardwood, and sat down beside her. “Susan, Susan, Susan.” Andrea patted her on the shoulder, laid her head across her back, like a mother bird. “My goodness, what’s happened?”
Susan raised her head from the table, wiping tears from her eyes with the rough, rutted backs of her hands. “It’s bedbugs, Andrea. This apartment has bedbugs, after all.”
“Oh, no!” Andrea said, her hand flying to her mouth. She looked around anxiously. “But I thought the exterminator, that young lady, said you were clear.”
“She did—” Susan stopped to blow her nose in a napkin. “She said so, but unfortunately she was wrong. Just … she was wrong.”
A tiny bedbug appeared on the arm of Andrea’s chair. As Susan watched in mute horror, the insect skittered onto Andrea’s shirt sleeve and down the withered line of her arm.
“Well, you know, Susan,” Andrea was saying, “If it’s necessary, I will of course pay for an exterminator.”
“Andrea … ”
“What, dear?”
The bedbug
“Sorry — there was—”
Susan turned over her hand. Nothing. No broken husk, no smear of brown and red. It had escaped.
“Now, listen,” Andrea said. “Because this is very simple. We are going to call back that lady who came. No, that’s silly. We are going to call someone new. I am sure that in Howard’s Rolodex there are a zillion exterminators.”
Susan shook her head, still working at the insides of her palms, feeling blood well up where she had broken through the flesh. She knew what would happen if Dana Kaufmann came back, or anyone else: they would look everywhere, turn the apartment upside down, and find nothing.
She moaned again and trailed out into a kind of desperate hiss. Andrea made a soft sympathetic exhale, brought her chair closer to Susan’s, and draped one thin bony arm over her shoulders.
“What does Alex think?”
Susan shook her head and gulped tea, wishing it were coffee. Her eyes ached, her brain thumped inside her skull.
“Alex is not being that helpful.”
“Men,” Andrea barked. “Men and their secrets.”
Susan looked up, struck by the change in Andrea’s voice. The thin comedienne’s growl had transformed in that one sentence, dropped into a deep, angry rasp: “With their
As she spoke Andrea looked off into the distance, out the windows above the stove at the streetlights punctuating the darkness beyond, and Susan examined her face. There was a coldness behind her eyes, a steely sadness that Susan had never seen before: the old lady was reliving some memory, something painful and raw. Susan studied her, rubbing together her bloodied palms.
“Andrea?”
“Yes, kiddo?”
It was as if a hypnotist had snapped his fingers: the light came back into Andrea’s eyes, and with a smile she turned her attention back to Susan. “Here’s what we’ll do. If you’re worried, we’ll just get you the heck out of here, that’s all. Right now. Tonight.”
“It won’t work.”
“What do you mean it won’t work?” Andrea was on her feet, all business, retying her robe with brisk movements. “Just for a couple nights, you and the whole gang, a nice hotel. On my dime, of course. Heck, maybe I’ll come with you. The Marriott, right here on Adams Street, isn’t a bad hotel, all things considered, though of course I haven’t stayed there in years. A nice hotel, doesn’t that sound just the thing, Susan?”
As soon as Andrea said it, the word clanged like a bell in Susan’s mind. Rang again each time she repeated it.
