The Sixes

“Oh, God, I can’t believe you noticed it,” Phoebe said, rolling her eyes

“No, no, it’s good. It gave me another glimpse of the soft, tender side of Phoebe Hall.”

“Hey, I’m in a strange house,” she said. She nudged him with her elbow. “I need to wake up at night and know where I am.”

A few minutes later they descended the stairs, and when they reached the front door, Duncan pulled Phoebe toward him and kissed her softly on the lips.

“So are you going to let me cook for you one night?” he asked.

“I’d like that,” she said.

“How about Friday night?” he asked. “Unless, of course, you have plans to eat alone at Tony’s.”

She smiled. “What do I have to do so you’ll finally let me off the hook about that?”

He laughed.

“Trust me, I’ll think of something between now and Friday.”

As she heard Duncan’s footsteps tripping down the steps of her porch, some of the discomfort from the previous night rushed back. She walked hesitantly into the kitchen. It looked exactly as it had when she’d left yesterday afternoon: the two glasses in the drainer, the faded yellow dish towel threaded through the drawer pull, the row of small gourds on the windowsill above the sink.

Get it over with, she told herself, and yanked open the door of the freezer. Duncan had been good to his word—there wasn’t a trace of anything foul in there. It was also totally empty inside; he’d tossed out her two tubs of sorbet and she found that he’d put the ice cube trays in the dishwasher.

An hour later, showered and dressed, Phoebe double-checked all the windows and doors before leaving the house. She took her car to campus this time, and bought a cappuccino and bagel at Cafe Lyle—since she hadn’t had the stomach to fix anything in her kitchen. Just as she planted herself at a table, Glenda called.

“You okay, Fee?”

“Yeah. I keep waiting to develop symptoms of bubonic plague, but so far I’m not hacking up any blood.”

“You didn’t stay up all night in a panic, did you?”

“No, no, I managed to get some sleep,” Phoebe said.

There was no way she could blurt out the details about her night with Duncan, not smack in the middle of the campus cafe anyway, and yet holding back made her uneasy. She hadn’t even told Glenda about her first dinner date with Duncan, and the longer she waited, the weirder it would seem—the two of them had always been open with each other about their personal lives. Phoebe sensed that she might be dragging her heels this time for a reason. Was it because she thought Glenda would disapprove of her becoming involved with another member of the faculty?

“I wish I could say it helped to know Buddy was patrolling the neighborhood,” Phoebe added quickly. “But he seems like the kind of guy people still give wedgies to. Any news from your end?”

“So far Craig hasn’t been able to flush out any of the Sixes, but he’s on it big-time. And I have the information you needed—Alexis’s admission file. I know you have a class at eight, but can you come over afterward and pick it up?”

Phoebe agreed, and after nearly wolfing down her breakfast, she hurried to Arthur Hall. She’d told her students to come prepared to comment on the writing styles in the pieces she’d passed out on Monday, and she planned to save time at the end of today’s class to describe some of the principles she’d learned from editors she’d worked with over the years. But as the students began tossing out comments, she found herself only half concentrating; instead her mind ricocheted between the dead rats, Blair, Lily—and Duncan, too. At one point she realized that one of the few boys in the class was calling out a question. She was forced to ask him to repeat himself.

“Isn’t it silly for us to be studying magazine articles when print is on its last legs? I mean, many of us may never write for magazines.”

“I disagree,” Phoebe said. “Yes, if you write professionally, a lot of your content will probably be for the Web—and that’s why I have you doing blogs. But there’s no reason to believe that magazines are going to be dead any time soon. There’s still a big market for long-form articles. In fact, I think that eventually you’ll find far more long-form articles on the Web.”

This led to lots of back-and-forth between the kids, leaving little time for Phoebe to share the editor wisdom she’d planned to dispense, but that was okay, since she didn’t feel focused enough to do it justice. At the end of class she gave an assignment for Monday—write a pitch for any magazine of your choice—and was out the door before any students could grab her for questions or offer additional commentary on the tottering future of print journalism.

The president’s office was across campus in the administration building, an older structure with marble floors and wide corridors. As Phoebe hurried up the stairs to the second floor, she nearly collided with Glenda’s husband, Mark. He looked dapper as usual in brown pants, a beige car coat, and a thin brown scarf around his neck.

“Oh, hi, Mark,” Phoebe said, greeting him with a smile

“Someone’s in a hurry,” he said in response. He forced a smile after his comment, but she’d detected something snide in his tone. She knew she wasn’t imagining it. Since she’d been in Lyle, he definitely seemed to be snubbing her.

“I was just going to catch Glenda between my classes. She’s up there, right?” Phoebe said.

“You mean, instead of putting out fires all over campus? Yes, the president is ensconced.”

Now that was definitely dripping in sarcasm, Phoebe thought. But she couldn’t tell if she or Glenda was the catalyst.

“Well, I’ll see you later, then,” she said, eager to extricate herself before the conversation deteriorated. “Have a good day.”

“Ditto,” he called as he descended the stairs. Ditto, she thought. What the hell was going on with him?

Phoebe waited for Glenda’s assistant to announce her arrival before stepping into the office. She was struck, as she had been the first time she’d visited, by the duality of the room’s personality. The throw pillows on the couch and citrusy scent from bowls of potpourri made the space inviting, but at the same time the formidable desk clearly conveyed that someone powerful held court here.

Before Phoebe could even say hello, Glenda tossed her head back from her seat behind the desk and laughed.

“You look like you’re ready for the red carpet. Clearly you aren’t going to let some rats cramp your style.”

Phoebe had dressed in a tight pencil skirt, a crisp white blouse, and a leopard-print belt, but she knew Glenda was picking up on more than that. The night with Duncan had left her feeling rejuvenated.

“That’s nice of you to say, considering that the last Botox shots I had in Manhattan wore off about three weeks ago,” Phoebe said.

Glenda rose from her chair and came around the desk, then perched on the front edge of it.

“Maybe life in lovely Lyle, Pennsylvania, is agreeing with you—despite a few recent disturbances,” Glenda said.

“Let’s not jump to any conclusions just yet,” Phoebe said, smiling, deciding this might be the time to spill the beans about Duncan. “Speaking of life in lovely Lyle, I bumped into Mark on the stairs here.”

“He was dropping off my BlackBerry,” Glenda said. “In my frantic state this morning, I’d left it at home.” She glanced down at the desk and scooted some papers out of the way, as if not wanting to meet Phoebe’s gaze.

“Okay, talk to me, G,” Phoebe said. “Something’s up between the two of you—I can tell.”

Glenda shot a glance at the office door, making sure it was closed. “Then maybe you can explain it to me,” she said, “because I haven’t a clue what’s going on. Things just seem off between us lately, and I’m not sure why.”

“Off how?”

“He’s grumpy toward me—a lot. You saw it that day with Brandon. And if he’s not grumpy, he’s just cool, standoffish.”

“Could it be your job? Your career’s never been a problem for him before, but then again it’s never been this big.”

“That’s the first thing I wondered, even before I asked myself if he might be screwing someone else. But I’ve