Why wasn’t I going out with Vadika more? Where was my boyfriend, girlfriend, or nonbinary partner? They didn’t care which. What did I plan to do when I graduated next year? Did I know that I couldn’t hang out with them in our high priestess, Gertrude’s, garden and inside her lilac-and-green Victorian home alongside the river forever?
My friends were turning into cranky aunts.
Anyway, I’d told them that I already had enough on my plate.
“Like what?” they had asked.
Well, the Samhain celebration that Vadika had—but also hadn’t—suggested I plan on campus. The celebration that I then had to plan quickly and efficiently, as if they hadn’t seen through my terribly delivered lie to begin with.
Gertie had to cover up her laughter when I admitted the truth to her.
For now, however, everyone got off my back. I had until the holiday to make it all happen. Just like magic, I’d prove myself to Celeste, even though I insisted I truly didn’t care what she thought of me in comparison to her fifteen-year-old daughter, who was, according to her, destined to take over the coven one day.
I huffed. “She just gets on my nerves.”
“I know.”
“I wanted to prove her wrong.”
“I know.”
“I know you know, and I appreciate you.” I stared up at Vadika with soft, large eyes as we stood outside the Student Union Building—a.k.a. SUB. Inside, in one of the slightly mildew-smelling conference rooms, was a bunch of other commuter students less acclimated to Barnett than Vadika. There were also the gooey and delicious snacks the club adviser brought every other week.
“I can’t steal you any more donuts.”
“Like they would notice.”
She smiled, shaking her head. “I’m stopping in for all of five minutes, and then my parents are coming right after to pick me up for the weekend. Wish me luck at another joyous family wedding.”
“Don’t get hitched without me.”
The last time she had gone to a wedding with her family, she’d sent messages—which I still saved—about her aunts sticking her in a closet with a much younger boy, who they believed she’d have such beautiful little babies with.
I’d nearly died with laughter at Vadika begging me to call the National Guard to come and save her.
“I’ll take pictures of my many potential suitors.”
“That will help me make it through the weekend, thank you.”
“Don’t look so sad,” Vadika complained. “I can’t stand it. You’re going to make me sneak you inside again. No one believes you’re a very distant cousin visiting campus.”
I shook my head. “I’m okay. I’m just going to drop some stuff off in my room and take a walk.”
“Say hi to the sunset for me.”
“Say hello to your future husband for me.”
She groaned, throwing her head back as she headed inside.
2
As one of the smaller residence halls on campus, most people never realized the old tree-covered building was there. Or they thought it was another set of tiny offices where they stuck the adjunct professors. After being placed there against my will when the housing came around at the end of my second year, I had gone searching for the space and easily fell in love.
Old windowpanes were chipped with layers of history and paint. Creaky radiators always made the room a little too warm or too cold, and yet it felt right. It felt perhaps the mostBarnettthan any of the other updated buildings. I could imagine other students sitting right where I was. I could feel the marks they had made where they lived and worked, both physically and in the stale air that hung in the stairwell.
Or I did love it when I had a roommate who didn’t terrorize every moment of my waking time inside of it.
Natalie didn’t win the housing lottery this past year either, and she was much less enticed by the hall’s unique charms.
